Goal Setting: How Do Marc Pro Athletes Plan for Big Goals?
The first step in accomplishing your goals is setting them. The Marc Pro team asked our athletes, “How do you set goals for yourself?” with the hopes that these athletes’ responses can inspire your own goal setting.
Goal Setting with the Marc Pro Athletes
Ben Greenfield
How do you set goals for yourself?
I test my blood, urine, stool, saliva and nervous system health for key biomarkers, then customize and adjust my daily habits, bio-hacks, workouts, diet and supplements accordingly!
What is your main goal for 2017?
To continue my pursuit to teach people how to attain an optimized human machine with a high functioning brain and body. But for my personal health specifically, I’m planning on putting on about 15 pounds of muscle, along with speed, power and strength in 2017!
Brian MacKenzie
How do you set goals for yourself?
Through inspiration. That can come through pain, suffering, joy, or love. It has to be felt though, and I have to understand that feeling. If I don’t explore the feeling nothing will occur.
What is your main goal for 2017?
To get closer to what we are naturally capable of doing and being.
Emily Bridgers
How do you set goals for yourself?
Evaluate your priorities first and then set realistic goals based on how you prioritize. Make sure those goals/priorities are in line with your lifestyle and have a plan to make them happen. Make general and specific goals. Write them down because you are more likely to achieve them!
What is your main goal for 2017?
Be present. Continue to push the boundaries of my athletic potential and lead by example throughout my fitness/competitive journey.
In other words, appreciate my talents daily and the people around me that have allowed me to get this far. Honor these gifts by continuing to pursue CrossFit competitively and being the best athlete, coach, and influencer possible.
Philip Mooney
How do you set goals for yourself?
I like to think about what would make me proud, and what would make my daughter proud of me. The answer to that can usually be found by winning a big race!
What is your main goal for 2017?
I’d like to set the fastest time riding from the bottom to the top of Mt Tam on Railroad Grade.
Chris Harland-Dunaway
How do you set goals for yourself?
First I think of a race I love and have the ability to win (this requires some ambition and imagination, but also an idea of races you’ve succeeded in the past). I then address the main weakness in the way of me winning that race. Is it tactics? Conserving energy? Having a better threshold? Having better punch? Having a better sprint? I think that identifying your main weakness in your way is the best way to take on a challenging goal, and then really addressing it once or twice a week in some way, for months.
What is your main goal for 2017?
Win White Rock Road Race.
Sam Boardman
How do you set goals for yourself?
For me, and much like many other people, setting goals equates to growth, both on and off the bike. Whenever my coach and I map out the races for the season, or my general training, every year we have tried to up the intensity bit by bit. Whether that meant augmenting the volume or hitting races with a more competitive start list, the objective has always been to push my body and mind further and further out into that unknown gray area of physical and mental limitation, trying to make the unknown known. And I think, getting on a more existential level, that’s the whole point of sport. When you boil it down, in the grand scheme of things winning a race means very little to those other than the person who actually won it, and that’s because of that process of discovery. Understanding that YOUR own body is the one capable of overcoming that obstacle, be it a hill, a certain distance, or just some stupid fast peloton full of other racers just as gritty as you are, is what makes bike racing so special, and what guides my goal setting process. What are the steps I need to take to achieve that euphoria? That being said, that euphoria doesn’t always come in the shape of actually winning a race. This year, being new to the team, I have very few goals that don’t include the team.
What is your main goal for 2017?
This is my first year racing at the domestic elite level, and I right now, my only goal is to be a sponge. My teammates have amassed an unbelievably amount of experience that I want to absorb and learn from. If that means working for another teammate, I am more than happy to do so. But if I were to pick a specific race, I would have to say the Chico time trial. I have a score to settle with that stage that has been haunting me for the better part of the year, and I am intent on getting that monkey off my back with a result this year.
Blake Anton
How do you set goals for yourself?
I do it based on a couple of criteria. First is what races are fun and I love. Sometimes it is the course, the spectators, or the region. Second is what are the team’s goals? Got to keep the guys upstairs happy! Lastly, is what would push and develop me most as a rider? Reaching outside of your comfort zone in bike racing is tough, because you generally get your teeth kicked in, but you have to do that to push yourself in training, trying to eek every drop of potential and performance out. And every one in a while, you get lucky, have great legs, and it becomes your day.
What is your main goal for 2017?
Poyang Lake will probably be my biggest goal for the year. It is an incredibly beautiful race in a stunning region of China, is quite difficult, and is a major team race.
Sam Bassetti
How do you set goals for yourself?
One of the things that drew me into this sport in the first place was a desire to find out how good I was and how good I could become. When I first started racing in the Nor Cal High School Mountain Bike Racing League, I wasn’t fighting for podium spots. I was fighting to finish inside the top 50. Seeing the work I began putting into the sport translate into results was always very satisfying, and it still is today. The desire to see how good I can be has become a guide for my goal setting.
What is your main goal for 2017?
My goals always force me to ask myself, “Can I be that good? Can I be that fast?” This year I want to win the Sunset Road Race stage of the Redlands Bicycle Classic.
What are your goals for 2017? Tweet your goals to the Marc Pro team at www.twitter.com/themarcpro.