My Top 5 Mistakes I've Made Training
- Jake Hicks
- Aug 17
- 8 min read
Updated: Aug 18
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I train every day of my life. I've done so for over 10 years and I've trained for over 25 total. One of my favorite things about training is I've learned it would take multiple lifetimes to truly master. I've made many mistakes over the years, and I think sharing mine will only help others go further than I have. Enjoy.
I started lifting at eleven and have been training for more than twenty-five years. In this article I will walk through the top five mistakes that cost me progress, time, and sometimes confidence. These are the lessons I wish I’d learned two decades ago—simple ideas that change how you build size, strength, and athleticism. Below I break them down, explain why they matter, and give practical steps you can use right now.
The video version is better IMO and you can watch the video on YouTube by CLICKING HERE.
Mistake #1 — Starting strength training too late (and misunderstanding how to get strong)
One of the biggest turning points for me was when a coach explained Newton’s laws in the context of athletics: He told a group of NFL athletes that a body at rest stays at rest until acted upon by an external force. Then he said the acceleration of an object is directly proportional to the force acting on it. He summarized it with the harder you push the ground, the higher you jump, or faster you run. BOOM that was a major lightbulb moment for me. I've wasted my entire athletic career not understanding the importance of strength and force production. That five-minute explanation clicked in a way nothing else had. The difference wasn’t just looking big; it was being able to move and perform through force expression.
There are a few ways to get big. Unfortunately not all ways are beneficial to atheltes and some of them can actually negatively impact your performance on the field. If you’re young and want both size and performance, you need to prioritize high-output exercises and reps. I wrote an article detailing high vs low output training and exercises. CLICK HERE to read it.
The barbell is the best implement to develop general strength. It's the best tool in the weight room to place the most force, or weight on your body. You want to build muscle that not only looks big, but performs big. Take this mindset into your training. Unfortunately for me, I focused on getting big, using a lot of bodybuilding and low output exercises. I didn't understand the difference. I thought getting bigger meant I was getting stronger. Not always the case. There's no such thing as "TOO BIG" but there is such a thing as "WRONG BIG". Read that article I linked for more context.
Mistake #2 — Believing extreme soreness equals a good workout
I used to think if I didn’t wake up sore, I hadn’t worked hard enough. That’s a trap. Soreness is neither a reliable measure of progress nor a goal. Training should be a controlled stimulus followed by recovery that yields adaptation. Too much soreness is a sign you overshot the dose which results in a recovery time that is too long.
Here is an analogy: if you want your your hand to become tougher, you can rub it on concrete a little at a time. Rub too much and it becomes raw and you won't be able to use it for weeks. Instead rub it on concrete just a little at a time, let it recover and repeat. As your experience increases, so will your tolerance and you will be able to rub it harder and longer. Pause.... Take this same approach in training. Micro-dose your training stimulus, let it recover, then repeat. Soreness happens, but EXTREME soreness should be accidental—not the point of the session. Recovery is when you are progressing. Make sure it's not an extended period of time that inhibits your ability to train at a frequency that is advantageous for growth.
Plan training loads so progress is repeatable week to week, not brutal workouts that leave you struggling to get off a toilet.
If you’re constantly wrecked, reduce volume or intensity and focus on consistent progression.
Mistake #3 — Skipping Leg Day
Being tall and lanky, I avoided squats because I felt I was bad at them. They were also very uncomfortable. So I just didn't train them as much. That decision limited my progress. It's harder to re train a bad habit so my advice is to start day 1 establishing high standards for positions and depth. Squat depth and position are standards you should establish even with no weight on the bar before you load them. This should be priority, not weight.
As a coach, I became fascinated by the idea of self-efficacy. Self-efficacy (how good you think you are at something) determines whether you practice it and how much effort you put into it. If you think you’re bad at a movement you’ll avoid it, or when you do have to do it you might not put as much effort in. A couple things to improve self efficacy is education and practice. Education on why you should be doing the thing you don't like, then an environment that allows both practice and grace while you are in a developmental stage.
The key for squats is to set a high standard DAY 1. If you have to take 10 steps back to re learn it DO IT. It's worth it. Let other people claim these big numbers. I used to see garbage squats from people who claimed to be stronger than me. They are lying to themselves. Let them. Reform your squat, and other lower body exercises to a high standard quality movement pattern. That's the real way to get ahead, because so many others would rather lie to themselves and cheat their way to big lifts. Trust me that is not the way.
I was also never exposed to many lower body movements such as RDL's or deadlifts, not even a trap bar deadlift until I was in the performance world as a coach. My movement library for lower body was awful. I wish I had been exposed to other forms of lower body training much earlier in my lifting experience.
Start back at square one: prioritize technique and depth with light loads or just bodyweight. If you can't squat the weight to the standard position and depth, it's not worth doing.
