Samuele Bolotta: Okay, welcome everyone to this new episode of Iron Minds. I've got Nicola Piro here with me today. Hey Nicola, how's it going?
NICOLAS: Hey, several, I'm fine.
Samuele Bolotta: That's good. So Nicolai is a fellow coach at TSG. is also an elite lifter. And so he's here with us today to talk training from you know both the perspective of you know a a a coach and an athlete. And yeah, so the the first question that I wanted to ask you is I know that you have a background in other sports, right? could you tell us a little bit about what your trajectory was before power lifting, what you were doing, the first steps that you moved into powerlifting, and so on.
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure. So my name is Nicolas Sparrow. I've been in powerlifting since 11 years now, but I have also played rugby in high level in France, especially in the junior category. And then I was like semi-professionals untimely 22 years. I stopped like rugby three years before, but so I have practiced powerlifting and rugby in same times during maybe six or seven years. I was world junior champions with pre-Rudby too, so it was pretty challenging. When I was 14, I was in good rugby club and we did physical preparation and my performance was really good. Regarding other girls, like on bench press for example, I maybe bench like 140 at 15 years. something like that. And so my father looks if there are like competition and he finds the French Federation and some competition and some clubs. it's why I start for lifting. And I really enjoyed it at my first times. At my first years, I have lost against Collantin Clément. sbd4ever on instagram in subjunior category and like that's funny that's pretty funny that we still are together in in powerlifting now And so, yes, it was pretty hard because when I was at I Love rugby, I played maybe five times a week rugby, like four trainings and one end game every Sunday. So I tried to do like powerlifting too in the afternoon and rugby in the night, but it was really a lot of work. and with just
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: 2G too. So I manage my split of the week with my everyday, for example, on squat and deadlift just before the rugby training, with the rugby training with low intensity, and pretty far for the game to have time to recover, for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Interesting. Interesting. Yeah, that must be tough. Yeah, that
NICOLAS: Yeah. Yes.
Samuele Bolotta: must be tough. I mean, especially because then I mean you you you still kept making progress in powerlifting, which is pretty insane. I don't think a lot of people could do that in terms of like making progress in power lifting and then also playing rugby on top. That's like crazy.
NICOLAS: Yes, so for me when I started to do this like it was normal and because my friends like do physical preparation for rugby too so yes for me it was pretty okay. The hardest things was I had a lot of injuries with rugby like I broke my knee, my ankles, my shoulder so it was always like three or four months with rehab and so it made ultimate progress. But yeah, really when I think of it now, I think it's impossible to do the same. Even if I try to keep one external sport, like maybe Jiu-Jitsu or kickboxing or biking, just to have different things of powerlifting because when you work all your day for powerlifting, for coaching and you train also, I need to have some... standards like for
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: my mental.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, of course. Do do you still do cardio and do you think it's important to do so for a power lifter?
NICOLAS: Yes, I try to do like lot of cardio maybe three or four times a week depending on the period of competition or not. And I think it's really important first for health and also for a better capacity to recover. I think like if
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: you have a good level of cardio, you can recover better between threats and between sessions too. So you can train with other intensity. and yes, recover and making more progress. But you need to manage it well and push more volume of cardio during your off-season and then reduce during competitive season.
Samuele Bolotta: Of course, yeah, yeah. And like is there anything that you take away from rugby from from the rugby ears that you still cherish? And it could be, you know, a coach, it could be, you know, some some lesson that you learned and that is still valuable in your powerlifting journey right now.
NICOLAS: Yes, I think like regarding the mental because when I was like at I level in rugby in junior category like the like it was training was really hard like coach said if you train others and you play game like the game will be easy. So yes, training was really hard and you know, we we was like a lot to to gain the place for the game. So it was really competitive and I feel that's like my mental to be really stronger for powerlifting now. And like powerlifting
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: it's pretty easy compared to rugby, honestly. So.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah. And how would how would you define like a good mindset for a power lifter? What are the key characteristics in your opinion?
NICOLAS: I think it's important to be very resilient and patient because
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: progress is pretty long and also you can have long periods without progress and just maybe with progressions too but better days will come and you just need to continue to work hard and like I have a friend who said to like you will know you will start to love powerlifting when you train like four times with bench press to gain only two kilos in a year. So I think it's
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: the principle of the sport.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And and what do you think about like I see a lot of you know junior lifters who are making like super fast progress, of course, because
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: they are new to the sport, and they have these component of I would say an aggressive mindset with them. That is they are really aggressive, they want to do more and more and they they they train with this kind of mindset that is like very focused on you know getting more and more results but then of course as you say there's gonna be a time where you can't PR by 20 kilos every every three months right and so what is your like how how do you see this like how can you still maintain a good level of aggressivity Right. that becomes more realistic because now this aggressivity cannot be a twenty kilo PR. It's going to be maybe a one point twenty five kilo PR or even even less, right?
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure. But so it's really like we see a lot of junior listers come and get out because they just want like they just all in during like two or three years and then it's too hard. So they take a long break, for example, and then come back or not. And so, when it starts to be hard, it's It's the time when you see if you are really passionate about this product or not.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: And you need to appreciate the process. You need to really enjoy the process to become stronger and not just to enjoy the results. And you need to have fun, even if boring training, for example, presets of five, LP-6 is not really fun. But if you enjoy... and you still like very focused on it. You can still continue to make progress and have fun in poleftin gym. And also for me, I was really aggressive for example in juniors and then I had two kids. So I need to like relative like I know like poleftin is not the most part of my life now. And so
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: It's pretty good for this because you can like just if you make a bad session, it's not dramatic because the most important are kids for example, or you're in something
Samuele Bolotta: Mm, yeah, yeah.
NICOLAS: other of powerlifting.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And like what do you think about the the Michael Jordan mentality? in terms of, you know, like you know, right, he was always like pretty aggressive, pretty tough, focused on the results, focused on wanting more and more, definitely like not friendly, pretty tough with teammates as well. Like, do you think that's more of a survivorship bias that is if one hundred people did that, they would never become Michael Jordan, even with his genetics. Or do
NICOLAS: now.
Samuele Bolotta: you think that there's something to learn from that kind of mindset?
NICOLAS: I think there is something to learn because like you know to find adaptation to continue to make progress even if like life becomes harder because you become adults and you have more responsibility you can find some yeah some adaptation like the I have a good example in my category with Tony Cliff who making would still making progress at 40 years and he has a full time job pretty hard. I know it rained at maybe nine when him kids sleep and he did all his workday. So, and yes, I think he found adaptation. and continue to make progress. So yes, I think the most important is to continue to make progress in the cow.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. I see. And and so we talked about two components already, that is genetics, because you said that at 14 years old you were benching 140, which is crazy.
NICOLAS: Yes.
Samuele Bolotta: and we talked about psychology, right? So I want to give you six six components, let's say, of training. And I would like you to to rank them in terms of importance for long term success for an athlete. And so these six components are genetics, good technique, programming, and then the lifestyle of the athlete, the coach-to-athlete relationship, and finally the psychological traits, the mindset of the athlete. So it's six variables basically.
NICOLAS: Yes, yes, pretty hard to make a ranking, but I think maybe the first should be genetics because you
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: can start with the difference between accretes.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: So maybe it's accounts like the mental, the psychology of
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: accretes are really important because as we said, it's really It's pretty hard sports when you can do like a year without making progress and you should continue to train and to be focused on training. So it can be pretty hard. And in third, I think the lifestyles because if you have like we said like we can make adaptation but if you can have like the work with not retiring like not manual work for example it can be really helpful for training. If I saw if you have kids it's pretty tiring too so when they are especially when they are young. So it's also why we see more and more like student lifters which we are very strong fast because they don't have like too many responsibilities and they can do like
Samuele Bolotta: Course.
NICOLAS: four hours training a day and be focused on powerlifting. So
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: lifter is pretty important. And then I think here maybe the cold chocolate roll-up chips. are really important too because you need to be like really honestly with your coach because if you do like overshoot every two weeks for example and don't send to your coach the program will not work. It's why I think the coach-coach-accent relationships is more important just before the programming.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: And then yes. the programming and the technique are important too. But I think that
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: technique is very personal because we can see like every, every like world record with different technique. So technique is very personal and you have the basics, but then you can need to adapt to your genetic for example, and to be the strongest possible.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah, that's very interesting. So
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: okay, so it's pretty interesting because you know, quite often I see a lot of people place an immense amount of emphasis on programming and technique, which of course are important, right? Like I
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: I think no one no one would say programming and technique are not important. But I see very few lifters Realize that there's so much more to training than that. It's not only programming and technique. there's so much more, right? And as you say, first of all,
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure.
