It’s 6 o’clock, people are starting to file into the triple wide and you find yourself standing in front of the monitors looking at the WOD. Your coach then begins to go over what you will be doing that day. What kind of thoughts are running through your head? Are you still mentally stuck at work? Or maybe you are thinking about what you are going to eat post WOD. Instead of allowing these thoughts to run through your mind, I challenge you to actually visualize yourself going through the workout.

Lets look at a WOD and see how we can visually go through and prepare ourselves for that workout.

The Workout is:

21-15-9

Thrusters, 135/95

Box Jumps, 24/20”

As we can see the thruster weight is relatively heavy and we are going to have to break up our sets. How do we break it up? Should I try to go 11/10 or 7/7/7? See yourself going through each rep. If you see yourself breaking down after hitting 11 in a row, then it would be best to go with 3 sets of 7 instead. Now lets take a look at the box jumps. Do I step down from the box or do I jump down and then go into the next rep? Again, visualize yourself going through the movement. See yourself doing the movement both jumping down and stepping down. Which one seems to be more efficient?

Visualizing the workout beforehand can not only give you the confidence to work through the WOD, it can also allow you to see any problems you may run into. So, the next time you are standing in front of those monitors don’t just listen to the WOD being explained. Instead visualize yourself going through it. Think about each movement, the weight you will use, how you will break up your sets. The more variables you can address in your mind, the less you will have to think about during the workout.