Increasing Velocity: Part I (The Wall)

"I wish I threw harder!" 

If you are a pitcher, I am certain, without any question of a doubt, that these words have been uttered across your lips at some point.  If you try and tell me they haven't, I'm looking you right in the eye, right now, and calling you a LIAR!  As pitchers, it seems like the notion of throwing 100 mph is engrained in our brains from the first day we toe that rubber, and set our sights on the catcher's mitt.  Well, talk is cheap.  Do something about it!  Right??  Could it be that easy?  I think it's safe to say, that in today's day in age, the concept of gaining velocity, "in the weight room" so to speak, is a generally accepted idea.  So why aren't results the same across the board?  Why do some pitchers gain 8 mph in their first 6 weeks of training, and other don't see any improvement, EVER?  Perhaps, it has much more to do with, actual, desire than most of us realize.  Perhaps, just uttering the words, "I wish I threw harder," won't actually make us throw harder.

The Wall:

If you want to see gains in your velocity, you have to push past "The Wall!"  What is "The Wall?"  The Wall is that feeling you get when you're tired, and you just don't think you have any more.  The Wall is that little voice inside your brain, saying, "OK, That's probably good, right about there!"  Elite athletes know The Wall, and know it well.  They already know how to push beyond it.  That's what got them to the position they are in.  The Wall is different for every sport, and every situation.

For cyclists, The Wall comes when your at the foot of a 3 mile climb, your legs feel like jello, and you feel like your lungs have shrunk to the size of pears.  In the concept of velocity gaining, there are several "walls," like, sore muscles, sore arms, pitch counts, desire, and determination.  The challenge then, in gaining velocity, is to commit to a program, and push through all the "walls" that may be standing in front of you, all while keeping a close watch on, what many pitchers will refer to as their baby, your arm.  The key becomes knowing yourself and your arm, and how much the both of you can handle.  But I can promise you this.  If you are not willing to test your limits, you will never know.

Now, I know there is still the camp out there, we'll call them "old-school," that is adamant, to this day, that there is nothing you can do.  Velocity is something you're born with, you either have it, or you don't!!  I must admit, there is certainly some truth to this.  Can we grab an John Doe off the street, give him a year's worth of training, sit back and watch him blow up radar guns across the land?  No.  There is certainly some natural ability that needs to be taken into consideration here.  But, when speaking on pitcher-to-pitcher basis, is it possible to increase an individual's very own, personal, velocity?  Yes.  Is it going to take a lot of hard work?  Yes.  Do you have to be 100% committed to the task at hand, pushing yourself out of comfort zones, and beyond personal limits you didn't think you possibly could, convincing yourself that what you are doing is worth your time and will pay off in the end??  YES!!