Samuele Bolotta: genetics, then their psychological traits, their attitude towards training, the lifestyle, certain choices that they make in terms of recovery and so on, the coach to athlete relationship. So I I think this is an interesting topic, and you know, I had a we we recorded an episode last week with Kate, Kate Cohen, TSG like sports psychologist. Exactly.
NICOLAS: Mortal coach? Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And yeah, like we we went through these this topic that is it's interesting that almost everyone says psychology is either first or second, but then there's not a lot of lifters, especially like when they're young. in the junior class who are aware of this and who like tr actually train their psychological traits, right? they might realize that they are important, but then do they put you know put in time to train those psychological traits, right? So that's interesting, I think.
NICOLAS: Yes, and you know like for genetics if you want a good example. When I started powerlifting I said to my sister I just tried to make deadlift and she was 13 years and she pulled 100 kilos. She never did sport before. So I said yes, you are
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: made for this sport and now she has the strongest deadlift in French history with 250.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: So yes, I think genetics are pretty important. And for sure, the psychology, we see lot of people's lost battle or lost competition due to psychology. And psychology and training is very important too,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: because you can have fear of the bar, for example, on squat, or very stressful,
Samuele Bolotta: Of course, of course.
NICOLAS: or be very stressful when you need to do a top set. Like we see lot of young lifters like change their approach of the bar on the first attempt. And for me,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: like openers, second bar and third attempt should look like the same regarding mentality approach and setup.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, sure. Yeah, yeah. And in light of all of these things that we discussed, what do you think is the most common reason for plateaus among intermediate lifters, I would say. Intermediate advanced lifters, right? I'm not talking about,
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: you know, the super elite lifter who's close to their genetic potential.
NICOLAS: I was pretty hard because if you have a good coach you can have a plateau but if you don't have a coach that just take your coach and I think it will be going better but
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: if you have a good coach and you have plateau I think sometimes it can be the lifestyles but if you have like a lot of work For example, during your period, can be ultimate
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: progress if you change of city or something like that.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: For athletes it can be psychology too because they made like a plateau in their head and just don't have to break it. So yes, I think if you have a good coach, that the difference can be in lifestyle or psychology.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I try to avoid a lot of psychology with my athletes when I see like they need it or when I see like... when a program like her peer, they are really stressed, so it can make
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: the difference.
Samuele Bolotta: Interesting, interesting. Okay. Yeah, that's pretty that's pretty cool to know. And how do you typically address like what do you want to see psychologically in in your athletes? Like in terms of expectations and dealing with failures, stuff like that.
NICOLAS: Yes, I try to know, for example, on squat, if they are stressful, I try to know because they are fear to fade and just to be injured or
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: just it's the weight is stressful for them because it's a new weight and it's a fear. And also I try to work a lot with their setup and their
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: mentally. monthly routine
Samuele Bolotta: yeah, yeah.
NICOLAS: yeah you know you need to speak to yourself for example and just to have
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, you mean like you mean your your inner talk.
NICOLAS: Yes, exactly. And you can have like technique talk, motivation talk or emotional talk. So
Samuele Bolotta: Mm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: I try to ask them and I ask them to write it just to repeat it in training. And if it's
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: worked, keep it. If not, just write a new and try it then. And
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: we speak a lot about it. For example, for me, I really like to just count like when I put my hand I count one, three and then
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: when I put my feet too and just to not have like negative things come in my head and just to have lot of times, every time something to think and so not negative things come.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And something that I'm interested in is the opposite question. That is, I just asked you what is the most common reason for plateaus. On the other hand, when you prescribe a very successful block for one of your athletes, right? Or when you yourself go through a very successful block, what do you think? like how do you think you can replicate that state of flow. Do you think that it's something that the coach has a lot of control on? Do you think that it it's related to the interaction of variables that we cannot 100% control? What do you think about this?
NICOLAS: Yeah, I think if you can find a good block and you can work with athletes regarding volume and intensity and repeat them two or three times and continue to work. But
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: you need to be careful to not use it too much. because it will stop, because progress will stop
Samuele Bolotta: Worse.
NICOLAS: like a day. So, but for example, I can have, I can try to have like the eight weeks before competition, pretty the same for athletes, just change like intensity when they make progress for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: But I can try to keep pretty the same during. two or three competitions if they make good competitions because if it works, we don't need to make some changes.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And what what do you think in terms of programming is the most important variable when it comes to to progress? That is, if there was one variable that you could track, what would that variable be? Some people have said tonnage, other people have said average intensity, other people have said velocity, it could be whatever.
NICOLAS: if I just only to choose one. Yes, maybe the average intensity on the week are pretty important for me.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Okay. Yeah.
NICOLAS: You need like to increase it when you need to increase during preparation for competition. But yes,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I really like to train with VBT personally and I like to prescribe. when I could have one, but it's pretty expensive, so not all have one. But yes, I think you can make very good program with tonnage, average intensity and velocity. It can be like perfect.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. And how do you typically go about average intensity? That is like how do you how do you personalize that? Because you know, we also know stories of people who cannot train at very high average intensities, other people who I mean and maybe this is a bit extreme, but like you know, other people who keep it very low. and focused on s a lot of submaximal work. So how do you see this?
NICOLAS: Yes, but I try to find a correlation between average intensity and estimated rate maximum.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: So, for example, if I saw an accret we will make really good progress with an average intensity at 80%, for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I will just try to keep them and increase the bit of volume and see if progress continue or not. I can just see the estimate repatism or I can do also test at the end of the block for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Okay.
NICOLAS: And for sure, like you have people that's depending like their age, their weight category, and also their work. so you can have people who make really good progress with low, pretty low intensity program because they just have like very fat, very tired life, for example. So if you add too much stress on training, they just burn out on. it will be too much. But like we said, like junior listers, we, which only have like to train and go, go to study and stay sit up and all the day, like you can train
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: with lot intensity and it's not a very, it's not a problem because it can,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: it can have a good recuperation, recover.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah. And in in your experience, are people like are people pretty similar in how they respond to stimuli or you've noticed quite a bit of variability?
NICOLAS: I think like more people are in the high category more than it to have like very variation on intensity on the week and train with pretty low intensity and like with small weight class you can you can try you can train with high intensity and they recover pretty well so
Samuele Bolotta: Mm. I see.
NICOLAS: yes I see the difference between category. Also with age, like with master athletes, it's pretty hard to train high intensity a lot of times because they need more time to recover. But you can have exception, but most of the times these rules work pretty well.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. And do you tend to place more emphasis on, you know, the the total dose across the week? the the or across the weeks. So across the the the the block, right? Or on the the sequencing, the priming, the relationship between each session within one week.
NICOLAS: Sorry, can you repeat just to be
Samuele Bolotta: Sure,
NICOLAS: clear?
Samuele Bolotta: sure, sure. In other words, what I'm saying is, are you more interested in the total amount of work that a person is doing or in how that work is distributed across the week?
NICOLAS: I think the total of work is
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: very important. But if I see the secondary day, for example, impact too much than the primary day, and if we are closer to competition, I would just decrease secondary day because my goal is really to be stronger on primary day. But if you are... If we are in off season, the most important will be the total. But closer to competition, it will be more like the split of the week. for example, for me, my secondary day was often pretty hard and I'm bad
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: really a lot. My primary day, like, closer to competition and we're start to just, like, really decrease intensity. And so my primary day, like, really increased. So it was really better for competition. But to make progress
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm, of course.
NICOLAS: of long time, I need to keep the buff at high levels.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I see what you mean. Yeah, yeah. So you think in terms of like, for example, the the relative intensity of each session, basically what you're saying is when we are in the off season, you could even keep three days that are pretty similar in terms of how hard they are, and it's fine. Whereas
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: when we approach competition, we really need to start distinguishing between maybe a primary day that we're supposed to base our decisions on and then you know a secondary and a tertiary day. Yeah.
NICOLAS: Yes, yes, need to have like big difference like in the intensity. Like if I squat like three times a week, I need to have like one squat LP free, for example, one squat LP is five or six. And we can have like one squat LP eight or nine. But I can do like, I can train like three times a week with LP seven or more, for example. But I'm in 120,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: so it's pretty hard for me also to recover.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah. And you mentioned velocity tracking earlier. one question that I wanted to ask you is, you know, in relation to all of the things that we've discussed, do you like to prescribe training with percentages, RPE, velocity, a combination of these of these tools? and you know, what do you think about you know the whole debate between auto regulation and more rigid prescription? So what do you think about all of this?
