Breaking the push-up max ceiling

I have been training for over half a year now, and step by step my performance has been improving. Cumulated small gains, ended-up being big gains.
To illustrate my point, let's compare my current Personal Bests for a few workouts versus my first attempts (Oct/Nov 2013). In bracket I'm showing Alexander Villena's PB as benchmarks of top performance (I still have lots of work to do):

• Aphrodite: 30:49* → 18:59* (AV PB = 13:27*)
• Dione: 37:03* → 23:17* (AV PB = 19:51)
• Hades: 25:17 (no star) → 16:04* (AV PB = 13:43*)
• Pull-up MAX: 14* → 34* (AV PB = 59*)

Not surprisingly, enhanced physical activity has been leading to better results across the board. However, lately I have been growing disappointed with my (lack of) progress in push-ups. It that one specific exercise I felt like I had plateaued.
 
Below is a chart showing all my Push-ups max results since the beginning (PB are highlighted in blue).

While following the program, my PB went from 42 to 53. An improvement, but nothing spectacular. At first I didn't worry about it, thinking that I would probably get better results after completing my Cardio-Strength program simply by increasing the ratio of Strength-oriented workouts to my routine. In March-April I started making my own schedule, so I included a lot of Venus, Hades and Pushup MAX.

But nothing happened.

I once equaled my PB, but most of the time I was far below. Of course, often I had been performing the Pushup MAX toward the end of a session, when my arm muscles were already tired. So poor performance on any single day didn't mean much. But looking at the trend, it confirmed what my guts had been telling me: my performance stalled around 50.

By mid-May I was convinced that to progress further I needed a special training for push-ups. So I started looking for a method. The good news is that the Internet is full of advises on how to improve push-ups. The bad news is that there is no consensus: everyone makes different recommendations. Also, a lot of the suggested methods did not really fit with my schedule or my regular training. Many programs had very heavy training days followed by 48 hours of rest. I wanted to focus on push-ups, but not do only push-ups.

I wanted something that I could do in complement to my other Freeletics workouts. In the end, I took some ideas from 3 coaches' opinions on the matter and mixed them with a former Navy seal's 10 days program to come-up with a custom training plan. Using 50 reps as my baseline max, I setup the following rules:

• 10 consecutive of days push-ups training, followed by 48 hours of rest
• Total push-ups per day: 4 times my max (=200 push-ups per day).
• 25 repetitions per set (half my max).
• First 100 reps before breakfast, the last 100 in the evening with my regular training.
• I didn't want to risk injury from over-training, so if my evening workout already included push-ups, that would count toward my daily goal of 200.

Each set of 25 would be performed consecutively (no break) and recorded in the Freeletics app as a Push-up MAX. The idea was to keep track of my count, but also to force me to take breaks. Because a MAX lasts 1:40 and I only need half this time to do 25 push-ups, hence I would get ~1 minute of rest between each set.

I was wondering if that regimen would be too hard on my muscles. But 25 repetitions turned out to be a good number. It was exactly the number of reps that I could perform before getting into the grinding zone. The first few days my arms would be tired rapidly. In the first 2 sets I would do all the repetitions in 40-45 seconds. The 4th set was harder, my paced dropped to 55-60 seconds. After a 5-6 days my speed improved (35-40 seconds) and was constant during all 4 sets.

After a few days when I saw that my arms handled the effort well, for added difficulty, from time to time one of my kid would lay on my back while I performed the push-ups. The extra weight was respectively 15kg (33 lbs) or 11kg (24 lbs). It's cheaper than buying a weighted vest, but the downside is that for them it's like a merry-go-round ride. Once they try it, they want to get a ride every time...
 
After the 10 days of training and the 48 hours of rest, I took a new Push-up Max  to measure improvements. I ended-up doing 60 repetitions, largely breaking my 3 months-old PB. 


However, when completing this test, my shoulders still felt a bit stiff. I wasn't sure if I was in peak condition. I decided to do a second test after an additional 2 days of rest. Tonight I started my training with a Pushup MAX and completed 60 reps again. A few workouts later, I completed a second Pushup MAX ending at 55 reps.

The last 3 attempts have clearly been a notch above historical performance. So the special focus definitely paid-off. I will probably re-do a similar program in the future to keep driving improvements (may be pull-ups?). But this will remain occasional, in order to give my body enough rest.

