Richard Gibney's 365 Days of Fitness: Day 282

Day 282 For my workout today once again, like yesterday, I found myself with very limited time for a workout. I had about 40 minutes to get to the gym, do a workout, get back home, shower and get changed for Thanksgiving Dinner. It took me about 5 minutes to get to the gym which was pretty good time. I ran up to the gym as fast as I could and got into my workout gear. By this time I had about 30 minutes. I needed a really quick workout but I also I wanted it to be really hard. I was about to eat a massive meal and really wanted to get the metabolism jacked up before consuming a couple thousand calories.

A couple months ago, I tried the Fraser Quelch Battle Rope Challenge. Fraser is a world re-known fitness expert and presenter. I follow his blog and posts on facebook. I found one particular series of posts quite interesting. Fraser was blogging about a training progression he was using to build up to 20 minutes of continuous battle ropes. like most things, intensity will play a part in how long you can do something, but if you've ever tried battle ropes, you know that even one minute is incredibly difficult.

On my first attempt at Fraser's challenge, I managed 10 minutes of alternating waves with the battle ropes. I could have maybe managed another minute but I was toast. Today I decided I had 15 minutes to get a workout in and that was how long I was going to do the ropes for. Obviously I could have done these very slowly and managed 15 minutes no problem but my plan was to maintain a relatively high intensity throughout. Quantitatively, I did my best make sure that the wave of the rope went all the way to anchor point, every time I moved the rope. For speed I maintained at least 2 waves of the rope per second.

The first 5 minutes were pretty tough. By minute 4, I was thinking there's no way I'm going to manage another 11 minutes. The second 5 minutes were a bit easier. You kind of get into a zone and just plug away. The last 5 minutes however, were brutal. Mentally you're not sure if you can make it and physical everything is just screaming. In the end I hung on and finished a full 15 minutes. Afterward, I was totally fried. I lay on the ground for about 3 minutes trying to catch my breath, a 3 minutes I hadn't factored into my 40 minute time limit.

Today's Workout:

15 minutes of continuous battle ropes (alternating waves)

Bonus activities

• Moving a massive plant to Nicole's Mom's house
• Lifting and emptying a big pot of potatoes
• Mashing Potatoes
• Copious amounts of chewing and subsequent digesting

After putting myself back together I managed to get back home, showered and changed just in time for the massive feast that Nicole and her sister Clare had put together. It was amazing. I had to wait until the inevitable food coma had passed so that I could write this post. An hour ago I'm pretty sure there wasn't enough blood going to my brain for me to write a single sentence.

Well, I managed to complete 15 minutes of battle ropes. I'm not at the same level as Fraser. I have some work to do yet. 15 minutes crushed me and I'm pretty sure I was maxed out. 20 minutes is going to be tough. On the plus side I'm pretty sure my metabolism was firing on all cylinders as I sat down for Thanksgiving dinner. In the grand scheme of things the meal was so big it didn't make too much of a difference but at least my body was well prepped to absorb lots of nutrients.