<p>I can’t believe it, but I actually did it. The *ol’ (formerly) fat guy *version of Zuzana’s *Burpee Fusion *workout.</p>
<p>My version:</p>
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<p>I wasn’t sure how many sets I could do. But, spurred on by the visual of Zuzanna demonstrating the hip drive on the swings, I did ten sets!</p>
<p>With a five minute warmup on the Airdyne to start and a five-minute cool down on the Airdyne, the whole thing took 32 minutes start to finish. Average heart rate 75%, max heart rate 94%. Who says you have to spend hours in the gym? That is a heck of a workout.</p>
<p>That’s 100 swings (24 pound dumbbell) and 50 burpees. I owe it all to Zuzana. No wonder she gets a million views on some of her workout videos. I have no way to even conceive of how she does back to back sets of that stuff with no rest. I was huffin’ and puffin’ bad at the end of the burpees in every set. I needed the full 60 seconds to recover and towards the end, 60 seconds wasn’t enough.</p>
<p>The heaviest weights in our office are 50 pounds. Individual dumbbells and weight plates. I think that we have six 50s though I don’t actually think that there’s anyone in our office that could do even four. I’ve never seen four 50s on the bar.</p>
<p>At the YMCA, the dumbbells go up to 125 pounds. I’ve never seen them used.</p>
<p>125 pounds? I wonder who would even think about trying those!</p>
<p>Our Costco is having a roadshow of Precor exercise equipment. I checked the prices, and was dissapointed: not much of a discount compared to what one would pay at Precor stores. Ironically, Precor’s factory is located right across the road from this Costco! Nope, no bargains.</p>
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<p>Maybe some big ol’ strong guy, doing a farmer’s walk (holding dumbbells at your sides)? I couldn’t even get one of those out of the rack.</p>
<p>Here’s a picture of Arnold posing and he’s got a dumbbell with 47.5 pounds in his hand.</p>
<p>[Arnold</a> Schwarzenegger Photo](<a href=“http://www.postersguide.com/posters/arnold-schwarzenegger-3812637.html]Arnold”>http://www.postersguide.com/posters/arnold-schwarzenegger-3812637.html)</p>
<p>You’d need really strong fingers to haul 125 pounds off a rack. I can’t even lift a 125 pound barbell.</p>
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<p>And, 47 pounds of steroids for breakfast that morning.</p>
<p>WNP, your PR is amazing! You should be very proud of yourself! My DH is seriously thinking about trying racewalking when the weather becomes nicer. His knee is still bothering him if he tries to run, but biking and walking are OK. Can you, our resident racewalking expert, offer any advice or tips on how to get started? Many thanks in advance!</p>
<p>Tonight I ran a 5K on my treadmill in 25:40. This is my 2011 PR. 
I think I’m going to slow down a bit and try to run longer distances. My goal is to run a 10K in under an hour and not die of boredom. Do not get me wrong, I love to run, but I like diversity in my exercise activities. :)</p>
<p>Here are the medicine balls with the one handle. [Product</a> - Power Ball Medicine Balls](<a href=“http://www.performbetter.com/detail.aspx_Q_ID_E_3540_A_CategoryID_E_166]Product”>http://www.performbetter.com/detail.aspx_Q_ID_E_3540_A_CategoryID_E_166)</p>
<p>In the facilities that I work at, our dumbbells go up to 115 or 120 I believe. They occasionally get used. I did see a couple of high school football players using 90 pound DBs yesterday for incline bench press. I was trying to drag one of them to get it out of the way at one point… WOW!</p>
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<p>The bench press is probably the only exercise he knows and the incline version is better for watching yourself in the mirror!</p>
<p>There needs to be a rule. If you are strong enough to take a 90 pound dumbbell out of the rack, you have put it back… because there probably isn’t anyone else in the gym who can!</p>
<p>Well I was actually in the high school weight room yesterday. One of the stations had groups of 3 with one group doing DB incline and the other group doing barbell lunges.</p>
<p>I can take an 85 off the rack, do my side pulls or rows and put it back. But the feeling in my fingers is like they’ve been stretched out on a rack. I do the 75s for my side pulls and didn’t want to go any higher because of my arm problems. I can’t imagine doing any other exercises as it would involve rotating my arms to get the dumbbells up and I don’t think that I have the joint or muscle strength to do that. Those football players must be very strong just to be able to get the dumbbell above their arm unless they’re using the other two guys to put them into position.</p>
<p>Yeah, even trying to roll them on the ground isn’t that easy.</p>
<p>One other thing about using those kinds of weights is that one mistake and you could seriously injure yourself. My weight injury story is that I was on the leg press machine with 300 pounds loaded and I had an itch on my back and tried to scrape it against the back of the seat. Very bad move to fiddle when at load. I recall it taking several months to heal.</p>
<p>I’m going to work more on the bench press as it’s easy to do at the office. I suspect that I can eventually get up to 150 if I keep at it for a few years but I don’t think that it’s possible to get to the 175 to 200 area that a lot of guys like to get to. Upper body strength has never been my thing - it’s pretty uncommon for most of the people that I work with too - I don’t really know of any bodybuilders where I work.</p>
<p>I got to the YMCA last night and did a few exercises while my son ran. Assisted pullup, dip, abs machine, leg lifts and adductors. I usually do more but I ran into a friend from Hewlett-Packard that I hadn’t seen in a while and we chatted about our workplaces. It may be that the pullups that I did last spring contributed more to my tennis elbow than tennis as I did feel the stress doing the pullup.</p>
