Pushing my limits on the Survival Workout

Sunday, June 24, 2012
I typically measure the intensity of my Survival Workouts by the number of stations I include.  I consider a station a point on the trail where I stop and perform any of the variety of exercises I’ve laid out to address a total body workout.  When I was able to perform my calesthenic-type moves for the muscles of the lower body like sprints through the woods and picnic table hops, it would not be uncommon to have over 20 stations.  Since the injury to my knee and the resulting surgery, I’ve been limiting myself to about 16 stations…until Sunday morning.

I start the workout with push-ups normally.  I’m tuned in to my pr in a big way with push-ups and always challenging myself to do more.  Then I move to the pull-up station where, tired from the push-ups, I tend to manage around 12 full extension repetitions.  Well this day I thought I’d start with the pull-ups to see if I could break my pr of 14.   Happily, I managed 16 though could only do 65 push-ups following my pull-up effort.

Along the way, I did extra biceps curls and recorded another pr with 18 overhead rock presses.  I was feeling so good that I did 4 climbs of the swing set, but at that point all the extra work began to take its toll.  I managed to get close to pr’s on many of the final lifts, but was completely spent when I returned to the car.  I had a nice pump as a result of all the additional sets, but no one was there to see my sweaty, glistening biceps.  Bummer...since I know chicks really dig that.

I’d hoped to get in a bike ride later in the day, but Heidi returned from her three-week field trip out west and wanted to share her pictures from the Grand Canyon, Zion National Park, and the Colorado Rockies.  She’d taken over a thousand and I wanted to see them all.  It was an amazing trip, one she says she will never forget and was so grateful that I had introduced her to camping, backpacking and the wilderness, which inspired her to take the trip in the first place.  She was able to do and see the things she did not only because of her desire to visit these places, but because she keeps herself in shape to do them through cycling, swimming and running...and I’d like to think I inspired some of that, as well.

Survival Workout: 60 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 100-150.
Calories burned:  600.