"Drop and give me 1000!"
Friday, March 5, 2010 by Matt Mercier
Last night I decided that I would do something worthy of writing about.
I don't know why 1000 push-ups came into my head, but it was the first thing, and I decided I would stick do it. I am a man of my word.
As far as I know, nobody can bust out 1000 push-ups at once, so attempting to do that would be as useful as punching myself in the face. What I can do, is perform 25 with little difficulty, so I should be able to do 25 push-ups every 15 minutes. This will give me 100 per hour, and if I start the moment when I wake up I should get to 1000 push-ups by 5pm.
The alarm went off and I was up immediately ready to get started. The first 25 were rough, but they woke me up. I set my watch to go off every 15 minutes and went about my normal daily activities. Sure enough as the morning progressed the beeping noise would proceed my dropping to the ground and pushing out 25. As I reached the 350 mark I noticed fatigued setting in at push-up number 20. That number began to get lower. By the time I reached 500 at lunchtime, I was wobbling at number 16, and hesitating before commencing. Do a few more, rest before finally getting to 25.
Fatigue would case strength to leach out of me so rapidly, one moment I'm sticking to a decent cadence, and in just a few repetitions I would be gritting my teeth just to do one push-up. I could see that I was losing the battle, my muscles weren't able to recover in the 15 minutes I gave them. I dipped into my long distance running training and did what I would have done had I hit the wall on the road. I gelled. I sucked down a "Gu" and took an hour break.
As the afternoon went on I continued, slowly reaching 700, then 800. I felt confident. If marathon training teaches you anything, you know that the human body was built for the long haul. If you give it enough time, it can perform almost anything you ask of it. As I moved up the to the golden number I was again wobbly nearing 25. 5pm came and went, as any breaks, or hesitations I took cumulated in my original completion time being extended.
We had company at 6:30, and I had to excuse myself while I double-timed-it to the guest room to eek out my final few sets. Yes, it is embarrassing, how do explain as an adult that you are trying to do 1000 push-ups? My poor wife was not in an enviable position.
I was able to record the finish, so here it is in all its anti-climactic glory.
I did it. I can now say that I did 1000 push-ups in one day. It was not as hard as I thought it might be. I was only inconvenienced the next day when I experienced soreness in my pectorals so intense it felt like the muscle itself had the flu. Aside from this however, the challenge wasn't that challenging, and I may have to up the ante next time.
I don't know why 1000 push-ups came into my head, but it was the first thing, and I decided I would stick do it. I am a man of my word.
As far as I know, nobody can bust out 1000 push-ups at once, so attempting to do that would be as useful as punching myself in the face. What I can do, is perform 25 with little difficulty, so I should be able to do 25 push-ups every 15 minutes. This will give me 100 per hour, and if I start the moment when I wake up I should get to 1000 push-ups by 5pm.
The alarm went off and I was up immediately ready to get started. The first 25 were rough, but they woke me up. I set my watch to go off every 15 minutes and went about my normal daily activities. Sure enough as the morning progressed the beeping noise would proceed my dropping to the ground and pushing out 25. As I reached the 350 mark I noticed fatigued setting in at push-up number 20. That number began to get lower. By the time I reached 500 at lunchtime, I was wobbling at number 16, and hesitating before commencing. Do a few more, rest before finally getting to 25.
Fatigue would case strength to leach out of me so rapidly, one moment I'm sticking to a decent cadence, and in just a few repetitions I would be gritting my teeth just to do one push-up. I could see that I was losing the battle, my muscles weren't able to recover in the 15 minutes I gave them. I dipped into my long distance running training and did what I would have done had I hit the wall on the road. I gelled. I sucked down a "Gu" and took an hour break.
As the afternoon went on I continued, slowly reaching 700, then 800. I felt confident. If marathon training teaches you anything, you know that the human body was built for the long haul. If you give it enough time, it can perform almost anything you ask of it. As I moved up the to the golden number I was again wobbly nearing 25. 5pm came and went, as any breaks, or hesitations I took cumulated in my original completion time being extended.
We had company at 6:30, and I had to excuse myself while I double-timed-it to the guest room to eek out my final few sets. Yes, it is embarrassing, how do explain as an adult that you are trying to do 1000 push-ups? My poor wife was not in an enviable position.
I was able to record the finish, so here it is in all its anti-climactic glory.
I did it. I can now say that I did 1000 push-ups in one day. It was not as hard as I thought it might be. I was only inconvenienced the next day when I experienced soreness in my pectorals so intense it felt like the muscle itself had the flu. Aside from this however, the challenge wasn't that challenging, and I may have to up the ante next time.
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