100 pushups, Canada Fitness, and my 1998 fifty pushup adventure

I remember back in 1997 or 1998 when I decided that I would get in shape. I had stopped playing basketball for about 3 years and hadn't found my next sport (Ultimate) yet. The undergrad days were impacting my health, so I came up with a few simple strategies.

The above picture was taken and the badges were designed by The Canadian Design Resource.

Ever since the days of Canada fitness (see picture above for the excellence badges), I've been challenged by push ups. I, probably, cheated back in the day of Canada fitness to get up to the excellence range. Regardless, I made the goal of being able to do 50 consecutive pushups.

The plan was relatively simple. Before I showered each morning, I would do as many pushups as I could. There's nothing like doing pushups in a basement, in the middle of January, in "cold" Ottawa, but after about 5 months, I got into the 50 push up range. This helped me in the following summer as I worked landscaping between my Bachelors and Masters degrees.

Once again I've decided to hit a push up goal. This time it's 100 consecutive push ups, but I won't be using my own strategy. Instead, I'm using some other bloggers plan: Onehundredpushups. In this program, I'm up to week 3 and I finished the 1st workout of the third week. I still remember how long it took to get to 50 pushups was, so I'm surprised that this plan intends to get you there in roughly 6 weeks. The sets definitely make more sense than just max out exercise. I'll keep you posted.

Peter

More Mainstream Media Reporting on Video Game Sports Benefit

Another article (here) has jumped on to what I've been pushing for some time now - video games for athletic training. The article is not a full blown promotion for gaming as training. The article describes examples of gaming, but more a focus on how technology has impacted sports and the idea of virtual training. They completely bypass the idea of spacial awareness, which I believe is the biggest benefit for team based athletes.


Also, in the article they make a brief reference to the Wii. Likely, you've been discussing and wondering how the Wii could impact an Ultimate video game. One of the ideas I had was manufacturing a disc in which you could insert one of the joysticks/remotes. Then I wonder if the throwing motions could be captured in a game. Maybe with a Wii fit board you could somehow play a game. I imagine it would be a first-person based sports game similar to EA's latest range of first-person campaings (if you haven't tried one like Fifa'09 then give it a shot. It's a new take on the sports game, and I've taken Andy Johnson and Fulham much further then there real counterparts [though Fulham is having an amazing season]).

I doubt we will see a mainstream Ultimate game in the near or far future. Once again our sport is too small and the game appeal is not worth the game development costs. This is good since you have to go out and run around instead of playing video games simulating your sport in the isolation of your own home. Keep video games for those downtimes, and use them for improving hand-eye coordination and spacial awareness.

PJ

My own attempt at conscious breathing

Apparently, we care about breathing. Some interesting comments were added to yesterday's post, and today, after recovering from a little food poisoning, I was back on the treadmill. I decided to focus on some breathing exercises, and I thought I would give you a little personal experimentation perspective.

At present, on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I run for about 30 minutes at a certain rate increasing the elevation .5% per five minutes (if I'm feeling strong). Today I ran at 11.3 km/h plugged into the treadmill's television watching some show called "the class" (I think). There were a few really funny moments in the sitcom, which resulted in me laughing out loud on the treadmill, and these moments made interesting challenges for breathing and running.

Back to the breathing... My plan was to work on breathing for parts of the run and see how easy it was. I was looking to use the 2 step inhale, 2 step hold, and 4 step exhale. Well, actually, I started with the 2 step inhale, 2 step hold, and 2 step exhale. That was a disaster since I couldn't seem to get enough air in my lungs to hold the rhythm for more than 30 seconds. Once I established the first rhythm with an aggressive 4 step exhale, I found I could keep the rhythm going for about 2 minutes. I suspect this aggressive exhaling sounded funny to other people in the gym. I didn't look, but I'm sure some people were concerned that I may be dying every five minutes or so.

I did about 4 of these breathing exercises over the thirty minute run, and during them felt awkward in breathing, but strong in running. It reminded me of my days on a swim team where you would freestyle swim for so many strokes without taking a breath. In the cool down, I did one more breathing exercise and found it significantly easier. My guess is that the less stress during the cool down meant my body wasn't in such high demand for oxygen and adapted easily to the breathing rhythm.

The other thing I paid attention to for the run was what seemed to be my natural breathing pattern. I'm not sure if there's a Heisenberg effect (where once you try to observe then what you're trying to observe changes), but I found I breath at roughly a 2 step inhale and 2 step exhale. There's no holding stage in my breathing. Also, I tend to breath through my mouth, and some of the literature is suggesting breath through your nose for calming effects.

Something to work on to make those 30 minute runs a little more interesting. Though the sitcoms in the morning on the treadmill are quite good, and if I can't get one that gets that specific channel then I get to watch cricket. It all makes the run a little less mind numbing.

PJ