Month: October 2023

Part One – 10/6/23 Evening – Burpees To End The Day Right :

10/6/23 ~620pm
I easily guilt myself into doing…something physical.

See, I’ve been watching all sorts of “training muay thai in thailand” videos, my youtube feed thinks I want to watch those with hundreds of thousands or millions of subscribers lift (ish) – it’s not challenging to say screw it, delay the shower, and go do…

Tonight is burpees.

Why burpees?
It’s simple – I didn’t feel like snatching the kettlebell or curling the barbell.

So burpees.

I take a few minutes to check in, laughing that I’m about to burpee while still burping from dinner, american chop suey, red sauce burps about to be combined with the wind builder 🙂

I’ll enjoy it.
(truly, no sarcasm, the more I do burpees the more I enjoy them)

then spoke about it as a short (as far as the video – I get a kick out of the drop of sweat coming out of my beard at about eight, nine seconds – and hehehe “liketh, subscribeth” as a sort of made it to the end easter egg)

I write it time and again.
I’d advise it to all ; do something physical every day.

The pushups, the burpees, maybe jump rope, a bunch of bw squats, kettlebell something, the mace swings, bleachers, a few pullups – something daily, to move, cause physical movement makes the mind right.

Happiness may be a struggle, but a good sweat while out of breath makes it hard to be anything but free and full of dopamine, on cloud nine of euphoria.

Many smoke weed, I’ll do burpees – mine doesn’t hurt, nor does it cost a penny, just honest sweat equity building into a few hours of a natural high.

Persistence & Tenacity

Part Two – 10/7/23 Morning – Burpees To Start The Day Right :

10/7/23 ~7am

Right now I’m adjusted to a horrible sleep schedule, the other day I’d told the pastor I’d be there this morning – I may not be going to service, but I’m going the the volunteer labor.

Shrugs. I’m in a weird place, working through it. It’s a rationalization, at least I’m doing something church related.

No sleep, I’m working out about 45min before my alarm, the alarm I intended to shower at anyway.

Sounds like last night, hop, skip, and a jump, really twisting my own arm 😉 to burpee before the shower.

“might as well do the burpees”

…..

Put the song on repeat, set up an interval timer – taking it easy…

third world – immortal technique

25×2 burpees every :30, so 50 in 12:30, should be simple, probably easy enough.

…..

Last night 75ish burpees set my world right for a good three hours.

I figure I’ll burpee myself to a positive mindstate, fit will come along with it.

See, burpees hit two birds, maybe more probably more definitely more, with one stone.

I’m in a better mood.
I got a good sweat going, чай хорошо (burpees тоже хорошо – да, yes I did duolingo already today) earned the green tea I may drink soon time allowing.
Fit comes with the burpees, there’s ∞ opportunity to build work capacity with it, playing with the variables.

Building Work Capacity With Burpees :

(note yesterday morning’s scale weight was 285lbs)
This morning’s burpees were done as two one pump cdc style (rocking chairs ish) every thirty seconds, the speed of each rep making no rest, all work, at the pace come out to almost twenty reps a minute.

That’d be 100 reps in over 5:00, under 6:00.
At that ability one qualifies as fit I’m sure

This morning I barely jogged it up, maybe one tenth of the rests.

One can rest with other exercises, que jumping jacks, high knees…high knees like that morning where “damn it how am I seven pounds over” needing to make 190 soonest.

(and thankful at that point in the season 189lbs was already+1, with every layer on, ipod in, burpee and high knees under the heat vent – ah high school wrestling – a fond memory)

One can hit their stomach hard, instead of lightly tapping.

One can add jumps to the end of the rep.

One can throw themselves down, one can kinda vary how much of the drop is kicking back vs absorbing with the triceps.

The sheer forces absorbed by the triceps when I do burpees is why I feel the burpee is more of an upper body strength builder than they’d seem on paper.

This too can be said by the upper back acting as deceleration, the reason why it too often pumps up from these burpees.

But how much my triceps are worked catching myself having dropped/thrown myself down – I’ll press stronger from a burpee habit.

…..

It wouldn’t take much to get this morning’s style, just do the reps, then rest during the rest periods from two to four reps every thirty seconds, meaning in not far off from 100 in 12:30, 100 in 10:00 being decent in my eyes, and above I already spoke of how the pace (minus all 22-24 seconds of rest out of :30) done straight though would be 100 in sub six, and rocking chair is inherently slower than just throwing yourself down, flop style, how we all learned burpees the few times we did them in high school class.