NICOLAS: So I think the most simple for athletes is just to follow the percentage. And I have a lot of athletes who like to train like this because they don't have to think during training and just follow. But they still have a fork or LP because just to not overshoot, undershoot, regarding what is prescribed in percentage. But when they have access to a velocity, I really like to prescribe Velocity because for me it's most important because when you have like correlation between intensity, between like Velocity and LPE, you can really adjust as best as possible the intensity of training. And like Velocity don't lie because a of people can overshoot or don't shoot, but... with velocity lines, true process. So it was like for me, velocity is most important. I LP.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. I see what you mean. Yeah. And do you think
NICOLAS: Hey.
Samuele Bolotta: that it could be misused as well?
NICOLAS: Yes, with beginner lifters, because they will change their technique just to be fast. So yes,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah.
NICOLAS: you need to have pretty good experience of training, because to have technique very the same, not change your technique, but in weight. It needs to be very reputable. So you can train with this. yes, I saw like for example on the Glyph, some lifters start to use velocity and just run their back to go fast. But that's not very good. So we stopped to use
Samuele Bolotta: Of course.
NICOLAS: it and just to have a good technique.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, because you know, one thing that J Jason sent a very interesting message today. And you know, we we were talking about this as well. and we were talking about the difference between noticing how the body of the athlete is moving under the bar and the velocity of the bar, right? And so there are people who believe, you know. Velocity is not important. I only care about how the body moves. Other people that maybe go in the opposite direction. And then probably like a happy medium is realizing that sure, velocity like matters. At the same time, you need to also look at how the body is pushing the bar, right? so yeah.
NICOLAS: Yeah, you know, for example, for me, I like to use the velocity in competition. And with my last warm up, I can predict pretty well my third attempt would be regarding the velocity because my technique is pretty repeatable and I don't have too much variations. So it can be really helpful for some lifters and it can be the same on training days. Like sometimes that happens. I don't know why velocity loss. or increase very fast. But most of the time I can predict if I do like this squat on last warm up, I can do this squat on top set and I will be into good HP for example, just with
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: velocity. So it can be great for this.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And in your experience, how does the mental aspect affect velocity? That is, if you are very hyped up and you're training with friends in front of other people, could this change a little bit?
NICOLAS: Yeah, yes, if you are high, for example, you can be very good in velocity.
Samuele Bolotta: Uh-huh.
NICOLAS: But it's just like you are in a good day also because you are maybe more aggressive or something. But I wanted to say like, velocity is very well when all goes well because when you see you make like speed. speed progress for example on same bar you can say I progress so I mean the good way but
Samuele Bolotta: Mm.
NICOLAS: during like bad periods it can be really hard mentally because like I said velocity don't lie don't so if I if you are slower on bar or same bars that you did before it just like bad times and It can be really hard when it's still like for a long time, you don't do like pair on weight or on velocity. It can be pretty hard.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm, of course. Yeah, yeah. And Yeah.
NICOLAS: Like, yeah, no, you like personally, I have stopped to use it during like six months because it was really hard to see each time on my last one up. was slower with something I did like faster, like six months before. So just I stopped it and I tried to enjoy
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: training again.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, I see what you mean. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. I think there's definitely like a and and you know, like this is I think that each tool has their specific pros and cons in terms of the mental approach. Because if you use RPE, you know, like there's a lot of potential like downsides there in terms of you know how it could ruin your training because some people are neurotic they might you know like keep obsessing over the RPE think a lot about which load they want to hit and you know maybe for percentages they have an idea you know of how this load is supposed to move and today it's not moving that way and so I start you know being paranoid. So I think that each tool has their own you know challenges to deal with mentally. and I think that it's important to be aware of the of them in the end.
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure. But they also need to see the standard factors because sometimes you can have bad t-shirt, but if something happens during your life, or
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: you have a bad sleep or bad meal, for example, it just can explain the bad training. And so you just need to do the work and continue to move forward. But I think you need to... to see if it's repeatable or not because you can have one bad day, it's okay, it's happened. We are all different and sometimes we are in a good day and sometimes not. But try to do the work and if it's other, it should be because you will still make
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: progress and it just can say you are just more fatigue but you are not less stronger. But
Samuele Bolotta: Absolutely.
NICOLAS: yes, but if it's like during long times, so maybe like try to speak with your coach and make some change regarding programming because it can seem like it's a program and you just not recover as possible or just you don't like training and you need to do more training to make progress. But yes, what I repeat a lot of times to my athletes like especially during off season or some bar like don't move as they want but it's only because they are like more volume like during for example t3 or secondary day and so they just are they not are like less stronger but they just have more fatigue and so it's harder for them to move the bar faster and it just what they need for the moment to be strange, become like stronger after. And a lot of times they understand it, like for example during D-Log, but because when I just drop the volume for second on the day, like bar moves very well and so that no, yes, I was just fatigue and no, it's okay.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah. and would you say that when it comes to programming, and and the premise is that this is in part a false dilemma, right? But do you think that you are more of a top-down or a bottom-up person? That is, do you tend to base your programs mostly on you know, the theory that you learned, your experience, your insights, your ideas on how things are supposed to move, or on the the feedback of the athlete in terms of how they respond to training, the the the way they deal with stimuli. And again, I I want to premise that of course no one is only top-down or only bottom up, right? But we can definitely see in the power lifting scene that some people tend to move a bit more towards the bottom up side, whereas others are more I would say focused on the top down side of the of the picture.
NICOLAS: Yeah, so yes, for me, like feedback of athletes are pretty important because if they want to make progress on long term and like stay in powerlifting, they need to like enjoy the process and enjoy the training. So I try to listen to their things and to adjust my program, organize it, even if I try to... to also keep my things because like sometimes like for example, they want to do like a PR in the month, but it's not a good period. So I try to explain then we can do like, we can do this now, but like we can build on two or three bots, three bots and do the NAFTA for example. But yes, I think like the communication is very important and lot of... I it's need to understand the program to really enjoy the process and go all in the process because if you program, especially when you program with volume-based and low-fault linear sets, it can be pretty hard for lifters who see a lot of top sets, for example, on Instagram, and they do
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: five sets of three reps and... But when they understand they need this to become stronger, it's fine.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And what would you say about technique in terms of do you think that you're more of a top-down person or a bottom-up person? Do you think that the body can learn how to move by itself? Or do you think that the coach should I don't want to say impose, but bring a lot to the table in terms of how the the athlete is supposed to move?
NICOLAS: I think like yes, the body can learn by itself and feels very natural like the athletes need to find something very natural for them and my priority it will be like to see if the basics are respectful like the standards or the feet the feet pressure for example on squat and the blessing like the bad positioning. If I see like something very not good for me, I will tell them, but I will not tell them like you should squat like this. I think you will be stronger because like I don't know, especially when they start. But yes, when I have a knuckle after like three or six months, like... we can start to make some changes and we'll see better. But honestly, not my priority. It's like especially music and lift. We found something dangerous, like very background and something like this. And if the standards are pretty good, that's fine to me. And for sure,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely.
NICOLAS: if I see like a cue or something they can do better, will tell them. But I will not change other techniques in one time for knuckles.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah. So so like what what is the the the coaching process look like in terms of technique guidance? That is, do you typically give technique cues like every week, every block? how does that look like on average?
NICOLAS: Like, the Zephyr and like, like, pretty beginner athletes, I can give like, one show like, every week. Like, one show
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: to be focused on each lift. Because, and not more, because if you lift too much, they will just be below and finish too much during lift. And it not will be really good. So I think like, one show by week can be great. And for like, pretty... Experiencing afters like when you buy block can be pretty good. You don't need to change too much I think.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, because technique is another aspect that some lifters tend to obsess over. That is, some of them believe that yeah, like if
NICOLAS: Yes. Yes.
Samuele Bolotta: you change if you find this final Q, then you can squat like 30 kilos more, right?
NICOLAS: Yes, I agree. If you change your technique, at least you need like maybe six or eight weeks to see if it really works. And I see a lot of thrifters that change at maybe 70 % or 80%. I say, I'm really stronger and I move faster. But then they come to their mats, it just don't work because... You know, like, you can change something and it's better with easy weights, but it's not the reality.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And something that I wanted to ask you is when you like how do you see intuition as a characteristic in a coach? Do you think that intuition is important or do you think that most choices should be made based on data? like and I think that it's interesting to you know draw A parallel with science, right? When you think about scientific experiments, you know, these people usually base their their moves on the data, right? They come up with hypotheses, they try to falsify the hypothesis. At the same time, we know that there are some scientists who at some point have these insights, these intuitions, and they maybe change the landscape of what the domain looks like. So what do you think about this in in powerlifting coaching? And actually
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: I mean I actually you know in rugby coaching as well and in basketball coaching, like it's the same.