Unexpectedly, I really enjoyed the quick push-ups session prior to breakfast. I'm thinking to do this more regularly. Total reps (100?), format (4 sets? 3 sets) and periodicity (daily? every 2 days?) are still to be determined. I will see in the next few weeks what routine feels the most natural.

Post-program (self-scheduled training): week #21-26

I had not reported on my training since completing the program. It's only now that I'm writing this post that I realize that 6 weeks have already passed. Time flies.

While I kept training every single week, overall the past weeks felt much more relaxed. Partly because there were more relaxed (less workouts), but also because peace of mind came from adjusting my training around my schedule.

My training was the following:

Week 21:

• Tuesday: Aphrodite (19:43* -PB) + Leg Levers Max (196* -PB) + Ares (08:16*)
• Thursday: boxing training
• Friday: Venus (21:24*) + Leg Levers Max (192*) 

Week 22:

• Monday: boxing training
• Tuesday: Hades (16:04* -PB) + Sit up Max (133*)
• Wednesday: Venus (20:58* -PB)
• Thursday: boxing training
• Saturday: Venus (19:23* -PB) + Leg Levers Max (187*) 

Week 23:

• Monday: Venus (20:14*) + Pullup Max (32*) + Pushup Max (41*)
• Tuesday: Pullup Max (34* -PB) + Pushup Max (47*) +Leg Levers Max (186*)  + Lunge Max (173* -PB) + Aphrodite (20:09*)
• Thursday: boxing training
• Saturday: Venus (21:05*) + Pullup Max (28*) 
• Sunday: Pushup Max (49*) + Pullup Max (29*) + Pushup Max (41*)

Week 24:

• Monday: Venus (21:13*) + Leg Levers Max (188*) + Pullup Max (30*) 
• Tuesday: Venus (21:38*)
• Thursday: boxing training
• Saturday: Aphrodite (20:00*) + Pushup Max (42*) + Leg Levers Max (183*) + Pushup Max (53*) + Pullup Max (31*)
• Sunday: Pullup Max (30*) 

Week 25:

• Tuesday: Hades (17:42*) + Situp Max (145*) 
• Wednesday: Aphrodite (19:38*)
• Thursday: boxing training

Week 26:

• Monday: Venus (24:24*) 
• Tuesday: Hades (17:35*) 
• Thursday: boxing training
• Friday: Venus (19:38*)

If I exclude, the Sunday were I just did a single MAX session for fun, over 6 weeks I performed 17 sessions for a total training time for ~339 minutes. That's 3 sessions per week on average, each of approximately 20 minutes.
True, the average is slightly lowered by Week #21, which was very light on purpose to recover from the preceding Hell Week. But figures don't lie. As outlined in a previous post, I intended to reduce the number of session and focus on strength workouts (which tend to be shorter than cardio).

Free training is new to me, so I'm still experimenting and trying to find the best balance between personal life & training. I will do a separate post for body stats after these 6 weeks, but there are already a few take-away:

• Adjusting training on the spot to fit unexpected schedule changes is great. That's the kind of flexibility I was looking for before starting Freeletics...

• ...but, I will probably need to fix myself a few strict guidelines. An absolute minimum number of 3 sessions per week is probably a good rule to put in place. As you can see on week 25, one schedule constraint after another led to only 2 sessions being done. It's not dramatic once, but it should not become a habit. Another rule that I'm contemplating is to do each workout at least once every 3 months. Just to avoid becoming too comfy by never doing the messy workouts that require you to crawl in the dirt (like Kentauros).

• Performance gains in Strength workouts have been slower than anticipated. As you can see, I have scored very few personal best lately. With the amount of push-ups that I have performed, I would have though that each new Venus would be easier than the previous one. But it wasn't so. I will need to be more patient to see progress, but also add a bit more Cardio sessions in my training mix (more time for muscles to recover and to keep good stamina).

Cardio-Strength Program: week #15 (Hell week)

Week #15 out of 15


Week #14 was relatively quiet, so I took it as a sign that the last week of the program would be harder than usual. Probably Hell.

At the end of week #7, I wrote that wasn't fully convinced about the Hell Days. I was feeling a bit nostalgic of the Hell Week. I preferred training every day rather than having a few long sessions. Well you know the saying: be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it.

