A number of years ago I remember attending a conference and the presenter asked everyone to imagine two scenarios. The goal was to make your way across a crowded room that you had been in before to the opposite side exit. The first scenario involved staring down at your toes and not lifting your head to see where you were. In the second scenario you could look up and ahead as far as you could see. Obviously the  second scenario would work better. You could plan your route more effectively. You could anticipate bottlenecks. You could side-step groups of people standing around and not moving. You could take larger steps and proceed more quickly. And the whole time you could keep your eyes on the end goal. And you'd have an idea of how you were progressing and how soon you'd arrive at your destination. With the other scenario you wouldn't be able to take as direct a path. You might end up trapped behind a group of people or at a dead end. You would have to walk more slowly and cautiously. You might be surprised if someone stepped into your path forcing you to stop or adopt a new course. In the end getting to your final destination would be more stressful, would take require more resources in the form of time and energy. Not a fun way to travel for sure. Consider using the same analogy to your health and fitness. Do you stare at the ground and have no idea what is coming up on the horizon? Or are you looking ahead to plan and anticipate your strategies? Let's look at a few examples to see how looking ahead can help you get a better result. SleepDo you have a set time to go to bed? Do...

Hi there: Hope you've had a great week. Mine flew by partly due to being busy. But I did manage to fit in a date night with my wife. And we went out for dinner and then to see the movie Conviction. She's not a huge Hilary Swank fan but we both did agree the show was pretty good. And it wasn't until after the show was over that it occured to me that the title was a play on words. You see the movie is about a couple of foster kids from small town Massasschusets. The brother is wrongly convicted of murder and the sister takes it upon herself to right this wrong and get her brother freed from jail. The only problem is that the sister is not a lawyer. Nor does she have degree to apply to law school. Nor a GED for that matter. But that doesn't stop her from doing whatever is necessary to achieve the end goal of freeing her brother from jail. Initially I looked at the title and thought it had to do with the brother and his conviction. But in retrospect it had to do with the sister and her conviction to overturn his sentence.So what does this have to with health, fitness, performance or anything?Well there are two messages you can take from this movie. The first is the most successful people aren't always the most gifted. Or the smartest. Or having the most of anything that is a pre-requisite for success in that field. Take Wayne Gretzky for example.He didn't have the hardest shot. He wasn't the fastest skater. He was in no way a physical presence on the ice. (some reports have him scoring the lowest on the Oilers' fitness testing). But he was the greatest player to ever play...