The Horse Trader's Son

Helmets and Beer for all. Credit: Red Frog Events/Warrior Dash

Well, after signing up for the Michigan Warrior Dash about 6 weeks ago, I thought I’d give an update on my progress toward my goal of even being able to finish “3.3 hellish miles.”  Most of my work has been with our new treadmill, a Gold’s Gym 480 Trainer from Walmart (click the link to see my review of this treadmill).

The treadmill has 8 pre-set workouts.  1-4 are “weight loss” workouts, 5-8 are “performance” workouts, designed to improve cardio-vascular fitness.  Since I was less concerned about weight-loss, I decided to start with #5, the easiest of the performance workouts.  ”Easiest” is a relative term, as I could not even complete this one.  After 14 minutes (all the workouts are 30 minutes in length) I had to cancel the workout and drop to manual mode, where I finished at a relatively easy pace of 3.4 miles per hour with no incline.

After that, I started working through the weight loss workouts, starting at number 1, which was easy.  The weight-loss workouts implement a pair of 1 lb dumbbells, and the treadmill signals you when to pick them up and when to put them down.  A few days later I completed #2, also fairly easy.   After a few more days (my schedule is to train 3 days per week) I completed workout #3, which was a little challenging but presented no trouble.  Finally, I got to #4, which completely kicked my butt, but I was able to finish it.  I decided to stick with this one for a while.

After about a month on number 4, I’ve noticed definite improvements.  I can finish the workout now without being completely wiped out.  The top speed on this workout is 4 mph, so I’ve started adding a few minutes at a medium jog (for me) of 7 mph, and can get through about 1/3 mile at this pace.  I’ve also lost nearly 5 lbs, going from 114 to 109 with no other conscientious changes in diet or lifestyle.  I’m almost ready to try to tackle workout #5 again, although I’m almost dreading that.

I still can’t climb the rope in the barn straight up, but I can use it to climb into the hay loft “batman” style, by walking up the stall wall.  I haven’t been able to climb a rope free-style since high school, but hope to achieve this goal by July.  We’ll see.

Why am I doing this?  For the beer.  And the viking helmet.  And the glory.  But mostly for the beer.

Every year we tell ourselves that this is the year we get back in shape.  This year we’ll start working out again, start running / walking / swimming – whatever we do for exercise – again.  For me it’s usually “this is the year I get back into Karate.”

Most of the time we start the year out with good intentions, but for many (myself included) life seems to get in the way.  The pressures of work, kids going to away to college, events at the high school, getting the hay crop in before it rains, etc.  There just always seems to be something competing for my time, and after dealing with these things every day, who has the energy to work out?

Well, this