That's exactly what happened to me, I got what I wished for: Hell Week. 7 days, 7 sessions.

The work load was heavier than usual. Not only because of the more numerous sessions, but also several sessions were made of several workouts. Add to the mix some sport that I have been doing aside from Freeletics, and that gives you a pretty exhausting week!


Monday: DIONE (26:45*)

The beginning of the week was as ordinary as it gets. Dione is one the workout that I repeated the most (15 times over the past 20 weeks).
I had a hard time finding my pace, and was rapidly out of breath. So in the end no PB, and a subpar performance.


Tuesday: APOLLON (24:37*) +ARES (08:09*)

My fear this week was to see a tendinitis at the leg come back to haunt me. The pain was gone for only a few days, and yet I have 3 Apollon scheduled this week. Running is not as bad as jumps, but it still generates enough stress on the legs to wake-up an inflammation.

While running, I did feel that my tendons didn't like it very much, but the overall distance was short so the impact was limited. After the workout, I decided to take advantage of being outdoor to practice hand-stands without any risk to destroy my living room walls. I didn't try to do pushups while hand-standing, this was just to get used to the position and train to land on the wall softly. I did 12-15 attempts, and stopped as the shock from landing back on the ground hurt more than the run had. Thankfully the (small) pain didn't last and I wasn't bothered again for the rest of the week.

The workouts were not performed back to back. I performed Apollon during my lunch break, but had to wait to be back home in the evening to be able to do the Ares' pull-ups.


Wednesday: HYPERION (18:48 -personal best) +APHRODITE (21:38* -personal best)

A fairly big day today, with 2 workouts that are usually scheduled as stand-alone.
Hyperion went well, still no star due to HS Pushups & Pistols, but at least I got a new PB. For Aphrodite, my last PB being 2 months old, I was sure that I could improve my time, despite being tired from the previous workout. It improved by only a minute, not bad but I expect to do even better if I attempt it with fresh arms.


Thursday: boxing training +VENUS (23:11* -personal best)

This was the day that I apprehended the most. Venus is heavily focused on arms. But so is my boxing training. Doing Venus first and its 200 puhups early morning would strain my arms and lead too poor performance in the evening. I did several time Metis after boxing, but I honestly didn't knew if I would be able to complete the entire Venus routine.
Skipped Freeletics training on Thursday (for example to do both session 4 & 5 on Friday), didn't feel right. After all, the goal of Hell Week is not just to train a lot but to train every day. 

I remembered one of the rules that I set: boxing comes first. So I decided to train at full capacity & intensity and do Venus right after. 

My arms were exhausted, my abs were strained from situps, leg levers and jacknives, so the only "comfortable" exercise was Deep Squat. It was very tough, I stopped thinking, my brain went completely on autopilot. Completion time didn't matter. Before starting I had already accepted that it could take up-to an hour,  as long as I could complete the workout.

To my great astonishment, I got a PB, improving my completion time by over 2 minutes!
This was only my second attempt at this workout so of course I had a margin for improvement, but given the context this was completely unexpected.
That night my arms were absolutely destroyed, but I was quite happy that the worse day of the week turned out to be a highlight of the week.


Friday: APOLLON (23:08* -personal best)

Another Apollon. My biggest room for improvement is on the running (that applies to all the workouts that include 400m run or more). The first round was fast, but I started losing my breath and slowed down for the second round. For the last round I was in "damage control" mode. Basically, I pushed to increase my pace. Not as fast as in round 1, but as fast as I could.
It paid off with a new PB, my time having improved by a few seconds.

Again, I practice a bit doing hand stands. I'm getting more comfortable at landing on the wall, hopefully with a bit more work I'll be able to do these damn HS pushups!


Saturday: APOLLON (22:35* -personal best) +PUSHUP MAX (38*) +VENUS (24:43*)

For the first time since starting the program, I changed the order of my training sessions. Session 7, originally scheduled on Sunday was very long and incompatible with my calendar. I would be gone all day skiing, and there is nowhere were way I can do Apollon by night. So I swapped days 6 & 7, in order to do the big session on Saturday.

Apollon went very well. This time I maintained a constant pace during all 3 rounds, and improved again my PB by a few seconds.