NICOLAS: Yeah, yes, I think like intuition are pretty important and because sometimes you just need to like to go outside the way to find something to become stronger like
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think it's it's why for example like high frequency start to be very popular in polypting because some girls like start to do like six or seven SBD a week It was like not normal, but it worked. So it continued. And now it's pretty like what did like most of small world class shifter, for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: Yes, I think intuition can be really important and you can find a good pattern, for example, technically with intuition or something like that.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And in your process, is it more important than data analysis?
NICOLAS: that just depends. Like, I don't know because we have a lot of trucker, but we have a lot of data to try it personally. So a lot of the times I can resolve a program only with data. For example, when
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I create, I have a plateau, I can have a good analysis and see what's not worth. For example. But yeah, sometimes you can have like an aspiration and try and it can work.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: So it's hard to respond to this. think the
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah yeah.
NICOLAS: buff are important because like, yeah, you can see with data and just if like you train not enough just to increase a bit and it will like, relance the progression.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah. and you mentioned high frequency earlier. one question that I wanted to ask you is imagine that you know a young Agata Shitko comes to you and asks you to be coached, right? do you see yourself, like how do you see yourself guide her? Towards this high frequency approach that clearly is working very well right now for her. Like, do you think that's a solution that you would arrive to? Do you think that you would, you know, keep her in the more mainstream frequency real? Like, what do you think about this?
NICOLAS: I think it will be like, it will need like lot of times with BKNR Zifter to increase high frequency because
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think you don't need to put them like on it too fast because they can make a very good progress without it and just you can use it like after because yes. I have an athlete who's seen with me, we did like high frequency before, but he came and he has like lot of mobility restriction and start to have lot of pain. So we decrease a lot the frequency, just try to build muscle, build a good mobility, like to be an athlete and before to be too much specific. And now we try to and he made like... good progress because again in muscle mass and he can perform without pain and now we can make to increase frequency again because he have very good potential and I think he can be very strong but yes I think you need to put it with time like
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think Agatha as like six or seven years of powerlifting before to do it, that she didn't start by it. So yes.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm, absolutely. And
NICOLAS: Yes, like what's important is to be an athlete, like have a good level of mass, have a good mobility, have a pretty good cardio, and then you can try to start to increase your frequency, for example. Because in powerlifting, you can have like athletes who start by powerlifting, but they don't like play sport before. and powerlifting can be pretty made pretty lot of restrictions if you perform only hit so you need
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: to perform different things
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And do you think that there's a like actually what do you think are the mistakes that a coach could make when it comes to coaching a very young and talented junior lifters? That is, and and I mean this in terms of how could you best build a long term successful sustainable career for them? And on the other hand, what mistake could you make? To maybe
NICOLAS: I think what you like most mistake you can do like it's yes like to go in the easiest way like if I like very talentless with a good genetic good muscular mass for example you can like like we say like prescribed high frequency pretty fast and it will be it will make a lot of progress. But when it will start to have a good plateau, when you can have a plateau, you will not have keys to make progress against because you will always be at maximum volume or frequency, for example. So it will be pretty hard. But if you can start like... with low frequency, like do a lot of accessory mobility, some cardio and start to increase like frequency after and really slowly. I think you can have progress in very long term and have less rest of injury. Because like we said, if
Samuele Bolotta: Absolutely.
NICOLAS: you perform only SBD, like it's not very good for your mobility and you should have like Ips or back problem for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's interesting.
NICOLAS: Yes, for me, it's pretty easy to push the credit at a maximum rack very fast. But yes,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: the program, when it will have a plateau, it will be very hard to make progress again. And also,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: it can just be burned out of poor lifting after two or three years and just quit.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah, also because you know, it creates expectations, right? when you're making such a fast progress as a young lifter, you know, you might start thinking, Okay, if I keep making progress like this, I'm gonna be in Sheffield in a in a few years.
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, and then you know, maybe you get through a plateau and it's difficult and you quit, right? So yeah, absolutely.
NICOLAS: Yeah, I celebrate. Yeah, you go.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, What I wanted to ask is precisely this. aside from junior lifters, what do you think is the most crucial variable when it comes to injury risk? Do you think that it's load management, a lifestyle problem, genetics?
NICOLAS: I think it's to not listen
Samuele Bolotta: Hm, okay.
NICOLAS: to Because when you get injured in polypting, it's always because you have, for example, on chest, your chest will be tight and it will finish by a chest tear, for example, because you just have pushed too much and don't have time to just... rest and recover from this. Like it's not like rugby or for example you can be tickered and break your knees. Like in powerlifting we control all the movements so most of the times you have tightness and you continue to push on it and you will get injured. So I think it's
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely.
NICOLAS: really important just to listen our body. and like do the things I do pre-hab for
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: example or some agencies to recover when you have like tight zone for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Absolutely, yeah, I see what you mean. Yeah. And yeah, it's interesting because when it comes to you know, I I see that I I see how it could be tempting for especially, you know, young coaches to push a talented young lifter that they're coaching. because they you know they they start thinking, okay, if I push this lifter who's like who can be really successful because they're talented, then you know I can make a name for myself and so on. but definitely like what you're saying is is really important and it also it also goes back to I think one of those psychological traits that you need to build into a into an athlete. That is the ability to learn to yourself, the ability to understand when you're close to the limit and maybe you have to push back a little bit.
NICOLAS: Yes. I have seen like too much Lister just to have like, yes, for example, shoot a problem and put
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: Tiger Bomb on it to bench.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: And because it's very warm, you don't feel the pain and it just
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: get worse and worse training after training. And then they
Samuele Bolotta: Exactly.
NICOLAS: get injured for three months. Instead, like if they take like one week of like deload. and then can push again, it will be fine.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. And and last question that I wanted to ask you. what do you think about powerlifting in 10 years? How do you see this port evolve, both at the you know, mainstream and elite level? what what do you think about this?
NICOLAS: Yes, I think the level will continue to increase because more and more people arrive to gain their life with poor lifting, for example with reputation or something like that. So they can be pretty professional athletes. So
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think yes, the level will continue to increase. we have like a lot of young listers who come. Even if I think like listers that young girls have before, so they will have their top levels like young girls, that's old
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: generation, for example. But yeah, it's pretty hard to know. Like I think for me now, we are pretty in the top in terms of visibility so I'm not sure it will continue to increase. It's still like really great like to be like for example on Eurosport for World Championships so if we like continue to be like this it can be great.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, something that I was wondering is, you know, how young lived yeah.
NICOLAS: And yes, I think more brands are interested in powerlifting, for example with Aventus competitions. Like you have Sheffield, Aventus, maybe you will have more in the further years. But it's still like pretty hard sport to perform. So you need to be very patient in resilience. I don't
Samuele Bolotta: Yes.
NICOLAS: know, I think it will never be like popular as soccer, for example. But yes, if we can
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah yeah.
NICOLAS: stay at the same level, can be great.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: And I feel also people start to understand, you know, to live like order in good condition, like to train strange is very important. Like 10 years before, like a lot of the third side, you only to train cardio, but now they start to make strange. So, so yes, I think maybe the, the people of powerlifters and the people of for coaching will start to be a bit different and we need like to do like powerlifting helps for the purpose for people. It can be like a great market for coaches.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, of course. I see what you mean. Yeah, I think it's interesting 'cause like w what I see right now is the It could be pretty daunting for a young lifter to start powerlifting and see that the record in the seventy-four kilo class is like nine hundred plus, right? And they might be thinking, I'm never gonna reach that. It's it's crazy, right?
NICOLAS: Yes, yes, I understand what you mean because like in France we have like a lot of athletes who start because we had like a lot of leaders who become like world champions with like Leah, Tiffany, Noemi and so
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah.
NICOLAS: they start and want it and thinks I will be world champions too if I train well in three or four years and it's not the reality and yes, no, the level are really really high. but you can just perform for yourself. And in France, we have really great local meets, and I think it's important to encourage them.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: Because you can do a lot of local meet with a good show, good organizations, and be really satisfying of your day. So I think it's most important to continue. if you want powerlifting to continue to grow.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I agree one hundred percent with what you're saying, man. Yeah. And so yeah. yeah. Yeah, did you want to to to to add something?
NICOLAS: No, think for me it's good. It was a good
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, perfect.
NICOLAS: time. I my English was okay. Yeah, yeah, thanks.
Samuele Bolotta: It was very good. No worries. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think it's really interesting. It's always nice to talk to someone who's been in the sport for, you know, such a long time. And not only from the perspective of a coach, but also from the perspective of an elite athlete. So yeah, that was pretty cool, man. thank you very much.
NICOLAS: Thanks a lot.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And thank you everyone for listening, of course. and yeah, stay tuned for the next episode.
NICOLAS: Thanks, bye.
NICOLAS: Hey, several, I'm fine.
