In a fitness doldrum...and my July challenge.

The "Doldrums" are a place on the sea where there are no winds. It is a place where a sailing vessel might be stuck for days at a time; waiting on currents or the slightest of breezes to move it along.

For the past few days, that's where I've been. I did manage a nice walk yesterday (3 miles), but I've done little else since the calendar turned to July. Oh, I've done a little stretching and some light exercises, but nothing that is going to move me along the path of better health and fitness. In the doldrums, there is little external motivation and in the case of the large sailing ships, little internal means to move out of them.

Fortunately, in the fitness world there is plenty of both--plenty of external motivators and an internal voice that says you just have to move...a little, just enough to get out of the doldrums.

On Friday, I ran across a site (or rather, it ran across my twitter feed) that is a monthly burpee challenge; a timed 100 burpee challenge on the first Friday of every month. To be honest, I'm not sure I can do 100 of these--even with the poor form of the girl in the video clip. I do have a month to get ready for the August challenge.Anybody want to try it with me?

I'll be happy if I can do 100 in any amount of time. I'm not sure that I could do 100 even without the push up portion. It wasn't that long ago that I didn't have the ab strength to get my legs back under me in a quick motion, nor did I have the flexibility to squat to the initial position very well to begin with!

And 100 push ups! Even at 1 rep at a time it sounds like a killer workout!

So that's it. Tomorrow I start.

Oh,
...and I went kayak shopping today. I'll probably hit Springfield lake again this week. If it turns out that I go very often, having my own will be a better deal than renting one every time. And it will give me the flexibility of going where I want to go instead of being limited to the same place all of the time. There are some very nice (and very expensive) ones out there, to be sure. As much as I'd like on of those, I'm sure I'll start with a lower cost one. I don't plan on needing to haul a lot of gear and I don't plan on hitting any hard waters. I just want to get some exercise (and maybe do a little fishing at some point). Maybe that's where I'll spend my holiday pay from working on Friday!
Maybe.

Any takers on the burpee challenge. We can motivate each other on our way to better health and fitness!

John <><