The real challenge came from the last 2 workouts. My shoulders & arms were still dead from Thursday's training load. While I didn't have sore muscles or felt any pain while at rest, when attempting the Pushup Max, it was clear that I had no juice left. I went through the motions to finish both the MAX and Venus, but a PB was clearly out of reach today.


Sunday: Skiing +HS PUSHUP MAX (69) +PUSHUP MAX (45*) +SITUP MAX (148* -personal best )

The numerous Squats & Deep Squats this week (800 reps if I counted well), took a toll on my tights. This time the skiing session was physically a bit more challenging than last time, but overall it was a very good experience.

After a full day spent driving & skiing (~5 hours of effective ski time), I was extremely glad to only have a few MAX to complete. Frankly, swapping sessions now really seemed like the wisest decision. Given my level of tiredness I probably would have risked injury by doing a big session tonight.

My arms had started recovering a bit, but HS pushups and Pushups were still more difficult than usual. No PB.
For the Situp Max, my abs were OK and mentally I was fired-up. This was the last workout of the program! Surely not the time to be holding back! I used whatever energy I had left to keep the pace as fast as possible. 
I literally got rug burns from these situps (and I still do as I write these lines 3 days later!), but I made it:148 reps. 6 more than my previous PB.

The program is over.

Free at last, Free at last, Thank Freeletics Gods almighty I am free at last!

Or am I?


Yes, I have completed every single workout in the program. I even tossed in a few extra. But now, the real challenge begins. I the next few weeks I won't be following any specific program. May be I will in the future, but in the meantime I will decide freely how frequently to train, what workouts to do and how to arbitrage between Strength vs. Cardio.

This is a welcomed break, as I will be able to tailor my workouts perfectly around my regular sport training and take into account any possible injury. For example, focus on arms & abs until my tendinitis is fully healed.

By now, I'm familiar with most Gods, so mixing the workouts to come-up with a good schedule will not be too difficult. The real challenge will be maintaining a high level of physical activity. This will require a lot of discipline and engagement. I like the results that I have obtained, and I want to get even more. So hopefully my motivation will remain as high as it is now!


Many of you have asked to see pictures after the program. I can tell you that the stats & photos have been taken, I just need to sit-down and summarize them in a post. It will come soon, so stay tuned!

Cardio-Strength Program: week #14

Week #14 out of 15

The training schedule this week was as plain as it gets. No new workout. Only fairly short sessions. A week mostly focused on strength, but with a balanced training load.

What's going on? Have the guys at Freeletics turned soft? May be it's just a pause before all Hell breaks loose in week 15. Anyway, my main concern this week was not the end of the program, but rather to try to get rid of the pain in my left leg that appeared last week.


Monday: HADES (18:57*)

Not a great performance today.
I was cautious to avoid any unnecessary stress to my leg, so I performed my workout relying mostly on my right foot. I could stand and walk normally, but to help the tendinitis disappear I absorbed the shocks (landing the burpee jumps) and leaned my weight (pushup position) only on my right side.
This peculiar stand certainly hindered me a bit. But honestly it's only half an excuse. My cardio wasn't at its best either. It was just a not-so-great day.



Tuesday: HYPERION (22:57 -personal best)
  
Hyperion was completed without star just like the first & last time. This means that I did the Strict Pullups & One-hand Pushups using the regular form. For Hand-stand pushups I used the alternate (easier) version. For Pistols, I'm not using a chair as recommended for the alternate form, but I'm not going low enough yet to qualify them as "regular". I expect to train for a few more months before I get a star on this workout.

My overall completion time improved by less than 2 minutes. Not a stellar gain, but I'll take whatever PB I can get!


Wednesday: POSEIDON (04:47* -personal best) +SITUP MAX (142* -personal best)

Both workouts today improved versus the PB scored last week. Poseidon improved by 9 seconds, but this time should keep on going down as pullups become more and more natural. For situps, 11 additional repetitions is a pretty big gain week over week. My abs have been spared so far this week, so they were at 100% capacity. I kept going as fast as possible but my pace slowed during the last minute.


Thursday: Skiing (alpine)

No boxing this week, but it was replaced by another good physical drill. Excluding the lunch break, I have been skiing in total for about 4h30 to 5h00.
It was my first session of the year, and it was made much easier by all the physical training that I went through. I like to complain about Squats & Split Lunges, but I reaped the benefits today. My tights never hurt for a single second, during skiing or the day after.


