Day two: Go Hard or Go Home

I just got back from work and I am really feeling the burn. They do say Go hard or Go home, don't they? So before I hit the hay, let me tell you about my SPARTAN GYM REGIMEN! 

Aside from my weak knee (and possible high blood pressure), I am rather a healthy kind of guy. Running the 10 km's should not be a problem. I won't be able to manage in 30 minutes like some of the elite athletes, but I think I could do it in under an hour. The hard part will be the obstacles. With each one taking a massive toll on your strength, it will be hard to keep on going when the body just wants to sit down and have a glass of water.


I had a chat with my kick boxing instructor who is the fittest person I know (next to Superwoman [mentioned above] and Alicia keys, but that's a different kind of fit!). We have agreed on compound exercises, work outs that target as many muscles as possible in one movement. The reason for this is that it is simple to get lost in isolating the popular muscles, these are easy to train but when this happens you are not doing yourself any favours.


Real strength comes when your body works together as a whole. Have you ever had do drag around an unconscious friend? Maybe they drank too much, maybe you knocked them out. Either way, they are heavy! This is because most of their muscles are not working. When you normally carry somebody (if there is such a thing), it is easier because the-not-too obvious muscles are still active. When the person is unconscious, you are basically lifting all their mass without any help. Now think of this in reverse, if it is normally easy to do a certain movement, take for example, climbing a rope or jumping over a puddle. Would it not be easier if even the little muscles in your body are working hard?


Going from this idea, I added a little Kombo tweak to the recipe, by deciding to superset the exercises. What? Yeah... I said, SUPERSET! So, I take the first two and do them back to back, the same goes for the next two, and the two after that. This brilliant idea was to ensure that the workouts have a cardio fitness aspect to them (just in in case running 10 km is harder than I thought!). I was basically moving as much as possible, as fast as possible and as often as possible.


Thanks to my big dreams, I'm exhausted! I may have underestimated the effect of sitting in front of the t.v and eating junk for the last three months. Tomorrow is going to hurt, I can tell already. In the end, it will pay off. Because... THIS IS SPARTA!


My focus is also to have the strength to pull my body over walls and swing across monkey bars with ease. To accomplish that, I did some back exercises (my fav!). 


The exact exercises were as follows:

Back and shoulders

Exercises
Overhand pull-ups - 4 Sets of 12 Repetitions
Clean and jerk with a front squat - 4S/10R    
Weighted twisting back extensions - 4S/12R    
Seated rows - 4S/8R                
Upright rows - 4S/8R            
Reverse flys    - 4S/8R            
Dumb-bell deadlifts - 4S/12R    
    
Core workout - 4S/12R
Weighted sit-ups - 4S/12R        
Reverse crunches - 4S/8R        
Hanging leg raises - 4S/8R


Here is a little video I found to show how useful a strong back is:

Ok, I admit that doing clap pull ups is not exactly useful, however you HAVE to admit that it's pretty damn cool! Well, that's all for today folks, tomorrow I'll cover diet tips... Yum Yum!


Peace out, 


Sonny