You’re only as strong as your weakest link!
How does this relate to fitness? Firstly it’s important to understand what is meant by the term “fitness”. To quote Coach Greg Glassman (founder of crossfit) “There are ten recognized general physical skills. They are cardiovascular/respiratory endurance, stamina, strength, flexibility, power, coordination, agility, balance, and accuracy. You are as fit as you are competent in each of these ten skills”. Suppose each link in your chain corresponds to one of these ten skills of fitness, the load you can support on the end of this chain is limited by the link that is first to snap. Now, this is still quite simplistic because each of these ten “skills” is comprised of smaller elements, I like to think of it as each link being made up of a smaller set of links. For example strength is not just how much you can deadlift, you might be strong in your deadlift but really weak in your pull-up, and it is this pull-up link that weakens the chain that makes up your strength link. Understanding where your weakness lies within each link is key to improving your overall fitness and physical performance.
It’s only natural that we bias our training to those things we excel at, but really we this is only making our weakness more of a hindrance. The aim is to develop your weakness to the point where they match your strengths. It’s important to start small. Dramatically changing your programming so that you substitute out certain workouts or exercises for a weakness dominant one intermittently may not be the most effective approach. Whereas attacking your weaknesses as part of a warm-up routine or supplemental work, adding movements/skills gradually, allows for a more linear progression and greater adaptation. Spending 15minutes a day working on your weaknesses is going to be more effective than 1 hour once a month.