Friday: HADES (17:02* -personal best)
  
The week started with a mediocre Hades performance, on a not-so-great day and with a painful leg. It ended on another Hades, but this time the pain was almost gone and I improved my PB by 35 seconds. I felt like I was flying during the first half of the exercise: round 1 was completed in less than 5 minutes and round 2 in less than 6.
Improving my pullups will be the key to keep pushing the time down. Performance for the rest of the workout is more regular.


Here we are: Week #14 is now over. Next week will be the last stretch before I complete my program. I don't know if it will feel like a sprint or a marathon, but I can already tell you that Week #15 is going to be Hell Week again!

Cardio-Strength Program: week #13

Week #13 out of 15

Welcome to "Max Week".
I usually find that doing several MAX in a row tends to be easier than 1 long workout, but I have to confess that it's a bit unsettling to look at your weekly schedule to see 14 workouts. For a split second, I was wondering what happened.
Upon closer examination, it turned out that the training load was comparable to a regular week. Only session 3 looked challenging on paper: 6 MAX in total, with the added difficulty that instead of 6 different workouts it's made of 3 workouts each to be repeated twice. 

Monday: HS PUSHUP MAX (67 -personal best) +PUSHUP MAX (48*) +JUMP MAX (220* -personal best)

The week started with HS Pushup MAX. And I am now able to confirm that I *really* suck at handstand pushups.
I expected to do the MAX in the easy form, but just to see if I had made any progress I decided to first try the normal version. This MAX only lasts 100 seconds, yet after 60s I still had not managed to get into the handstand position against the wall...
But I still wanted to know if I was able to do a HS pushup. So after the first failed attempt, I tried again but this time I had recruited my wife to help me get into the right position. It took a while, but eventually I ended-up in the right position. In the little time that was left I managed to complete ~1.5 repetition. I still have a bit of training before I can pretend competing in the Olympic Games' gymnastics competition... Of course, I didn't record this "performance" (I had to use external help), this was just a test.

I like to understand what are the barriers preventing me from completing certain exercises. HS pushups have been puzzling me for a while. Back in junior school, I wasn't too bad at hand stands. Of course it's a long time ago, but I had expected that after a few trials it would come back. For the past few weeks I had assumed that the main reason for failure was because I wasn't throwing my legs at full strength by fear of damaging the wall (remember I trained inside my house). However, during the last test my wife was there to catch my legs. She could have prevented any damage to the wall. Yet, that didn't solve the problem.
So my guess is that it's linked to some kind of unconscious barrier. To succeed in this exercise, I have to train my brain that it's ok to be upside down. From time to time I'll try to do specific HS training aside from the regular Freeletics exercises. No clock. No pushups. Just me in front of a concrete wall getting used to get these feet up. I'll let you guys know if that works.

After the 2 failed attempts, I still had all my training remaining to be done. So I reverted back to easy HS puhups, to complete the first workout. No star of course, but at least a PB. Followed by a Pushup MAX. Star, no PB.
My last workout was Jump MAX. I only completed it once in the past. It was in the middle of a Hell Day so not surprisingly I didn't deliver a peak performance (approx. 180 reps). This time I wanted to score more than 200 reps.
I did 50 reps before taking a short break to catch my breath. Then 40 reps. Then rounds of 20, reaching a total of 220 reps. A pretty good performance and a new PB. Breathing will be the key to get more reps.


Tuesday: HADES (20:32*)

I had sore calves from the Monday jumps and my motivation wasn't at its top. I haven't re-read all my previous posts, but I have the feeling that on Tuesdays I'm often less in the mood for training. I'll keep an eye open to see if that's really a pattern.
Anyway, as often when the mind isn't inspired, the performance isn't great: Hades over 20mn.


Wednesday: SPLIT LUNGE MAX (166* -personal best) +SITUP MAX (129* -personal best) +JACKNIFE MAX (37*) +SPLIT LUNGE MAX (149*) +SITUP MAX (131* -personal best) +JACKNIFE MAX (31*)


The training started well with 2 PB in a row, the first real difficulty appeared with the Jacknives (much harder than usual due to the previous situps).

