PT and more

I may have mentioned before that the Corps will be physically challenging. Well, now I'll give you something more specific. To pass the Corps physical test, you have to make a 1 1/2 mile run in about 15 minutes, as well as 42 pushups and 50 someodd situps. Right now I can probably do the run easily, the situps barely, and nowhere near 40 pushups. So Ross has kindly allowed me to tag along when he "PT's" and push me along. It's amazingly tiring.

Here's a basic outline of what I've done as far as exercise this week, starting on Thursday.
Thursday morning: about 8:00 I was awakened and 15 minutes later we were headed out to Pecan Park to run the Lanana creek trail. Pecan is about at the halfway point, so we started off in one direction, at Ross's pace. After about the hardest 3/4 of a mile I had ever run, we reached a set of pull-up bars. Of course, we couldn't let those go unchallenged, so I did about seven, while Ross did about ten. I don't remember exactly because I was having trouble with the oxygen levels in my brain. From there we continued to run to Liberty Hall, the Southernmost extent of the trail. There, we did pushups. After about 25-30 pushups, probably less, I just about passed out from the combined effects of the running, pushups, and having not eaten yet that day. After I revived a bit, we headed back north to Pecan, at my pace this time. Needless to say, it took us much longer to get to Pecan than it took to get to Liberty Hall.

Friday morning: I got up a bit earlier on Friday, mostly so that I could prepare for the day. This time I took Ross's advice and had some blueberry-lemon bread for a snack before we left. I also took the opportunnity to make some gatorade. Then we headed back out to Pecan to run Lanana again, but with a change: this time we did the whole thing. We started off heading south, through SFA down to the post office. That part of the trail is the least shaded, so we did it as early as possible. By the time we reached Pecan again, I was lagging badly with the entire north end of the trail to go. Ross, wanting to get his whole run in, told me I needed only to run until I met him coming back down the trail, then turn around. The only condition he added to that was that if I didn't get far enough, we would do sprints. More on those later. I did, however, survive the run, and go quickly enough to avoid sprinting.

Saturday morning: This morning, we went to the farmers market before delivering Mom to the gym and heading off to the SFA stadium. We got a few peaches and a very ripe cantaloupe.
At the stadium, Ross declared his intention to push me really hard. To that end, we warmed up (!) with a short, easy mile run. Then, it was off to the sprints. The objective of a sprint is to run the length of a football field as fast as possible, stopping at regular intervals to do pushups, situps, etc.
Ross taught me this really cool thing called a diamond. Basically, it's a pushups where your hands are together and your thumb and first finger form a diamond. Like a pushup, but lots harder. We did four of these sprints, then caught our breath for a couple minutes.
Then we did what Ross calls "suicides" (insert doom music here). A suicide is a set of short sprints, first to the ten yard line, then the twenty, then the thirty, touching each line with your hand. The name is quite descriptive of how it feels.
After the suicides, we cooled down by walking a slow lap of the track. Ross and I were both sick (litterally) of situps, Ross slightly more so than me. We did manage to make it home without incident though.

After having finally asked Ross how this compares to Corps PT, he said it's the same stuff, but more of it. It's gonna be rough.

I did finally get my Eagle Scout Board of Review last night, so I am officially an Eagle Scout! That means I'll get at least a small scholarship as well as the priviledge of wearing the medal on my uniform.