Samuele Bolotta: That's good. So Nicolai is a fellow coach at TSG. is also an elite lifter. And so he's here with us today to talk training from you know both the perspective of you know a a a coach and an athlete. And yeah, so the the first question that I wanted to ask you is I know that you have a background in other sports, right? could you tell us a little bit about what your trajectory was before power lifting, what you were doing, the first steps that you moved into powerlifting, and so on.
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure. So my name is Nicolas Sparrow. I've been in powerlifting since 11 years now, but I have also played rugby in high level in France, especially in the junior category. And then I was like semi-professionals untimely 22 years. I stopped like rugby three years before, but so I have practiced powerlifting and rugby in same times during maybe six or seven years. I was world junior champions with pre-Rudby too, so it was pretty challenging. When I was 14, I was in good rugby club and we did physical preparation and my performance was really good. Regarding other girls, like on bench press for example, I maybe bench like 140 at 15 years. something like that. And so my father looks if there are like competition and he finds the French Federation and some competition and some clubs. it's why I start for lifting. And I really enjoyed it at my first times. At my first years, I have lost against Collantin Clément. sbd4ever on instagram in subjunior category and like that's funny that's pretty funny that we still are together in in powerlifting now And so, yes, it was pretty hard because when I was at I Love rugby, I played maybe five times a week rugby, like four trainings and one end game every Sunday. So I tried to do like powerlifting too in the afternoon and rugby in the night, but it was really a lot of work. and with just
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: 2G too. So I manage my split of the week with my everyday, for example, on squat and deadlift just before the rugby training, with the rugby training with low intensity, and pretty far for the game to have time to recover, for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Interesting. Interesting. Yeah, that must be tough. Yeah, that
NICOLAS: Yeah. Yes.
Samuele Bolotta: must be tough. I mean, especially because then I mean you you you still kept making progress in powerlifting, which is pretty insane. I don't think a lot of people could do that in terms of like making progress in power lifting and then also playing rugby on top. That's like crazy.
NICOLAS: Yes, so for me when I started to do this like it was normal and because my friends like do physical preparation for rugby too so yes for me it was pretty okay. The hardest things was I had a lot of injuries with rugby like I broke my knee, my ankles, my shoulder so it was always like three or four months with rehab and so it made ultimate progress. But yeah, really when I think of it now, I think it's impossible to do the same. Even if I try to keep one external sport, like maybe Jiu-Jitsu or kickboxing or biking, just to have different things of powerlifting because when you work all your day for powerlifting, for coaching and you train also, I need to have some... standards like for
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: my mental.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, of course. Do do you still do cardio and do you think it's important to do so for a power lifter?
NICOLAS: Yes, I try to do like lot of cardio maybe three or four times a week depending on the period of competition or not. And I think it's really important first for health and also for a better capacity to recover. I think like if
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: you have a good level of cardio, you can recover better between threats and between sessions too. So you can train with other intensity. and yes, recover and making more progress. But you need to manage it well and push more volume of cardio during your off-season and then reduce during competitive season.
Samuele Bolotta: Of course, yeah, yeah. And like is there anything that you take away from rugby from from the rugby ears that you still cherish? And it could be, you know, a coach, it could be, you know, some some lesson that you learned and that is still valuable in your powerlifting journey right now.
NICOLAS: Yes, I think like regarding the mental because when I was like at I level in rugby in junior category like the like it was training was really hard like coach said if you train others and you play game like the game will be easy. So yes, training was really hard and you know, we we was like a lot to to gain the place for the game. So it was really competitive and I feel that's like my mental to be really stronger for powerlifting now. And like powerlifting
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: it's pretty easy compared to rugby, honestly. So.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah. And how would how would you define like a good mindset for a power lifter? What are the key characteristics in your opinion?
NICOLAS: I think it's important to be very resilient and patient because
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: progress is pretty long and also you can have long periods without progress and just maybe with progressions too but better days will come and you just need to continue to work hard and like I have a friend who said to like you will know you will start to love powerlifting when you train like four times with bench press to gain only two kilos in a year. So I think it's
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: the principle of the sport.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And and what do you think about like I see a lot of you know junior lifters who are making like super fast progress, of course, because
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: they are new to the sport, and they have these component of I would say an aggressive mindset with them. That is they are really aggressive, they want to do more and more and they they they train with this kind of mindset that is like very focused on you know getting more and more results but then of course as you say there's gonna be a time where you can't PR by 20 kilos every every three months right and so what is your like how how do you see this like how can you still maintain a good level of aggressivity Right. that becomes more realistic because now this aggressivity cannot be a twenty kilo PR. It's going to be maybe a one point twenty five kilo PR or even even less, right?
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure. But so it's really like we see a lot of junior listers come and get out because they just want like they just all in during like two or three years and then it's too hard. So they take a long break, for example, and then come back or not. And so, when it starts to be hard, it's It's the time when you see if you are really passionate about this product or not.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: And you need to appreciate the process. You need to really enjoy the process to become stronger and not just to enjoy the results. And you need to have fun, even if boring training, for example, presets of five, LP-6 is not really fun. But if you enjoy... and you still like very focused on it. You can still continue to make progress and have fun in poleftin gym. And also for me, I was really aggressive for example in juniors and then I had two kids. So I need to like relative like I know like poleftin is not the most part of my life now. And so
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: It's pretty good for this because you can like just if you make a bad session, it's not dramatic because the most important are kids for example, or you're in something
Samuele Bolotta: Mm, yeah, yeah.
NICOLAS: other of powerlifting.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And like what do you think about the the Michael Jordan mentality? in terms of, you know, like you know, right, he was always like pretty aggressive, pretty tough, focused on the results, focused on wanting more and more, definitely like not friendly, pretty tough with teammates as well. Like, do you think that's more of a survivorship bias that is if one hundred people did that, they would never become Michael Jordan, even with his genetics. Or do
NICOLAS: now.
Samuele Bolotta: you think that there's something to learn from that kind of mindset?
NICOLAS: I think there is something to learn because like you know to find adaptation to continue to make progress even if like life becomes harder because you become adults and you have more responsibility you can find some yeah some adaptation like the I have a good example in my category with Tony Cliff who making would still making progress at 40 years and he has a full time job pretty hard. I know it rained at maybe nine when him kids sleep and he did all his workday. So, and yes, I think he found adaptation. and continue to make progress. So yes, I think the most important is to continue to make progress in the cow.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. I see. And and so we talked about two components already, that is genetics, because you said that at 14 years old you were benching 140, which is crazy.
NICOLAS: Yes.
Samuele Bolotta: and we talked about psychology, right? So I want to give you six six components, let's say, of training. And I would like you to to rank them in terms of importance for long term success for an athlete. And so these six components are genetics, good technique, programming, and then the lifestyle of the athlete, the coach-to-athlete relationship, and finally the psychological traits, the mindset of the athlete. So it's six variables basically.
NICOLAS: Yes, yes, pretty hard to make a ranking, but I think maybe the first should be genetics because you
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: can start with the difference between accretes.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: So maybe it's accounts like the mental, the psychology of
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: accretes are really important because as we said, it's really It's pretty hard sports when you can do like a year without making progress and you should continue to train and to be focused on training. So it can be pretty hard. And in third, I think the lifestyles because if you have like we said like we can make adaptation but if you can have like the work with not retiring like not manual work for example it can be really helpful for training. If I saw if you have kids it's pretty tiring too so when they are especially when they are young. So it's also why we see more and more like student lifters which we are very strong fast because they don't have like too many responsibilities and they can do like
Samuele Bolotta: Course.
NICOLAS: four hours training a day and be focused on powerlifting. So
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: lifter is pretty important. And then I think here maybe the cold chocolate roll-up chips. are really important too because you need to be like really honestly with your coach because if you do like overshoot every two weeks for example and don't send to your coach the program will not work. It's why I think the coach-coach-accent relationships is more important just before the programming.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: And then yes. the programming and the technique are important too. But I think that
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: technique is very personal because we can see like every, every like world record with different technique. So technique is very personal and you have the basics, but then you can need to adapt to your genetic for example, and to be the strongest possible.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah, that's very interesting. So
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: okay, so it's pretty interesting because you know, quite often I see a lot of people place an immense amount of emphasis on programming and technique, which of course are important, right? Like I
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: I think no one no one would say programming and technique are not important. But I see very few lifters Realize that there's so much more to training than that. It's not only programming and technique. there's so much more, right? And as you say, first of all,
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure.
Samuele Bolotta: genetics, then their psychological traits, their attitude towards training, the lifestyle, certain choices that they make in terms of recovery and so on, the coach to athlete relationship. So I I think this is an interesting topic, and you know, I had a we we recorded an episode last week with Kate, Kate Cohen, TSG like sports psychologist. Exactly.
