I hate burpees. Even at my fastest clip I do them pretty slowly (10 in about 25 seconds), and in no time at all I feel like quitting from exhaustion and misery. About two-and-a-half years ago I managed 100 in just under 10 minutes, and the experience so scarred me that I’ve only worked them half-heartedly and sporadically since.
So, in the spirit of working on your weaknesses, I resolved to make them a staple of my regime, and just managed to get my time back under 10:00. My approach was pretty simple: do 100 burpees every Tuesday and Thursday. For the first workout, set the Gymboss (cool, new 2009 version of an already-great timer!) to 2 minute intervals and do 10 burpees at the top of each interval, resting during the leftover time (yes, that’s a lot of rest!). Every workout, subtract 5 seconds from the intervals. So 1:55 intervals the next workout, then 1:50, etc. Once you get down to 1:00 intervals, and you do 10 at the top of each, you will get your 100 in under 10 minutes.
Here’s how it went for me (date, interval time, total time):
1/14 2:00 18:40 1/19 1:55 17:11 1/21 1:50 16:21 1/26 1:45 15:12 1/28 1:40 14:44 2/02 1:35 14:10 2/04 1:30 13:55 2/09 1:25 13:06 2/11 1:20 12:25 2/16 1:15 QUIT (pulled shoulder at 17, bailed at 50) 2/23 1:15 12:06 2/25 1:10 11:02 3/04 1:05 QUIT (chickened out at 67) 3/05 1:05 10:15 (needed revenge) 3/09 1:00 09:51
This feels pretty close to my wall. The final 30 burpees of that set were ugly, ugly, ugly. Practically staggering to my feet to manage a 1-inch jump. Ugh. But I’ll take it. Not sure what I’ll do at my next workout. Shaving off another 5 seconds each round doesn’t sound like much, but it’d actually represent improving my time by more than 8 percent!
P.S. I know 10:00 isn’t an earth-shaking time. Remember this guy, who cranks out 100 in 5:00 and change? Unreal.