<p>This morning after waking up the second time, I felt very good (not in pain as usual). I felt stronger and refreshed - perhaps due to bumping up the weights a bit or running longer than usual or maybe just getting the upper hand on this cold that I have (that’s all over the office too). At any rate, it’s nice to feel good for a change.</p>
<p>Hey, BB, I am excited to hear Mr. BB is considering the wild and wacky sport of racewalking!</p>
<p>I started about 8 years ago after reading a magazine article that touted the cardio benefits and the minimal stress to the knees. I bought Dave McGovern’s book, The Complete Guide to Racewalking and taught myself. I entered some competitions and each time I would come back and read the book again and tried to improve my technique. Each time I would see some improvement. I went to the National Senior Games in Pittsburgh in 2005 and actually saw some really good people. It helped me so much. I broke my leg before the 2007 games, so I had to wait until 2009 to compete at the national level again. I decided to attend a clinic prior to the 2009 games. I went to one with Dave McGovern who offers clinics anywhere someone is willing to host one. He is very entertaining and a good diagnostician. </p>
<p>Last year, I attended one with Jeff Salvage and Tim Seaman (a former Olympian). I really liked his clinic much better. He is much more organized, truly interested in every participant, and willing to give lots of feedback afterwards. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.racewalk.com%5B/url%5D”>http://www.racewalk.com</a></p>
<p>He also sells a DVD and some other materials that are helpful. </p>
<p>Another thing that is helpful to check out some of the best people via YouTube. It doesn’t look so silly when you see top athletes with great form. </p>
<p>Keep me posted and let me know if he ever decides to compete.</p>
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<p>Here’s a variation to try from the new book I’m reading. </p>
<p>1) Just take one dumbell instead of two (you might have to go a little smaller on the weight).</p>
<p>2) Get in bench press position on the bench, but then slide down so just your shoulders and head are supported on the bench. Your bent legs are holding up your thighs, butt, and torso in a bench press position. Just rest the hand without a weight on your hip.</p>
<p>3) Do all your reps with the weight in one arm, then switch the weight to the other arm and do the same number of reps.</p>
<p>I’m just going to use the Smith Machine for the Bench Press. I am still going to avoid dumbbells for a while, except for doing curls with fairly light weights, at least until the right arm is 100% and that may take several more months.</p>
<p>Even the Smith Machine is not 100% safe. I do set the stops but the bar can still land on my chest. The height on the bench vs the stops on the Smith Machine are not optimal. I could drag a different bench over which would line up better but that other bench doesn’t have wheels on it so it would take a bit of effort getting it under the machine. The Smith Machine is the best solution for me at this time. 100 pounds takes moderate effort and that’s all I’m looking for right now. I may inch up on the weights but will inch back down at the first sign of arm pain.</p>
<p>I generally prefer routine to novelty. I like to find an exercise or exercise routine and just do the same thing getting better slowly. I record all of the stuff that I do and I don’t like my spreadsheets to get too wide with different exercises.</p>
<p>Goodness I was a little sore this morning! My inner thighs and abs really benefitted from the change in workout yesterday. Instead of biking today I used the dreadmill and walked 4.6 miles with random inclines. Will go back to the ab work and using the single grip medicine ball/core ball thing I used yesterday for tomorrow’s routine. Will see if this change helps me shake this plateau! I was so hungry this morning so scrambled egg whites over a huge helping of leftover veggies. Will have a banana for my morning snack since I haven’t had any for a long time. Making roasted spaghetti squash, red pepper and broccoli with grilled mahi mahi for dinner tonight. Yum!</p>
<p>I was sore in hips and butt last night – I think mostly from the dumbbell swings, but probably from jumping up in the burpees. The *New Rules of Lifting for Abs *workouts also have me doing all kinds of hip hinge stuff that is working my legs and hamstrings in new and foreign ways.</p>
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<p>I’m trying that for the first time. I downloaded workout sheets for this new program and have started a little 3-ring binder. The sheets are mostly handy as a one-page “cheat sheet” for actually doing the workouts, but have places to record reps and weights for each exercise in each set. So, we’ll see how that goes.</p>
<p>I started with five- and eight-pounders, doing flies while lying on a stability ball. I also used three-pounders for what my trainer called “Arnold” – sort of lifts up and bringing them down close together. I found the three-pounders to be ridiculous. </p>
<p>I now use 15-pounders for flies and overheads, 20-pound kettleballs for up to the shoulder and between my legs, 25-pound barbell for behind my head as well as lying down and doing my traps, and 35-pound barbell for some clean-and-jerks from a standing position.</p>
<p>I find keeping the spreadsheets on the cloud (Google Documents) helps as I can update my workout log from anywhere with a computer. I can also generate charts if I want to. I record my weight machine workouts on an old PDA and then transfer the data to the cloud when I have a computer handy.</p>
<p>Tennis went well: 6-1, 6-1. I definitely felt faster on the court today - perhaps due to more strength-training.</p>