The summer between my 7th and 8th grade year, I had wanted to be a great basketball player. I wanted to be a shooting guard for the Los Angeles Lakers. Magic would be the point, Kareem the center, with Big Game James and AC Green as the forwards.

No offense to Byron Scott, but he would be my back-up. I gotta play somewhere.

My dad shows up one day with a notebook. It was a thin, light blue notebook and inside he had put together a basketball workout. It was broken down into daily goals, weekly goals, and monthly goals for the summer.

Various items all meant to make me a better basketball player:

  • Take 100 foul shots.
  • Shoot 50 left handed layups.
  • Dribble with both hands driving to the basket 10 times at various spots.
  • You get the point.

It was a great plan and if I had followed it daily who knows how my basketball career would have ended up. There were days I just wasn’t as diligent as I needed to be to accomplish the daily goals. But the point was it was a plan.

It was a well thought out plan that had goals and was put on paper. It might have been a very successful plan if I had followed it better. But it was a plan nonetheless to put me in the best position possible to succeed at basketball.

How many of you are on a plan for your athletic goals?

I’m guessing not too many.

“Well, Adam, I’m on this awesome lifting routine that is going to get me big and fast BRO!”

That’s wonderful! How detailed is this lifting routine? When I was strength coaching at Columbus Academy high school for our various teams, I had the kids on a very detailed plan. They didn’t realize it. They just did the exercises, sets, and reps I put up on the board, but there was a method to the madness.

I knew how many weeks we would be lifting. How many days a week. What percentage of their max I wanted them lifting each week and for how many reps. If I wanted a week where I didn’t want them going as hard, that was built into the program. And it was all so they would be peaking at the time I wanted them to peak.

Same thing with our speed/strength program at my facility. You just don’t sign up with us and show up the first day and we pick an exercise out of a hat for you to do. We have a Day One workout that we start with. We progress you for 13 weeks and then do a reassessment.

But, it is a very meticulous progression. One that we have thought out very carefully, so that we get the desired results without potentially hurting you.

Our online speed program, the Run Faster Method, is even more meticulous. You are purchasing our speed program and doing it on your own, so we tell you exactly what exercise to do, for how long, on what day, and how to progress. Don’t think, just follow what we say and you get guaranteed success.

Why? Because it is a proven plan for to get athletes stronger and faster. If you want to be successful, you must have a plan. Very few successful people not only in sports, but in life, get to where they are without a plan.

Need to do work in the off-season to get better, hire a coach and follow his plan. Need to get your business to that next level. Create a business plan and have some mentors look it over until you get just the right plan.

I’m not saying you can’t be successful without a plan. Heck, even a blind squirrel finds a nut sometimes. But, when you have all these great resources out there, why take that chance. Get the best plan for you, then follow it to the letter. Don’t be like me wondering how good a basketball player I COULD HAVE been. Make your plan and find out how good you WILL BE!

Photo courtesy of 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cav Div on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/1stbct-1stcd/