Keep calm and go unbroken
un·bro·ken
Adjective
Not interrupted or disturbed; continuous:
The term “unbroken” seems to stem from the crossfit phenomenon. Unbroken and DNF seem to be the two “phrases” I hear bandied around amongst the crossfit peeps who inhabit my “other gym”.
Granted I don’t know much about crossfit having never stepped inside a crossfit gym, I’ve watched it on the TV and I glance in at the crossfit section when I’m at Les Mills and watch them do their handstand pushups but that’s as far as my experience goes.
However my p.t “says” it often, and it’s usually accompanied by a headshake and a raised eyebrow which in laymans terms translates to “WTF?!?! move your lard arse!” (well to be fair I’m not sure about the lard part – but the rest is totally on the money)
You see Mr P.T seems to have a “thing” for crossfit – he makes me do crossfit push ups, crossfit burpees, crossfit olympic lifts, crossfit blah blah blah .. there are “standards” to be met and believe you me that involves lots of me swearing at him when he won’t count a rep. I’ve mentioned he’s not bad looking right? .. It’s the only reason I keep him around really 😉
Anyway I’ve been really trying to carry this with me .. the desire to go unbroken.
I had gotten myself into a really bad habit at Ludus where I would see the number of reps on the board (for example 40) and think sweet I’ll do 20 then two sets of 10 with a wee breather and maybe even a swig of water.
There are exercises I’d have no chance in hell of doing unbroken – chins for example but otherwise I’m really trying my hardest to go the distance – all the time hearing “his” (the p.t – not God) voice inside my head .. unbroken Julz, you got this!
Fast forward to this morning in the Arena and the board contains this ..
12 minutes to “complete” each row!
I said to Iz “Well looks like today I’m just going to be doing a shite load of burpees and not much else!”
As we were about to start I looked across the arena and my eyes met JP’s so I mouthed “50 unbroken – ok?” and JP being JP replied “ok then”
And that was that. I had to go unbroken now since JP would notice if I stopped, so I put my head down and did it *proud* and yes he also went unbroken since he said he would – man of his word is our JP.
BUT it gets even better ..
I did every single set of burpees unbroken – four sets of 50 unbroken *insert expletive* burpees! The first two were doable, the second to last set I really had to push through the last 20 but that final set – fml I honestly wanted to puke, but couldn’t because that would involve stopping – I did wonder if I could puke and burpee at the same time but thankfully I didn’t find out.
On a side note I “dnf”ed every set I don’t actually think anyone got to the end because I didn’t see any crawling going on, but I could be wrong ..
I got through some chins on sets 1-3 but didn’t even get close on the last set – those spider pushups straight after the burpee/puke set made me want to cry!
As I’ve found out those are the workouts I love the most 😉
Till next time