Use other lower body variations—RDLs, trap bar deadlifts, hip hinge work—to build posterior chain strength and confidence.
Be willing to take steps back technically to go further long term. Fix positions before adding weight.
Mistake #4 — Underestimating the importance of food (especially carbs)
Working out is catabolic: you break the body down in the gym and you build it back up outside the gym. The anabolic piece is dietary. A simple truth I learned: lift the weights to break down tissue; eat the food to build it back up.
“You don't get bigger in a gym, you get bigger in the kitchen. The program to gain weight is a fork, not a barbell.”
Carbohydrates matter because they replenish muscle glycogen—the primary fuel for lifting the weights. Many lifters focus on protein but under-eat carbs and energy, which limits recovery and performance. If you want to grow and lift heavier, treat food like fuel. Carbs are the main source of energy. They allow you to go further in the gym, do more reps etc much like gas allows a car to drive further. Many people could double their carb intake and still have room to eat more. I wrote an article on gaining weight, you can CLICK HERE to read it. The person that eats the most food will make the most progress in the gym. It's that simple.
Stop making excuses. Eat the food, and trust me when I say there's more to eating and gaining weight than the average person is aware of, read that article I linked to learn more.
Think in terms of energy: carbs are a primary source of energy when you lift weights. If you’re lifting heavy, your glycogen stores need replenishing—eat the carbs.
Protein and fats matter, but don’t sleep on carbs for training performance and recovery.
Mistake #5 — Only doing the exercises I liked (avoiding variation)
I used to rotate the handful of lifts I enjoyed while ignoring many useful variations. Week after week, month after month I'm just doing that stuff I like and avoiding everything I don't like. That limited my long-term progress. Every exercise variation is a tool—front squat, box squat, deficit deadlift, RDLs, trap bar deadlifts, pause bench, close-grip bench—each gives you a different leverage, weakness fix, or carryover.
Another example: I didn’t do pull-ups because I wasn’t good at them and instead used lat pulldowns. Lat pulldowns felt good, pull ups didn't. I also didn't know how to do pull ups and relied on my human instincts which was to make them easier and cheat. Major mistake. Pull-ups are the back squat of upper-body pulling strength. Strength compounds across movements: an example is I can strict curl 75 pound DBs. I didn't do a bunch of bicep curls to accomplish that feat, I simply got strong AF from pull ups and rows. I literally barely do any bicep curls. This reinforces my first mistake on not prioritizing strength.
So many times I went to the gym only to do the things I enjoyed or felt good doing. This is a trap. As humans we like to do things we are already good at. A lot of our human instincts are the EXACT OPPOSITE of what we need. Our human instincts are to survive, make things easier or more tolerable. Training instincts often counter our human instincts. You must overcome or override your human instincts and I like to say replace your emotions with logic. Be a robot. That's the advantage to working with a coach or training on a well designed training program. That program is built on logic, not emotions or your feelings. Trust me when I say this, if you don't like it, it's probably exactly what you need to be doing.
Incorporate exercise variations, ESPECIALLY the ones you "don't like".
Let logic—not emotion—decide your program. If an exercise helps your goal, do it even if you don’t “like” it.
Become a robot. There are no exercises you like, there are no exercises you dislike. There are only exercises.
BONUS CONTENT: Frustration is often a prerequisite of change. When your level of frustration is high enough, you'll seek change. And that's exactly what happened to me and why I am sharing these things. I've been down these roads, you don't have to go down them as well. Learn from my mistakes and stack more quality training in your prime. I didn't know these things as an athlete, but I strongly believe these things could have strongly affected my trajectory of my athletic career.
How to fix these mistakes — Practical rules to follow
Prioritize heavy, low-rep strength work with barbell-based lifts and meaningful variations.
Microdose training stimuli: progress consistently rather than chasing extreme soreness.
Start technical movements early—squat and hinge patterns should be learned and reinforced from day one.
Treat food as fuel: track intake, prioritize carbohydrates around training, and remember growth happens in recovery.
Create a logical, non-emotional plan and stick to it. Decide what you need and do it even if it’s uncomfortable.
Conclusion
These five mistakes—starting strength training late, chasing soreness, avoiding legs, underfueling, and sticking only to favorite exercises—cost me years. Each one is fixable with a little honesty and a plan. If you take one idea away today: build strength early, eat to support it, and use variations to give yourself a longer, more productive career in the gym.
Recalibrate your mindset and how you make decisions on what you're doing in the gym. Understand the depths of training and read those articles I linked. This is the type of information I wish my 14 year old self could have received.
My programs and remote coaching services exist for one simple reason. To save each athlete from going down the same wrong roads I did. Shop my programs below, or complete a custom program questionnaire. I would love to work with you and help you achieve you goals.
Here are a couple FREE Downloads. Swole Method is an intro to low rep sets. Super Sets is an advanced and novel low rep set program that I created.
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