What can be worse than a Split Max? Two Split Max of course!
Repeating these workouts twice was my main concern today, but surprisingly it wasn't as bad as I expected. No PB on the second Lunge MAX, but I wasn't very far from the first attempt. I even managed to get a second PB in Situp MAX! I didn't have to wait long to pay the price for this effort. My abs were burning during the last Jacknives.
Overall I was pleased by the results, but this was a fairly demanding day due to the heavy load spread over very few muscles.


Thursday: Boxing training

Training as usual. Just want to confirm that sore butt is definitely a consequence from Lunges...


Friday: nothing

I intended to do the session 4 on Friday, however I woke-up with a pain just above left ankle, on the outer side of the leg. Probably the tendon, rather than muscles.

Curiously this is not a spot where I'm used to have tendinitis. Usually after too much running or rope jumping I get tendinitis on the inner side of the leg (also just above the ankle). Because of this new location, I assume that it must be caused by an exercise that I'm not used to do. My guess is that the Jumps on Monday did the bulk of the damage, but that I didn't feel it yet. The Thursday training probably finished the job (the boxing stance and movements rely heavily on the ball of the foot, just like when landing those jumps), leading to the inflammation of the tendon.
The pain didn't fade during the day, so I decided no to train to give a full day of rest to my leg.


Saturday:

• Session 4: DIONE (25:43* -personal best)
• Session 5: HS PUSHUP MAX (58) +PUSHUP MAX (53* - personal best) +JUMP MAX (217*)

I could still feel a pain. It didn't seem bad enough to lead to a more serious injury, so I decided that I could finish my training. To support the foot and avoid torning my foot, I wore an ankle brace.

I didn't notice any discomfort during the first workout. It went very well, I finished well under 26:00 improving again my Dione PB and finally beating that time from Mads that I had used as a training goal for weeks. This really felt like a big achievement (I now have to find myself a new target to keep going!).

I followed-up by completing the fifth & last session of the week. I didn't even try to do normal HS pushups this time, and went straight to the easy version. No PB. For pushups, that was painful but I did manage to improve my personal best, finishing with 53 repetitions.

Last but not least Jumps MAX. The exercise went relatively well, breathing was a bit better than Monday so I think that under normal conditions I could have gone a bit above 220. But at the very end of the workout, I felt that the repeated landings were worsening my leg condition. So I stopped before the end of the timer.


That's all for the week. From a training stands point it was very good, with an unusual training routine, many PBs, and a milestone achieved in Dione. The only downer is this stupid tendinitis. I hope that it will not jeopardize week #14 training. The good news as I look at the week #14 training is that it's mostly strength focused, so I won't have to complete jumps or run 1 km.

Cardio-Strength Program: week #11

Week #11 out of 15

Good news for you guys. I don't have much to comment this week, so hopefully you'll be spared from my long monologues!
The training program that I was assigned is very standard. No new workout. No particularly difficult assignment. No complaining about the weather.
Just a lot of Dione, it felt a bit like starting the program all over again.


Monday: DIONE (28:21* -personal best)

In week #9, I was assigned my first Dione in a long time. So I had expected to send my 2 months old personal best out of the ballpark. In the end, it "only" improved by about 2 minutes (at 29:16*).
I didn't want any regrets this time. To get good completion time in cardio (regardless if you are aiming at 15mn or 45mn), it's all about pace. Starting too fast jeopardizes the end of the workout. In my case, I have noticed that if I don't pay attention, I tend to slow down during the abs workouts. I slip into a comfortable rhythm instead of my best pace.
In the end I improved my completion time by nearly a minute.


Tuesday: HADES (18:01* -personal best)

For some reason, I was convinced that week #11 started with 3 Dione in a row.
But that evening I wasn't really in the mood for a 30mn workout, so just in case I double checked my schedule. Believe it or not, but I was glad to see that I had to do Hades instead.

Let's pause for a second, and think about it.
Only a few weeks back, I couldn't do 3 normal pullups in a row. But today, my brain categorizes a workout with 45 pullups & 45 pushups as "good news".
I'm not pretending to be a pullups guru. I still have huge room from improvement. But I think that it's a good anecdote to share with for those of you which have just begun training. Yes, these damn pullups may feel impossible. But the more you try, the easier it gets.

Anyway, another PB. I expected an improvement, as last week training was heavily focused on arms. But a 1:28 gain was bigger than I had imagined.