NICOLAS: Mortal coach? Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And yeah, like we we went through these this topic that is it's interesting that almost everyone says psychology is either first or second, but then there's not a lot of lifters, especially like when they're young. in the junior class who are aware of this and who like tr actually train their psychological traits, right? they might realize that they are important, but then do they put you know put in time to train those psychological traits, right? So that's interesting, I think.
NICOLAS: Yes, and you know like for genetics if you want a good example. When I started powerlifting I said to my sister I just tried to make deadlift and she was 13 years and she pulled 100 kilos. She never did sport before. So I said yes, you are
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: made for this sport and now she has the strongest deadlift in French history with 250.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: So yes, I think genetics are pretty important. And for sure, the psychology, we see lot of people's lost battle or lost competition due to psychology. And psychology and training is very important too,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: because you can have fear of the bar, for example, on squat, or very stressful,
Samuele Bolotta: Of course, of course.
NICOLAS: or be very stressful when you need to do a top set. Like we see lot of young lifters like change their approach of the bar on the first attempt. And for me,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: like openers, second bar and third attempt should look like the same regarding mentality approach and setup.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, sure. Yeah, yeah. And in light of all of these things that we discussed, what do you think is the most common reason for plateaus among intermediate lifters, I would say. Intermediate advanced lifters, right? I'm not talking about,
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: you know, the super elite lifter who's close to their genetic potential.
NICOLAS: I was pretty hard because if you have a good coach you can have a plateau but if you don't have a coach that just take your coach and I think it will be going better but
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: if you have a good coach and you have plateau I think sometimes it can be the lifestyles but if you have like a lot of work For example, during your period, can be ultimate
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: progress if you change of city or something like that.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: For athletes it can be psychology too because they made like a plateau in their head and just don't have to break it. So yes, I think if you have a good coach, that the difference can be in lifestyle or psychology.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I try to avoid a lot of psychology with my athletes when I see like they need it or when I see like... when a program like her peer, they are really stressed, so it can make
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: the difference.
Samuele Bolotta: Interesting, interesting. Okay. Yeah, that's pretty that's pretty cool to know. And how do you typically address like what do you want to see psychologically in in your athletes? Like in terms of expectations and dealing with failures, stuff like that.
NICOLAS: Yes, I try to know, for example, on squat, if they are stressful, I try to know because they are fear to fade and just to be injured or
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: just it's the weight is stressful for them because it's a new weight and it's a fear. And also I try to work a lot with their setup and their
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: mentally. monthly routine
Samuele Bolotta: yeah, yeah.
NICOLAS: yeah you know you need to speak to yourself for example and just to have
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, you mean like you mean your your inner talk.
NICOLAS: Yes, exactly. And you can have like technique talk, motivation talk or emotional talk. So
Samuele Bolotta: Mm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: I try to ask them and I ask them to write it just to repeat it in training. And if it's
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: worked, keep it. If not, just write a new and try it then. And
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: we speak a lot about it. For example, for me, I really like to just count like when I put my hand I count one, three and then
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: when I put my feet too and just to not have like negative things come in my head and just to have lot of times, every time something to think and so not negative things come.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And something that I'm interested in is the opposite question. That is, I just asked you what is the most common reason for plateaus. On the other hand, when you prescribe a very successful block for one of your athletes, right? Or when you yourself go through a very successful block, what do you think? like how do you think you can replicate that state of flow. Do you think that it's something that the coach has a lot of control on? Do you think that it it's related to the interaction of variables that we cannot 100% control? What do you think about this?
NICOLAS: Yeah, I think if you can find a good block and you can work with athletes regarding volume and intensity and repeat them two or three times and continue to work. But
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: you need to be careful to not use it too much. because it will stop, because progress will stop
Samuele Bolotta: Worse.
NICOLAS: like a day. So, but for example, I can have, I can try to have like the eight weeks before competition, pretty the same for athletes, just change like intensity when they make progress for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: But I can try to keep pretty the same during. two or three competitions if they make good competitions because if it works, we don't need to make some changes.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And what what do you think in terms of programming is the most important variable when it comes to to progress? That is, if there was one variable that you could track, what would that variable be? Some people have said tonnage, other people have said average intensity, other people have said velocity, it could be whatever.
NICOLAS: if I just only to choose one. Yes, maybe the average intensity on the week are pretty important for me.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Okay. Yeah.
NICOLAS: You need like to increase it when you need to increase during preparation for competition. But yes,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I really like to train with VBT personally and I like to prescribe. when I could have one, but it's pretty expensive, so not all have one. But yes, I think you can make very good program with tonnage, average intensity and velocity. It can be like perfect.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. And how do you typically go about average intensity? That is like how do you how do you personalize that? Because you know, we also know stories of people who cannot train at very high average intensities, other people who I mean and maybe this is a bit extreme, but like you know, other people who keep it very low. and focused on s a lot of submaximal work. So how do you see this?
NICOLAS: Yes, but I try to find a correlation between average intensity and estimated rate maximum.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: So, for example, if I saw an accret we will make really good progress with an average intensity at 80%, for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I will just try to keep them and increase the bit of volume and see if progress continue or not. I can just see the estimate repatism or I can do also test at the end of the block for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Okay.
NICOLAS: And for sure, like you have people that's depending like their age, their weight category, and also their work. so you can have people who make really good progress with low, pretty low intensity program because they just have like very fat, very tired life, for example. So if you add too much stress on training, they just burn out on. it will be too much. But like we said, like junior listers, we, which only have like to train and go, go to study and stay sit up and all the day, like you can train
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: with lot intensity and it's not a very, it's not a problem because it can,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: it can have a good recuperation, recover.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah. And in in your experience, are people like are people pretty similar in how they respond to stimuli or you've noticed quite a bit of variability?
NICOLAS: I think like more people are in the high category more than it to have like very variation on intensity on the week and train with pretty low intensity and like with small weight class you can you can try you can train with high intensity and they recover pretty well so
Samuele Bolotta: Mm. I see.
NICOLAS: yes I see the difference between category. Also with age, like with master athletes, it's pretty hard to train high intensity a lot of times because they need more time to recover. But you can have exception, but most of the times these rules work pretty well.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. And do you tend to place more emphasis on, you know, the the total dose across the week? the the or across the weeks. So across the the the the block, right? Or on the the sequencing, the priming, the relationship between each session within one week.
NICOLAS: Sorry, can you repeat just to be
Samuele Bolotta: Sure,
NICOLAS: clear?
Samuele Bolotta: sure, sure. In other words, what I'm saying is, are you more interested in the total amount of work that a person is doing or in how that work is distributed across the week?
NICOLAS: I think the total of work is
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: very important. But if I see the secondary day, for example, impact too much than the primary day, and if we are closer to competition, I would just decrease secondary day because my goal is really to be stronger on primary day. But if you are... If we are in off season, the most important will be the total. But closer to competition, it will be more like the split of the week. for example, for me, my secondary day was often pretty hard and I'm bad
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: really a lot. My primary day, like, closer to competition and we're start to just, like, really decrease intensity. And so my primary day, like, really increased. So it was really better for competition. But to make progress
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm, of course.
NICOLAS: of long time, I need to keep the buff at high levels.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I see what you mean. Yeah, yeah. So you think in terms of like, for example, the the relative intensity of each session, basically what you're saying is when we are in the off season, you could even keep three days that are pretty similar in terms of how hard they are, and it's fine. Whereas
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: when we approach competition, we really need to start distinguishing between maybe a primary day that we're supposed to base our decisions on and then you know a secondary and a tertiary day. Yeah.
NICOLAS: Yes, yes, need to have like big difference like in the intensity. Like if I squat like three times a week, I need to have like one squat LP free, for example, one squat LP is five or six. And we can have like one squat LP eight or nine. But I can do like, I can train like three times a week with LP seven or more, for example. But I'm in 120,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm. Yeah.
NICOLAS: so it's pretty hard for me also to recover.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah. And you mentioned velocity tracking earlier. one question that I wanted to ask you is, you know, in relation to all of the things that we've discussed, do you like to prescribe training with percentages, RPE, velocity, a combination of these of these tools? and you know, what do you think about you know the whole debate between auto regulation and more rigid prescription? So what do you think about all of this?
NICOLAS: So I think the most simple for athletes is just to follow the percentage. And I have a lot of athletes who like to train like this because they don't have to think during training and just follow. But they still have a fork or LP because just to not overshoot, undershoot, regarding what is prescribed in percentage. But when they have access to a velocity, I really like to prescribe Velocity because for me it's most important because when you have like correlation between intensity, between like Velocity and LPE, you can really adjust as best as possible the intensity of training. And like Velocity don't lie because a of people can overshoot or don't shoot, but... with velocity lines, true process. So it was like for me, velocity is most important. I LP.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. I see what you mean. Yeah. And do you think
NICOLAS: Hey.
