The importance of setting specific training goals.
To succeed in a professional sporting environment, you can’t simply go through the motions during training. Each session must have a clear focus—a deliberate plan driven by intent and purpose.
Looking back on the early days of my career, I often fell into the trap of training without a specific goal. While this approach may yield minor improvements over time, the progress is rarely transformative. If you truly want to excel—striving to get just 1% better every day—each training session must have a defined focus. Those small, deliberate increments compound over time, and consistent, purposeful training is what ultimately leads to significant success.
How do i prepare for focused training?
The most effective tool I use to stay focused is my trusted notebook. Before every training session, I take the time to identify a specific skill I want to develop. This process ensures that I step onto the field with intention, not just routine effort.
Here's an example.
Let’s take cricket as an example—a sport renowned for its technical intricacies. There are countless aspects to fine-tune during training, but honing in on one area at a time delivers the best results.
For instance, consider the importance of bat speed when striking the ball. The faster your hands travel through the ball, the faster it will go—giving you a better chance of scoring runs. To improve my hand speed, I discovered that raising my bat higher during my backlift made a significant difference.
The principle here is simple: “What goes up, must come down.” A higher backlift provides more space for the bat to accelerate as it descends. In my case, my natural backlift sat around 90°, but I identified that increasing it to approximately 140° would help generate more speed. My training sessions then became hyper-focused on achieving a backlift closer to 140°, as illustrated below.
By setting specific, measurable targets like this, each training session has a clear purpose. It’s this level of intentional focus that enables real improvement and meaningful progression in any sport.
This is just one example of the preparation I go through before training to identify a specific focus point for the session. Often, these focus points carry over into multiple sessions because mastering a skill rarely happens in just one practice – and if it does, kudos to you!
Writing my goals down keeps me accountable. Knowing that I need to have something recorded in my notebook before every training session ensures that I allocate time to think about my focus. It also serves as a valuable reference point to track my progress. I find it incredibly rewarding to look back over the past few months and see everything I’ve worked on. It’s easy to lose sight of how far you’ve come, but keeping a training diary allows me to reflect and gain perspective. It gives me a confidence boost when I need it, reminding me of all the small, consistent improvements – the 1% gains – that have added up over time.
Here is a small excerpt from my note book:
Let's circle back.
Practicing specificity is essential for achieving those 1% improvements. Before any training session, regardless of your sport, make sure you set a clear goal. This helps ensure your training is intentional and purposeful, rather than just going through the motions. If you have aspirations of becoming a professional athlete or simply want to keep progressing, specificity in practice is crucial.
The simplest way to maintain this habit is by keeping a training diary. Take five minutes before each session to write down your goal for that day. It doesn’t have to be groundbreaking or complex – just something to guide your focus. If you need to repeat the same goal across multiple sessions, that’s perfectly okay. True progress takes time, and most goals won’t be achieved in a single session.
Keep striving for those 1% improvements every single day. Small, focused efforts compound into significant results over time.
Get in touch.
Let me know if you found this article helpful! Feel free to leave a comment below, or reach out to me directly at thesweatysistersclub@gmail.com. I’m always happy to provide personalized feedback and connect with you!