Beginner / Intermediate / Advanced - terms for people who don't understand the process.

We like organisation and patterning it's in our nature to categorise things and people.  We have a whole field of study in biology designed to label things (taxonomy) based off our own definitions that means nothing to the natural world.  A tiger doesn't appreciate it is of the Genus - Panthera or the Phylum - Chordata.  These definitions or categories are meaningless outside of the world of science or more specifically biology. 

This same need to categorise or pigeon hole pervades into how people think about strength, power or conditioning.  They assume that their is a nice clean cut period where someone is "novice" "intermediate" or "advanced".  These definitions mean nothing outside of the tables or spreadsheets they are presented in.

Some of the quickest squat progress I have ever made was right at the top end of what some people would classify as "elite" which is a joke.  I went from a 222 kg squat right up to a 262 kg squat in pretty much one year.  That was after training for 5 years and squatting pretty much every week in between.  To put that in perspective it took me 2 years to go from a 150 squat up to a 200 squat lifts that some would class as "intermediate" for a lifter of my size.

A number of things changed, I interacted with more experienced lifters and coaches, I was able to sort out a couple of things regarding my technique and I got more flexible.  None of these things fit into the neat little hole or categories that text books might want to say exist.

May I introduce my new model.

Nothing in the world is clean cut or straight forward all strength training is when you boil it down is your continual application of stresses and your bodies robustness and ability to not break.  The more reps you add the heavier the weights you lift the greater the demands on your body how heavy you can go in the end is determined by a complex interplay of factors.  But ultimately if you can - 

• Stay injury free
• Push yourself mentally and physically week in week out.
• Progressively push the envelope and increase volume and load.

You will get stronger.  Nothing magically changes when you reach certain levels of strength other than the margin for error decreases and the physical demands of the sport increase.

If you can deal with these two factors you will progress.  Just because you squat 180 kg doesn't mean jack shit in the grand scheme you have just achieved that load, you are neither beginner or intermediate you are just an amalgamation of your training history and your current mental state.   

I have had athletes who some people would consider to be the upper echelons of physical performance make outstanding progress on a programme I have used for girls who bench press under 40 kg.  All I did was show them how to apply themselves and before you know it life time PBs topple like they are novice trainers. 

Training really is a simple process and as they say the devil is in the detail.  The sooner you disregard labels and dichotomy and embrace a philosophy that accepts it's simple nature but adopts an individualistic problem solving approach that removes complication the sooner you will see progress.

Success in the squat needs - a straight bar path, a stable torso and a lower body that pushes through strong positions.

Currently the following complications are stopping me achieving these simple and optimal goals = tight adductors pulling my knees in at the bottom of the lift.

By removing complications you can have a marked increase in performance regardless of the level of performer. 

Marc