The mental side of training - Friday, September 18th, 2026
The mental side of training
Over the last couple weeks, we’ve been talking to the girls we’re working with in team training about something that has very little to do with how much they can lift, how fast they can run or how high they can jump.
We’ve been working in talks on the mental side of training as well the physical side.
Because developing an athlete isn’t only about making them stronger, faster and fitter. It’s also about teaching them how to show up, how to respond when something is hard, how to take coaching, how to handle frustration and how the attitude and effort they bring can affect everyone around them.
One of the biggest things we’ve been reinforcing is the importance of controlling your controllables.
You can’t always control the workout. You can’t control what your teammate can do. You can’t control who is faster than you, stronger than you or picks something up more quickly than you. You can’t control whether something feels harder today than it did last week.
But you can control two really important things: your attitude and your effort.
We’ve also been talking about what we call the 3 C’s: Complaining, Comparison and Complacency.
Complaining can change the energy of a training session pretty quickly. Comparison takes your attention away from what you are there to accomplish and puts it on what someone else is doing. And complacency shows up when you stop being willing to push outside what is comfortable, accept correction or work on the things that need work.
None of those things make you a bad athlete. They’re things every athlete, and really every person, can fall into. The important part is learning to recognize them and redirect your attention toward the things you actually have control over.
At the end of training, we want the girls to be able to ask themselves a few questions:
Was I prepared for training?
Did I give my best effort?
Did I have my best attitude?
Was I coachable?
Was I a great teammate?
Did I get better?
Did we, as a team, make each other better?
Did I have fun?
What we love about that checklist is what isn’t on it.
Did I finish first? Did I lift the most? Was I the fastest? Did I beat my teammate? Was I the best athlete in the room?
Those things aren't how we're asking them to measure whether they had a successful training session.
And while we’ve been having these conversations with our team training athletes, there’s a lot here that applies to every single one of us who walks through the doors at CrossFit Indestri.
We may not technically be teammates. We aren't all playing for the same hockey team or preparing for the same competition. We’re different ages, have different abilities and are training for different reasons. But we do share something. We’re all here with a common goal of becoming stronger, faster and fitter, improving our health and moving the needle closer to fitness and further away from sickness.
So maybe that same checklist is worth running through every once in a while.
Were you prepared for class?
Did you give the best effort you had available that day?
Did you bring a good attitude?
Were you coachable when your coach corrected you, asked you to change something or encouraged you to do something that made you uncomfortable?
Were you a great classmate?
Did you contribute to making the people around you better?
Did you get a little better yourself?
And importantly, did you have some fun while doing it?
Because a great training day doesn't always end with a PR or the fastest time on the board. Sometimes getting better means listening to a correction. Sometimes it means choosing the harder option when it’s appropriate. Sometimes it means encouraging the person beside you. (Encouraging them, not coaching them) Sometimes it means having a crappy day and still refusing to let that crappy day dictate the attitude you bring into the room.
There is a lot about training we can't control.
But how we show up, the effort we give, how we respond to coaching and what we contribute to the people around us? Those are ours to control.
And learning how to control those things might be one of the most valuable things we can take from training.
Friday, September 18th, 2026
Focus:
Front Squats
Empty Bar Zombie Squat
5 - 5
then:
Front Squats
5 - 5 - 5 - 5
WOD:
20 min EMOM
Odd - 5 Perfect Push Ups
Even - 10 Wall Balls 20/14
Check back each night at 8pm for the next days WOD .
Contact us: Address: 200 Mountain Rd #3, Collingwood, ON L9Y 4V5 Phone: (705) 444-0006 Follow us on Instagram @crossfit_indestri