Your Journey
Where you started, and where you are now. Three boxes ticked, three to go.
"I just want to be flying."Survive squat blocks, run without niggles, get the elastic jerk back — all moving, the foundation rebuilt. Performing at your best now, not chasing old PBs.
Where you are as an athlete. Faint is your start. Solid is now. The dashed line is your potential, what the performance phase is for.
Why the potential matters
Fewer injuries. The stronger you get, the harder you are to break. Strength training cuts runners' overuse injuries to around half, and you came in with a left-right imbalance and a string of old niggles.Lauersen et al., British Journal of Sports Medicine
Faster, for less. More strength, power and speed improve your running economy, so the same pace costs less energy and you can hold it for longer.Systematic reviews, Sports Medicine
The payoff. Closing that left-right gap is exactly what makes the squat feel even, the jerk feel fast, and the calf and foot stop being the weak link in everything.
Late-stage rehab — foundation rebuilt, now closing strength deficits before full performance.
May: the right calf flared up. An old Achilles area, mid-block. We regressed one thing, not everything: ankle isos and no-pain calf work went in, while the deadlift, push press and CrossFit intervals stayed. That's the whole principle. The calf settled, the rest kept building, and you never lost the thread. You gave up the British Finals for this block. The point was to come back better than you left.
1 · Close the deficits. Single-leg quad and hamstring strength, left and right. Get hamstrings toward the 0.4 × bodyweight target and the right leg up to the left. This is the fix for the squat, the deadlift and the clean.
2 · Three high days. Monday, Wednesday, Friday — lifting, plyos and sprinting building in intensity. Off-feet intervals and your own CrossFit sessions bleeding back in around them.
3 · Back to performance. Squat comfortable at competitive percentages, jerk elasticity back, running repeats at intensity, left side within 10% of right. The road back to Finals level.
4 quick questions. Tells you where to start, and how deep to go.
So I know whose audit I'm looking at.