The importance of consistency in your training

Ever since I first started training in martial arts I’ve been interested to find out why some people succeed in their training and become very skilful and others start off with the best of intentions but just never achieve the same results and then eventually give up.

When I sit down and think back on the all the people I’ve trained with over the years I notice an obvious recurring theme coming up again and again. It is a combination of consistency and perseverance. The successful may not have made huge improvements straight away or had much early success but they trained consistently, they made a habit of turning up regularly for classes a certain number of times a week and worked hard to reach their goals,

On the other hand I’ve seen many people who have been very sporadic in their training, they would train every day one week and then not turn up to the gym for the next month, when they return after a long layoff they notice that their training partners have gotten much better than them due to training consistently which can be very demoralising.

So why is it so hard to be consistent with your training? Well, everyone has their own reasons ranging from tiredness, minor injury, loss of motivation etc. however the key is to expect these obstacles and then plan how you are going to overcome them. Trick yourself into turning up to class because you know that once you are there you will enjoy it, you will be glad that you did it because you’re on your way to getting fitter, learning new skills and taking another step closer to achieving your goals.

How to stay consistent in your training

Plan for your coming week on Sunday night make a firm decision about which classes you are definitely going to attend for the next week.

Commit to training a certain number of times per week e.g. two or three sessions and stick to it.

If you know you won’t be able to make it to a certain class, then plan to make up for it by coming to another class or book a PT session to make up for it

Keep track of your training and monitor it to make sure you aren’t slipping back into bad habits

Don’t make excuses or give yourself any reasons to fail and not achieve your goals

Don’t overdo it at the start, build up slowly. Start off by training two evenings a week and then build up gradually. If you go straight in to training every day you will burn out or pick up injuries.