Wednesday: DIONE (29:04*)

Today it was a bit more difficult than usual to get into my training. It felt like I started much slower than usual in round 1. The pace increased afterward. In the end I don't have to be ashamed of the result (it's still below last week's PB), but no new record today.


Thursday: Boxing training

Friday: Boxing training

Two boxing training this week. The second one was relatively short (~45mn).


Saturday: DIONE (27:03* -personal best) + Bonus: PULLUPS MAX (33* repetitions -personal best)

Sunday: Bonus: PUSHUPS MAX (51* repetitions -personal best)

Again a new PB in Dione. Again, improved by over a minute.
A few weeks back, I was wondering if my plateauing performance in the basic Cardio workouts (Dione & Aphrodite) was not linked to the increased diversity of my training. Or to put it differently, as I started doing a lot of other things (Hera, Kentauros, Hades, Zeus, etc.), I was getting less specialized in Dione & Aphrodite.

My first intuition, seems to be confirmed by my good results with Dione lately. I have been doing the same workout over and over again, and almost each time I have decreased my PB by a minute. The take-away is that if one day you absolutely want to achieve a certain milestone (e.g. Aphrodite under 15mn), but don't seem to get there. The best strategy is to repeat that same exercise over and over again, until you become super efficient at it.


Anyway, on Saturday I had some extra energy left to burn so I decided to do a quick Pullups Max. I had been doing many workouts that includes pullups, but without measuring my progress with a Max.
Shortly after I completed the workout, one of the blog readers (Dimitri) who follows me on the app, commented on the performance. Basically he was joking that 33 reps would look more feasible if it were pushups instead of pullups.

That comment actually reminded me that when I started, on bad days I would usually be in the mid-thirties for Pushups Max. My PB was at 42. Certainly I should be able to do more now. To avoid thinking about it too much, Sunday I did a quick test: 51 reps.
The first 30 reps were actually not difficult. Execution was quick without pausing. It's around 35 reps that my muscles started to be strained, and I slowed down notably.
Out of the 100 seconds that the exercise lasted, I estimate that it took me 50s for the first 35 reps and 50s for the last 16 reps.
So clearly the bottle neck for me to reduce time further is not execution speed but how many reps in a row I can endure. More muscle building is required...

Cardio-Strength Program: week #9

Week #9 out of 15

Last time I suggested that my next post would be an update on the evolution of my body stats. Then I realized that I was already in the middle of week #9. To be consistent with my previous measures, I decided to delay the measures until the week-end. A few days might not make a big difference, but I prefer taking snapshots at clearly identifiable milestones (like "after week #9") than fuzzy ones (like "after 8 and a half weeks").
So first I'm giving an update on my week #9 training, and then the body stats post will follow shortly (measures are already taken, I just need to sit and write them down).


Tuesday: ARES (08:06*) + LUNGE MAX (134*) + POSEIDON (05:55*) + SQUAT MAX (173*)

My training week started Tuesday (impossible to schedule earlier). No easy ramp-up for me this week: my first session was made of 4 workouts, including a new one.

First came Ares, a workout that I consider as relatively easy. As you can see I didn't get a new personal best. This shows that even when a workout is not particularly challenging, you need to be at your max intensity to get these damned PBs. Taking it easy is not an option!

Then came Split Lunge Max. If anyone wants to create the "Lunge Max Haters Club", I will sign-up immediately.  This exercise is basically a static version of the Lunge Walk. The strange thing is that I actually don't mind the Lunge Walk. I even wrote that, to me, it felt easier than Squats. 

After thinking about it, I think that I understand why Split Lunge is harder than Lunge Walk. When you walk, while your left leg moves forward, your weight is 100% on the right leg. Once the left foot connects with the ground, your body weight progressively shifts from the right leg to the left one. It's the same thing when you do a Lunge Walk: progressive weight shift.

To do a Split Lunge, during a split second both feet are off the ground (see video below). Which means that their is no progressive shift, one leg has to absorb 100% of the body weight at once when you re-connect with the ground. Hence the effort is bigger.

Then I completed a Poseidon workout. No PB either. Generally I expect to have a slightly sub-par performance  if I have already completed a few workouts beforehand. In this specific case I was disappointed. The last time that I did Poseidon was on week #2. 7 weeks later it took me 5 additional seconds to complete. This clearly wasn't my best day ever.