I’m finding more and more excuse/reason to do more and more burpees.

May they help you as well as they are me.

-J
Persistence & Tenacity

10/3/23
Today’s workout was a playful mix of a barbell loaded to 65lbs (a few reverse curls and curls – the curls with slow negatives and a 90° joint angle isometric hold on the final rep), a tad of flipping and catching a 25lb bumper plate, some burpees, but mostly handstand practice.

“plate flip challenge” – I’m more proud of it with my right

I love the handstand.
This, again, becoming a period where I do lots of handstand practice.

See, of Doug Hepburn was doing freestanding handstand pushups while both shorter and heavier than me, I can get to that level too!

…..

The handstand is a surprisingly full body workout.

More than anything I felt my lats, while the velocity of kicking up, landing, the lower body works in something of a plyometric manner.

Try it. You’ll see.
Acrobatics are awesome.

I settle on lots of handstands cause I enjoy the thing, the euphoria the first goal, the pump, the great sweat, the metabolic effect I notice from gymnastic type training all secondary, tertiary benefits.

Go train to be awesome.
To be capable of basic gymnastics, animal movements, decent sprinting and jumping, while too brutally strong…

The aesthetic is a side effect.

…..

I realized with a heavy late lunch (a few hours before the session) that one meal ish a day is where my energy levels feel best.

I hadn’t needed to eat then, and the meatballs (a mix of beef and pork) were far too heavy a food choice.

I want that saturated fat, and dessert, and whatever, at dinner time, maybe later.

If I’m really hungry I may have two dinners in around a five hour pm timespan.

If I feel the need I’ll have something light earlier than that big meal, it’s not a rigid thing, but it’s what has the most history of me feeling good while on it.

…..

Related to the last, the feeling I have after a great sweat from handstands, or from the out of breath euphoria of bunches of burpees – these things never make me ravenous, but make me want to hydrate.

I put water to my lips, and know the existence of god, water is that heavenly after a good calisthenics sweat.

Things like this, it’s what makes me want to see all busting out simple daily workouts, things that don’t have to be much quantifiable – burpees and jumping jacks mixed back and forth til a state of bliss, high rep calisthenics where you discover it’s like running sprints.

People need to workout.
They don’t need equipment.

15:00 of one no equipment required exercise can make a huge difference in one’s life.

Most would have the workout of their life just doing jumping jacks for the time, no treadmill tomfoolery.

Persistence & Tenacity

10/2/23
My energy was garbage, almost 5pm, and after a lazy day on little sleep – I was considering napping.

Here’s a trick for when you’re really being overly housebound… “I’m going to check the mail”.

Forces you to step outside, and check.

Once outside it’s only a hop, skip, and a jump to actually do something, whether that’s exercise, run an errand, whatever.

…..

“Well I’m outside, might as well lift.”
“But I’m tired” says the devil on the opposite shoulder.
“We’ll do one set, just one set of presses, then we can go inside if still tired ”

The Session :
Press
11x155lbs
8x155lbs
8x155lbs
Clean
5x155lbs
10x155lbs

The whole thing took twenty five minutes.

With the first set I thought “I’ll do a second, 50% set”, on the second I realized I’d do a third feeling warmed up.

The third was stronger than the second, though the reps matched.

With that third set my mind went “the clean is my limitation on the press – do an easy feel good set”, and I changed the music from rap to

where i’m from – jason michael carroll

The above saw me cry (very lightly), that tear dripping down my left cheek during the the cleans – it’s a coming of age song for me – I remember listing to it at 14yo/the start of high school, soon after my grandpa had passed.

The song ending, I had it repeat thinking “5 was too easy, we’ll go 7, no 8”, and since it’s STILL way within max I went 10 reps, took stock, and called the session – happy to feel good, not bummy, having done something that is better than nothing.

(not that a c&p only session is just better than nothing lol)

…..

After the lift I listened to a bunch of positivity, meditated, and stretched.

I’ve started to actually stretch ; butterfly, prying in the bottom of a deep bw squat, doing a bit of dynamic and isometric stuff aimed at flexibility.

It feels good man.

Persistence & Tenacity