Samuele Bolotta: that it could be misused as well?
NICOLAS: Yes, with beginner lifters, because they will change their technique just to be fast. So yes,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah.
NICOLAS: you need to have pretty good experience of training, because to have technique very the same, not change your technique, but in weight. It needs to be very reputable. So you can train with this. yes, I saw like for example on the Glyph, some lifters start to use velocity and just run their back to go fast. But that's not very good. So we stopped to use
Samuele Bolotta: Of course.
NICOLAS: it and just to have a good technique.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, because you know, one thing that J Jason sent a very interesting message today. And you know, we we were talking about this as well. and we were talking about the difference between noticing how the body of the athlete is moving under the bar and the velocity of the bar, right? And so there are people who believe, you know. Velocity is not important. I only care about how the body moves. Other people that maybe go in the opposite direction. And then probably like a happy medium is realizing that sure, velocity like matters. At the same time, you need to also look at how the body is pushing the bar, right? so yeah.
NICOLAS: Yeah, you know, for example, for me, I like to use the velocity in competition. And with my last warm up, I can predict pretty well my third attempt would be regarding the velocity because my technique is pretty repeatable and I don't have too much variations. So it can be really helpful for some lifters and it can be the same on training days. Like sometimes that happens. I don't know why velocity loss. or increase very fast. But most of the time I can predict if I do like this squat on last warm up, I can do this squat on top set and I will be into good HP for example, just with
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: velocity. So it can be great for this.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And in your experience, how does the mental aspect affect velocity? That is, if you are very hyped up and you're training with friends in front of other people, could this change a little bit?
NICOLAS: Yeah, yes, if you are high, for example, you can be very good in velocity.
Samuele Bolotta: Uh-huh.
NICOLAS: But it's just like you are in a good day also because you are maybe more aggressive or something. But I wanted to say like, velocity is very well when all goes well because when you see you make like speed. speed progress for example on same bar you can say I progress so I mean the good way but
Samuele Bolotta: Mm.
NICOLAS: during like bad periods it can be really hard mentally because like I said velocity don't lie don't so if I if you are slower on bar or same bars that you did before it just like bad times and It can be really hard when it's still like for a long time, you don't do like pair on weight or on velocity. It can be pretty hard.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm, of course. Yeah, yeah. And Yeah.
NICOLAS: Like, yeah, no, you like personally, I have stopped to use it during like six months because it was really hard to see each time on my last one up. was slower with something I did like faster, like six months before. So just I stopped it and I tried to enjoy
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: training again.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, I see what you mean. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. I think there's definitely like a and and you know, like this is I think that each tool has their specific pros and cons in terms of the mental approach. Because if you use RPE, you know, like there's a lot of potential like downsides there in terms of you know how it could ruin your training because some people are neurotic they might you know like keep obsessing over the RPE think a lot about which load they want to hit and you know maybe for percentages they have an idea you know of how this load is supposed to move and today it's not moving that way and so I start you know being paranoid. So I think that each tool has their own you know challenges to deal with mentally. and I think that it's important to be aware of the of them in the end.
NICOLAS: Yeah, for sure. But they also need to see the standard factors because sometimes you can have bad t-shirt, but if something happens during your life, or
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: you have a bad sleep or bad meal, for example, it just can explain the bad training. And so you just need to do the work and continue to move forward. But I think you need to... to see if it's repeatable or not because you can have one bad day, it's okay, it's happened. We are all different and sometimes we are in a good day and sometimes not. But try to do the work and if it's other, it should be because you will still make
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: progress and it just can say you are just more fatigue but you are not less stronger. But
Samuele Bolotta: Absolutely.
NICOLAS: yes, but if it's like during long times, so maybe like try to speak with your coach and make some change regarding programming because it can seem like it's a program and you just not recover as possible or just you don't like training and you need to do more training to make progress. But yes, what I repeat a lot of times to my athletes like especially during off season or some bar like don't move as they want but it's only because they are like more volume like during for example t3 or secondary day and so they just are they not are like less stronger but they just have more fatigue and so it's harder for them to move the bar faster and it just what they need for the moment to be strange, become like stronger after. And a lot of times they understand it, like for example during D-Log, but because when I just drop the volume for second on the day, like bar moves very well and so that no, yes, I was just fatigue and no, it's okay.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah. and would you say that when it comes to programming, and and the premise is that this is in part a false dilemma, right? But do you think that you are more of a top-down or a bottom-up person? That is, do you tend to base your programs mostly on you know, the theory that you learned, your experience, your insights, your ideas on how things are supposed to move, or on the the feedback of the athlete in terms of how they respond to training, the the the way they deal with stimuli. And again, I I want to premise that of course no one is only top-down or only bottom up, right? But we can definitely see in the power lifting scene that some people tend to move a bit more towards the bottom up side, whereas others are more I would say focused on the top down side of the of the picture.
NICOLAS: Yeah, so yes, for me, like feedback of athletes are pretty important because if they want to make progress on long term and like stay in powerlifting, they need to like enjoy the process and enjoy the training. So I try to listen to their things and to adjust my program, organize it, even if I try to... to also keep my things because like sometimes like for example, they want to do like a PR in the month, but it's not a good period. So I try to explain then we can do like, we can do this now, but like we can build on two or three bots, three bots and do the NAFTA for example. But yes, I think like the communication is very important and lot of... I it's need to understand the program to really enjoy the process and go all in the process because if you program, especially when you program with volume-based and low-fault linear sets, it can be pretty hard for lifters who see a lot of top sets, for example, on Instagram, and they do
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: five sets of three reps and... But when they understand they need this to become stronger, it's fine.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And what would you say about technique in terms of do you think that you're more of a top-down person or a bottom-up person? Do you think that the body can learn how to move by itself? Or do you think that the coach should I don't want to say impose, but bring a lot to the table in terms of how the the athlete is supposed to move?
NICOLAS: I think like yes, the body can learn by itself and feels very natural like the athletes need to find something very natural for them and my priority it will be like to see if the basics are respectful like the standards or the feet the feet pressure for example on squat and the blessing like the bad positioning. If I see like something very not good for me, I will tell them, but I will not tell them like you should squat like this. I think you will be stronger because like I don't know, especially when they start. But yes, when I have a knuckle after like three or six months, like... we can start to make some changes and we'll see better. But honestly, not my priority. It's like especially music and lift. We found something dangerous, like very background and something like this. And if the standards are pretty good, that's fine to me. And for sure,
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely.
NICOLAS: if I see like a cue or something they can do better, will tell them. But I will not change other techniques in one time for knuckles.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah. So so like what what is the the the coaching process look like in terms of technique guidance? That is, do you typically give technique cues like every week, every block? how does that look like on average?
NICOLAS: Like, the Zephyr and like, like, pretty beginner athletes, I can give like, one show like, every week. Like, one show
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: to be focused on each lift. Because, and not more, because if you lift too much, they will just be below and finish too much during lift. And it not will be really good. So I think like, one show by week can be great. And for like, pretty... Experiencing afters like when you buy block can be pretty good. You don't need to change too much I think.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, because technique is another aspect that some lifters tend to obsess over. That is, some of them believe that yeah, like if
NICOLAS: Yes. Yes.
Samuele Bolotta: you change if you find this final Q, then you can squat like 30 kilos more, right?
NICOLAS: Yes, I agree. If you change your technique, at least you need like maybe six or eight weeks to see if it really works. And I see a lot of thrifters that change at maybe 70 % or 80%. I say, I'm really stronger and I move faster. But then they come to their mats, it just don't work because... You know, like, you can change something and it's better with easy weights, but it's not the reality.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And something that I wanted to ask you is when you like how do you see intuition as a characteristic in a coach? Do you think that intuition is important or do you think that most choices should be made based on data? like and I think that it's interesting to you know draw A parallel with science, right? When you think about scientific experiments, you know, these people usually base their their moves on the data, right? They come up with hypotheses, they try to falsify the hypothesis. At the same time, we know that there are some scientists who at some point have these insights, these intuitions, and they maybe change the landscape of what the domain looks like. So what do you think about this in in powerlifting coaching? And actually
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: I mean I actually you know in rugby coaching as well and in basketball coaching, like it's the same.
NICOLAS: Yeah, yes, I think like intuition are pretty important and because sometimes you just need to like to go outside the way to find something to become stronger like
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think it's it's why for example like high frequency start to be very popular in polypting because some girls like start to do like six or seven SBD a week It was like not normal, but it worked. So it continued. And now it's pretty like what did like most of small world class shifter, for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: Yes, I think intuition can be really important and you can find a good pattern, for example, technically with intuition or something like that.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And in your process, is it more important than data analysis?
