A ladder workout with ascending numbers of Hindu Squats, Hindu Pushups, and Jacknifes.. Last time I did a workout with these exercises was a few weeks ago and I did it in a format where I did as many rounds as possible in 30 minutes of 100 Hindu Squats, 20 Hindu Pushups, and 20 Jackknifes.. I got 7 full rounds for a total of 700 Hindu Squats, 140 Hindu pushups and 140 jacknifes.. Not too bad for 30 minutes of work, but by limiting the number of each exercise per round I was able to really crank without putting myself into maximal effort.. Today I went to another level.. It was a ladder workout where I did 4 rounds with ascending reps. The rounds were:
-100 Hindu Squats, 25 Hindu Pushups, 25 Jackknifes
-200 Hindu Squats, 50 Hindu Pushups, 50 Jacknifes
-300 Hindu Squats, 75 Hindu Pushups, 75 Jackknifes
-400 Hindu Squats, 100 Hindu Pushups, 100 Jackknifes
The first round was a nice introduction to the torture I'd be experiencing over the next hour. It took a little under 5 minutes and I quickly calculated that this workout would take me close to an hour to complete and that I was going to put myself into some serious pain to complete it. In each round I completed the number of hindu squats without stopping. I had never done more than 200 of these in a row, so doing 200,300 and then 400 in a row was brutal. At a pace of about 40 squats per minute the lactic acid in the legs builds to a very uncomfortable level (in other words, really starts to suck) right around 100, so the push to continue after that is as much mental as it is physical. Beginning a set of 400 squats with 600 already in your quads is daunting, painful, and kind super challenging on a number of levels. The last set of squats took me 10:30. No stops the entire time. Walking really funny when it was over... The Hindu pushups were pretty agonizing for the rounds of 75 and 100. On the round of 75. Having already completed 75 of these, I had to stop at 60 before continuing on. And on the round of 100 I had to stop at 55 and 85.. The rounds of pushups were brutal. I went until my whole body was shaking and I had to take 3 breaths between reps just to complete another one, until the point that one more rep was impossible.. I would then rest 30 seconds and go again until I completed the number of reps I needed.. There was a lot of noise coming out of me, mostly unintelligible with some R rated wailing mixed in.. The rounds of jackknifes were just as difficult if not more so since it got to the point where I had to finish my last 50 in the round of 100 by doing 10 and taking 10 breaths, then 10 more jackknifes, and then 10 more breaths...
This is what training hard means. It means not knowing what your limits are but always training to try to find out.. My totals for the workout were 1000 Hindu Squats, 250 Hindu Pushups, and 250 Jackknifes.. Completed in 4 rounds of increasing difficulty. That's key.. I could just as easily have broken this down into 10 rounds of lesser reps and not pushed myself one quarter as hard as I did. I went into this knowing the number of reps it would take to put me in pain and I doubled it.. That was my goal for the workout and I achieved it...
To cap it off, after a 20 minute break I got on the power wheel and knocked out 200 yards of power wheel crawl and 80 power wheel hamstring curls in 7 minutes... 200 yards of power wheel crawl is much tougher when it follows 250 hindu pushups and 250 jackknifes...
I think I'll take it easy the rest of the day...
Train hard, be well,
Kevin
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