I wrapped-up the day with a Squat Max. No need to say I didn't get a PB. On a regular day this exercise is already a weak spot for me, but doing it after the Split Lunge Max was even more difficult. The positive point is that to stay focused I had set as a personal objective to do at least 170 repetitions. Mission accomplished.

This last workout was my 100th Freeletics workout since starting the program! I took a lot of sweat to get there!


Wednesday: DIONE (29:16* -personal best)

Before moving to my daily training, let me share a personal anecdote. As you know I practice boxing, which is a sport that makes the entire body work. Over the year I have gotten sore muscles pretty much all over the place (even jaws muscles!). Sometimes it hurt in places where I didn't thought that I had muscles. But I never had a sore butt like the one I got on Wednesday!
Ladies & Gentlemen, I may hate this workout, but I tell you: if you are looking to get an ass of steel before the Summer, Split Lunge is the exercise that you should be doing!

Only Dione was on the menu today. I'm very familiar with this workout by now, and my last PB was a 9 weeks old. So I expected a massive improvement, around 5 minutes or more.
In the end, if I did get a new PB, the time "only" improved by 02:11. Was my expectation unrealistic? Was my performance sub-optimal?
I don't know. Next time that I have to complete Dione, if my results improve dramatically (or not), I'll get the answer.



Thursday: Boxing training


Friday: KENTAUROS (30:59*)

When starting this program I have decided to spread the training load over the work-week, and use the week-end to get 2 consecutive rest days. Over the past few weeks scheduling constraints have extended my training to include Saturday as well.

To get back to my original setup, if possible I wanted to do my last 2 sessions on Friday. I can't do pull-ups where I train near work, so I decided that I'd train Kentauros during my lunch break and do the last session in the evening.

Kentauros is a workout that is physically demanding, but fairly balanced. To put it in other words: I respect this training, but that I don't really fear it. My confidence & motivation levels were good when I started training.

The workout began with the Lunge Walk, which was completed normally. But when came the time to do the first High Jumps, at first I couldn't do them. My legs didn't provide enough force to lift me off the ground high enough. The strange thing was my legs did not feel sore at all. I had no pain. Simply the muscles did not respond as expected. Eventually, I got the 10 jumps completed. This shook my confidence at bit but I kept going.
Then came the Burpee Frogs . Doing the burpee part was ok, but I couldn't jump forward as far as I usually did. The ironic thing when training over a fixed distance, is that because my difficulties to jump, I was forced to complete more repetitions. The icing on the cake was that the ground was soaking wet, so my gloves & tracksuit were quickly dripping with water.
Afterward doing the high jumps felt normal again, but the burpee frogs remained very difficult. As you can imagine I didn't get a personal best. I actually scored a "personal worst": 49 seconds more than when I first attempted Kentauros in week #7.

While analyzing what happened, I came to the conclusion that my tights had not recovered from the Split Lunge and the Squats on Tuesday. The leg muscles were still strained from the effort, but I had not realized it because they did not feel sore.

Those of you who follow me on the app saw that, I was a bit gloomy after the training and hoped to have better performance in the evening. Ultimately, it didn't train further. It was a bad day and I came home late, so I took a  rest in the evening.



Saturday: ARES (08:07*) + LUNGE MAX (143* -personal best) + POSEIDON (05:13* -personal best) + SQUAT MAX (171*)

A new day and a new start. I wanted to score as many personal best as possible to wash off the bad Friday. Session 4 was exactly the same as Session 1.
I felt great while doing Ares. I thought that I was flying.
If anything was flying around it must have been my mind, not my body. Because my completion time was not stellar. 1 second more than on Tuesday, that's an average performance.

Next came Lunge Max. I didn't want this exercise to because a phobia, so despite tired legs I gave it all to improve the number of repetitions. It worked, I got a PB.
For Poseidon I knew that I must be possible to improve. I stayed focused and managed to get a PB, improving by over 30 seconds.
For the Squat Max, just like in Session 1, I knew that the PB was out of reach but I didn't want to let my myself slack-off. So, again I set myself the objective to do over 170 reps. I barely made-it with 171 reps, but I was satisfied.


I was pleased with my last session. It's not my best day ever, I got 2 PB and it cheered me up after the Kentauros failure. It's always nice to finish the week on a positive note!