NICOLAS: that just depends. Like, I don't know because we have a lot of trucker, but we have a lot of data to try it personally. So a lot of the times I can resolve a program only with data. For example, when
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I create, I have a plateau, I can have a good analysis and see what's not worth. For example. But yeah, sometimes you can have like an aspiration and try and it can work.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: So it's hard to respond to this. think the
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah yeah.
NICOLAS: buff are important because like, yeah, you can see with data and just if like you train not enough just to increase a bit and it will like, relance the progression.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah. and you mentioned high frequency earlier. one question that I wanted to ask you is imagine that you know a young Agata Shitko comes to you and asks you to be coached, right? do you see yourself, like how do you see yourself guide her? Towards this high frequency approach that clearly is working very well right now for her. Like, do you think that's a solution that you would arrive to? Do you think that you would, you know, keep her in the more mainstream frequency real? Like, what do you think about this?
NICOLAS: I think it will be like, it will need like lot of times with BKNR Zifter to increase high frequency because
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think you don't need to put them like on it too fast because they can make a very good progress without it and just you can use it like after because yes. I have an athlete who's seen with me, we did like high frequency before, but he came and he has like lot of mobility restriction and start to have lot of pain. So we decrease a lot the frequency, just try to build muscle, build a good mobility, like to be an athlete and before to be too much specific. And now we try to and he made like... good progress because again in muscle mass and he can perform without pain and now we can make to increase frequency again because he have very good potential and I think he can be very strong but yes I think you need to put it with time like
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think Agatha as like six or seven years of powerlifting before to do it, that she didn't start by it. So yes.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm, absolutely. And
NICOLAS: Yes, like what's important is to be an athlete, like have a good level of mass, have a good mobility, have a pretty good cardio, and then you can try to start to increase your frequency, for example. Because in powerlifting, you can have like athletes who start by powerlifting, but they don't like play sport before. and powerlifting can be pretty made pretty lot of restrictions if you perform only hit so you need
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: to perform different things
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. And do you think that there's a like actually what do you think are the mistakes that a coach could make when it comes to coaching a very young and talented junior lifters? That is, and and I mean this in terms of how could you best build a long term successful sustainable career for them? And on the other hand, what mistake could you make? To maybe
NICOLAS: I think what you like most mistake you can do like it's yes like to go in the easiest way like if I like very talentless with a good genetic good muscular mass for example you can like like we say like prescribed high frequency pretty fast and it will be it will make a lot of progress. But when it will start to have a good plateau, when you can have a plateau, you will not have keys to make progress against because you will always be at maximum volume or frequency, for example. So it will be pretty hard. But if you can start like... with low frequency, like do a lot of accessory mobility, some cardio and start to increase like frequency after and really slowly. I think you can have progress in very long term and have less rest of injury. Because like we said, if
Samuele Bolotta: Absolutely.
NICOLAS: you perform only SBD, like it's not very good for your mobility and you should have like Ips or back problem for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's interesting.
NICOLAS: Yes, for me, it's pretty easy to push the credit at a maximum rack very fast. But yes,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: the program, when it will have a plateau, it will be very hard to make progress again. And also,
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: it can just be burned out of poor lifting after two or three years and just quit.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah, also because you know, it creates expectations, right? when you're making such a fast progress as a young lifter, you know, you might start thinking, Okay, if I keep making progress like this, I'm gonna be in Sheffield in a in a few years.
NICOLAS: Yeah.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, and then you know, maybe you get through a plateau and it's difficult and you quit, right? So yeah, absolutely.
NICOLAS: Yeah, I celebrate. Yeah, you go.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, What I wanted to ask is precisely this. aside from junior lifters, what do you think is the most crucial variable when it comes to injury risk? Do you think that it's load management, a lifestyle problem, genetics?
NICOLAS: I think it's to not listen
Samuele Bolotta: Hm, okay.
NICOLAS: to Because when you get injured in polypting, it's always because you have, for example, on chest, your chest will be tight and it will finish by a chest tear, for example, because you just have pushed too much and don't have time to just... rest and recover from this. Like it's not like rugby or for example you can be tickered and break your knees. Like in powerlifting we control all the movements so most of the times you have tightness and you continue to push on it and you will get injured. So I think it's
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely.
NICOLAS: really important just to listen our body. and like do the things I do pre-hab for
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: example or some agencies to recover when you have like tight zone for example.
Samuele Bolotta: Absolutely, yeah, I see what you mean. Yeah. And yeah, it's interesting because when it comes to you know, I I see that I I see how it could be tempting for especially, you know, young coaches to push a talented young lifter that they're coaching. because they you know they they start thinking, okay, if I push this lifter who's like who can be really successful because they're talented, then you know I can make a name for myself and so on. but definitely like what you're saying is is really important and it also it also goes back to I think one of those psychological traits that you need to build into a into an athlete. That is the ability to learn to yourself, the ability to understand when you're close to the limit and maybe you have to push back a little bit.
NICOLAS: Yes. I have seen like too much Lister just to have like, yes, for example, shoot a problem and put
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: Tiger Bomb on it to bench.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: And because it's very warm, you don't feel the pain and it just
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: get worse and worse training after training. And then they
Samuele Bolotta: Exactly.
NICOLAS: get injured for three months. Instead, like if they take like one week of like deload. and then can push again, it will be fine.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. And and last question that I wanted to ask you. what do you think about powerlifting in 10 years? How do you see this port evolve, both at the you know, mainstream and elite level? what what do you think about this?
NICOLAS: Yes, I think the level will continue to increase because more and more people arrive to gain their life with poor lifting, for example with reputation or something like that. So they can be pretty professional athletes. So
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: I think yes, the level will continue to increase. we have like a lot of young listers who come. Even if I think like listers that young girls have before, so they will have their top levels like young girls, that's old
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: generation, for example. But yeah, it's pretty hard to know. Like I think for me now, we are pretty in the top in terms of visibility so I'm not sure it will continue to increase. It's still like really great like to be like for example on Eurosport for World Championships so if we like continue to be like this it can be great.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm. Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, something that I was wondering is, you know, how young lived yeah.
NICOLAS: And yes, I think more brands are interested in powerlifting, for example with Aventus competitions. Like you have Sheffield, Aventus, maybe you will have more in the further years. But it's still like pretty hard sport to perform. So you need to be very patient in resilience. I don't
Samuele Bolotta: Yes.
NICOLAS: know, I think it will never be like popular as soccer, for example. But yes, if we can
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah yeah.
NICOLAS: stay at the same level, can be great.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah.
NICOLAS: And I feel also people start to understand, you know, to live like order in good condition, like to train strange is very important. Like 10 years before, like a lot of the third side, you only to train cardio, but now they start to make strange. So, so yes, I think maybe the, the people of powerlifters and the people of for coaching will start to be a bit different and we need like to do like powerlifting helps for the purpose for people. It can be like a great market for coaches.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, yeah, of course. I see what you mean. Yeah, I think it's interesting 'cause like w what I see right now is the It could be pretty daunting for a young lifter to start powerlifting and see that the record in the seventy-four kilo class is like nine hundred plus, right? And they might be thinking, I'm never gonna reach that. It's it's crazy, right?
NICOLAS: Yes, yes, I understand what you mean because like in France we have like a lot of athletes who start because we had like a lot of leaders who become like world champions with like Leah, Tiffany, Noemi and so
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. Yeah.
NICOLAS: they start and want it and thinks I will be world champions too if I train well in three or four years and it's not the reality and yes, no, the level are really really high. but you can just perform for yourself. And in France, we have really great local meets, and I think it's important to encourage them.
Samuele Bolotta: Mm-hmm.
NICOLAS: Because you can do a lot of local meet with a good show, good organizations, and be really satisfying of your day. So I think it's most important to continue. if you want powerlifting to continue to grow.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I agree one hundred percent with what you're saying, man. Yeah. And so yeah. yeah. Yeah, did you want to to to to add something?
NICOLAS: No, think for me it's good. It was a good
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah, perfect.
NICOLAS: time. I my English was okay. Yeah, yeah, thanks.
Samuele Bolotta: It was very good. No worries. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think it's really interesting. It's always nice to talk to someone who's been in the sport for, you know, such a long time. And not only from the perspective of a coach, but also from the perspective of an elite athlete. So yeah, that was pretty cool, man. thank you very much.
NICOLAS: Thanks a lot.
Samuele Bolotta: Yeah. And thank you everyone for listening, of course. and yeah, stay tuned for the next episode.
NICOLAS: Thanks, bye.
