Geezer's Long March Toward the Elite Sneaking Up On the Finish Line

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 237.

1st Cycle, Week 1. 5 reps, 5 reps, as many reps as possible.

Push Press: 100-115-130/6.

High Pull From Blocks: 135-155-175/6.

Cable Rotations: 150-150-150.

Average HR was 123 bpm @ 80% of MHR.

Stretched.

All in all, a good morning. Despite the fog. But! Onward through the fog, like a good Middle Earther.

In mocking homage to the now defunct WAYWT thread, I was wearing my "You Tell Them I'm Coming! AND HELL'S COMING WITH ME!!" t-shirt, complemented by a Keep America Great ball cap with stars and striped bill and Russell trackies. Completed with Walmart Bravos.

As I was leaving the gym a herd of fair, young, athletic lassies from Murray State and WIU were unloading from buses for an indoor track meet with the SIU women. Lots of gentle on the eyes.

Finally, heading home on Route 13 an enormous bald eagle launched itself from the top of an oak and soared across the highway. Wonderful sight.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 238.

Today consisted of intervals of clap push-ps, speed bag, turkish get ups (I know, it sounds like a bad West Hollywood joke), side medicine ball tosses, low kicking flurries, and stretches.

Average HR was 133 bpm % 86% of MHR.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 236.

1st Cycle, Week 1. 5 reps, 5 reps, as many reps as possible.

Incline Press: 135-160-180/6. Rep 6 was a real grind, like the bench press was, as well as the push press. The weight loss seems to have taken it's toll on my pressing. Or maybe my age. Pressing was never one of my strong suits. So to speak. So I need to drop 10% or so on those to get some momentum going.

Hammer High Row: 240-280-175/7.

Deadlifts: 210-245-275/6. I'm going to need another hole in my belt in with a loss of 10 more lbs. or so. Hitched on the new last hole, the belt was still a little loose.

Average HR was 118 bpm @ 77% of MHR.

[Mark E. Hurling]

I got my caber this afternoon. It was a lot longer than it looked from the road, and I needed to return home to get a saw to cut it to around 16 feet long. The property owner gave me the go ahead a few days ago, and the weather was dry enough to make it feasible today. The log will be called Angus.

[Cheesepuff]

Grats on needing a hole punch for your belt.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Thanks CP. That 3/8 drill bit will be doing yeoman's duty once more and soon.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 237.

The deadlifts exacted their toll on my back so today was rounds of back sparing things like speed bag, cable crunch, arms only rower and SciFit, medicine ball toss, heavy bag, and stretching. My VO2 max ticked up another point in range to 37-41.

Average HR was 123 bpm @ 80% of MHR.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Ball Cap.jpg

Full house tonight. Alex, Emma, Jacob, and Zach showed up. The chaos is modulating a little. I ran them through the techniques, which Alex and Emma are largely doing fine at. Jacob and Zach? Not so much given their inattention and tendency toward hyperactivity. But, getting better with the use of a slightly heavier hand on discipline and insisting on something of a Simon says kind of approach.

At the end, I worked on their hand striking techniques. Getting them aware of and using their legs and hips to add force to their strikes. Bending the knees and twisting the hips into the strike, vertical, horizontal, and downward. They seemed to pick up on the ideas pretty well. As we bowed out, I complemented them on areas of improvement. Jacob's stepping, Alex having made great strides in relaxing on the mat, Emma on her technique, and Alex on his improvement. Along with his and Jacob's need to pay better attention.

Average HR was 107 bpm @ 70% of MHR.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 238.

Sets of 8.

Seated Press: 120-120-120.

Rope Handle Curl: 230-230-230.

Pullover and Press: 85-90-95.

Claw Curl: 150-152-155.

Average HR was 121 bpm @ 79% of MHR.

[Mark E. Hurling]

I went back for another round at the gym just to experiment and break in to getting into more serious training for the highland games. Now that I have that wee laddie Angus to toss around outside.

OTOH, I wanted to get a sense of swinging some weights around, both as in spherical objects, like the slam balls, as well as stuff like the hammer throw, which requires some real shoulder mobility and getting used to. For those I used 25 lb. plates and EZ-curl bars. The former gripped on the edges and circled around my head, and the latter, pretty much as the rigid handle used in the games for the hammer.

Then there's the weight toss for distance, for which I used kettlebells. Which I consider a fad and a gimmick generally, but useful in this context as a training device. I eschewed anything like the toss for height, the indoors didn't make it seem prudent.

I alternated these for around 35 minutes and burned 450 calories. Average HR was 126 bpm @ 82% of MHR. Altogether, somewhat surprising and unexpected in terms of intensity, conditioning effect, and calorie burn.