and see your needs (and vice versa), help just as much as you need and no more, and correct your form on an ongoing basis, based on the knowledge of your strengths, weaknesses, and goals.
I’ve learned the hard way that not all spotters are created equal. The most major sports injury I’ve had occurred when I asked a random guy in the gym to spot me, he clearly didn’t want to (but knew that gym etiquette dictated that he ought to), and even though I told him the kind of lifting I was doing, which necessitated focused, literally hands-on (on the barbell, not on me, in case there was any confusion) attention, he didn’t follow through on any part of it, and I ended up tearing a muscle. Know your spotter, or pick a different kind of workout until you find a spotter. And, when you are needed to spot someone else, be attentive.
Competition: If you’re someone who even remotely enjoys games or, you know, fun, at all, getting fitter with a training partner becomes much easier. I have some friends with whom I switch off coming up with workouts, and we see who can do it better, or faster, or longer. It’s fun to push through your plateaus, to challenge your strengths and your weaknesses, and to share all of that with a friend.
The adage of “if you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room” holds true here. I have friends who are stronger than I am, friends who are faster than I am, friends who have better endurance, friends who are more flexible, friends who excel at a certain sport. All of them can drive me to show up and do my best, with the hopes that one day my best might beat them!
Learning: I mentioned earlier that my friend Joe always has a new workout he’s just read about and is excited to try. The truth is, most of my training partners are constantly learning and trying new things, whether it be with nutrition, exercise, rest, discipline, skill training, etc. Two heads really are better than one.
When I train with them, I’m constantly learning new things, and that helps me come up with new goals, new ways of reaching my current goals, or new skills I want to develop. Most people resist change, but we also thrive on change. If the person who’s keeping you accountable can also provide a source of learning and potential growth for you, positive change becomes easier. That’s gold.
Wow, look how great training partners can be! Who knew? “Who” is indeed the right question, because that leads us to the final topic in this section: how to find training partners. There are a multitude of different ways to approach this, but here I’ll present a few, along with some other things to keep in mind.
Start talking more about the things that are important to you. (For purposes of our discussion, those would be faith and fitness). Back in 2013, pretty much immediately after finishing my first Spartan Race, when people asked “what’s up?” or “what’s new?” I’d tell them, “I’m really getting into obstacle racing.” I had done one race! And I hadn’t even done very well. But I was excited about it, and that was exciting to others. It made some other friends comfortable enough to say things like: “You know, I’ve thought about doing that, but didn’t know who I’d train with. Want to go for a trail run some time?” We found a new common bond and started training together. The same holds true for when I first started getting into my faith. It became a go-to topic for me and made others comfortable enough to dialogue about it and dive deeper.
Ask just outside your most immediate circle of friends. Chances are if you have a friend in your immediate circle of friends who is at a similar point of wanting to get fitter and better across the board, they’re already your training partner. If they’re not, well, for heaven’s sake, ask them. More likely though, if you’ve been talking about fitness and haven’t found an immediate friend who’s interested, you need to cast a wider net.
I can think of several times in my life when I had a particular fitness goal (in one instance it was endurance running), and I was making mention of it to pretty much all of my immediate friends. One finally said: “You know, you should talk to my friend Yanni. He used to run all the time. I think he still does. He’d probably be down to train together.” So I talked to him, he said he was always looking for a new running buddy, and we started running together.
So, ask others for recommendations. Even if you don’t feel comfortable bugging all your friends about their friends, try posting on Facebook that you’re looking for folks who want to train together. People will come out of the woodwork. I do recommend (whether it’s on faith or fitness), trying to focus Facebook posts so that it’s an invitation to specific training or accountability, etc. This prevents the all-too-common: “Man, there’s ANOTHER post from Kaiser. Does he do ANYTHING other than post about obstacle racing and Catholicism? Tuning him out!” It’s that syndrome that can happen when people feel bombarded by someone’s Facebook feed. And, as in all things social, don’t throw safety to the wind. Be smart about who, where, and when you plan to meet someone you don’t know really well.
Train for something in particular. Here’s another example from my own experience. Before obstacle racing, I had only one occasional training partner. When I started training for my second race, like I recommended above, I posted about it on Facebook. Suddenly, I had someone to train with every day of the week. Friends who wanted to run, acquaintances who wanted to lift, people who wanted to train specifically for obstacle racing and didn’t know how into it I was. (By the time I registered for my second race, I had stopped talking about how I was “getting into” obstacle racing, and had moved on to “I obstacle race.”)
Now, I have friends of friends who say, “Hey, I heard you were into obstacle racing, wanna train together?” The same proves true for friends who mention frequently or publicly that they’re training for a marathon (heck, even a 5k!), starting a CrossFit class, cycling, or rock climbing. If you pick a sport, or an event, and talk publicly about it or post about it on social media, I promise you’ll find other people who are doing the same, even among people you’re kind of already friends with and can get along with.
Even if you don’t find them immediately, do the event or the sport or the class. Some of my training partners are people I’ve met at a race, sometimes even during the race. I pass them or they pass me, and at the finish we end up introducing ourselves!
Find someone better than you. In general, you want someone who’s going to push you. Ideally, you can find someone who’s either, like, 10% better than you, or is better in one area but you’re better in another. Basically, if someone’s a 100% better athlete than you, they’re not necessarily going to get much out of being training partners, so it probably won’t work long term. But if they’re a little better than you, you can probably still give each other the push, the encouragement, and the competition that will help you both thrive. Or, if you have complementary skill sets, you can both challenge each other’s weaknesses with your strengths and create a really dynamic environment.
My friend Jeff is a much better runner than I am, but I’m stronger than he is. When we train together, we push each other outside of our wheelhouses to grow and be better. Again, the same holds true in our faith lives. Find people who embody a virtue or a spiritual life that inspires you. Spend more time with them, talk with them, and grow with them and from them.
So, in faith and in fitness, finding a “training partner” keeps us encouraged, accountable, and striving to get better, do better, and be better. But to get to “better” means that not only must we have a fixed ideal we’re progressing toward, we must know specifically where we’re starting from. How do we figure that out? Well, read on.
Chapter Five
The Examen
“The Christian soul knows it needs Divine Help and therefore turns to him Who loved us even while we were yet sinners. Examination
