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Penny Young: Getting fit the army way
Thursday Tom arrived home from university tonight with three binbags full of washing and an impressive set of biceps.
Thursday
Tom arrived home from university tonight with three binbags full of washing and an impressive set of biceps."Get off!" he said in embarrassment as his sisters and myself oohed and ahhed over his new musculature.
Even Mr Young - whose upper torso is as finely put-together a specimen of manhood as you could ever wish to see outside the Lido on a sunny August afternoon - nodded approvingly (folding his arms and discreetly flexing his own biceps in an unconscious display of alpha maleness. Bless. They're so transparent, aren't they?).
Apparently, Tom's new-found brawn was not down to his college diet of sausages and Hula Hoops, but was instead the result of the daily press-ups he'd been doing as part of the official British army fitness programme. I had a look on-line - there it is on The Guardian website. Journalist Rachel Dixon is doing the sixteen-week programme.
What a great challenge! I thought. My own fitness regime has been lounging about in the doldrums ever since Archie the puppy arrived.
So much for bracing walks - my current daily exercise is taking him halfway down the drive and watching the cars pass for ten minutes while he digs his heels in and whimpers and refuses to budge another inch even with a morsel of freeze-dried chicken liver held temptingly just out of reach.
Friday
I leap out of bed at the crack of, well, eight o'clock, and blow the dust off my trainers for the first day of the army fitness programme. Week One, Day One - run/walk for twenty minutes, then do press-ups and sit-ups for two minutes. I did manage the run - well, it was actually the sort of wheezing stumble that makes old ladies cluck sympathetically and cyclists give you a wide berth in case you suddenly keel over in their path.
Back home, as soon as I'd finished gasping for breath, I attempted the sit-ups and press-ups. 31 sit-ups with my feet anchored under the sofa, and 5 press-ups. I checked my fitness against the official site: "poor" for press-ups, "average" for sit-ups.
To add insult to injury, Rachel Dixon apparently scored 44 press-ups and 66 sit-ups on her Day One which put her in the Very Good category. I hate her.
Sunday
Today, I have to do interval running - flat out for 30 seconds, then resting for two minutes, repeated several times. I decide to take Mr Young with me as I haven't run flat out since I was seven and am afraid I might spontaneously combust if I do the same thing at the age of forty-eight.
We spend an unnecessarily long time debating how best to calculate the 30 seconds. First, I run while counting one-elephant-two-elephant etc., until I reach 30-elephant. Mr Young tells me this actually only lasted 15 seconds when I arrive, puffing, back at his side.
Eventually, we decide the best way to count the 30 seconds is for me to run away from him, counting to 30 and then run back towards him until he signals that the time is up. This isn't terribly successful, and I just end up scampering in small circles around Mr Young.
A few suspicious dog walkers keep their distance - I have a feeling that I am probably doing a good impression of an excitable terrier periodically breaking away from its owner to chase rabbits.
"Perhaps a bit of freeze-dried chicken liver might help?" Mr Young asks sympathetically.
I am too exhausted to slap him.
Related online: guardian.co.uk - The official British army fitness programme
'16-week planner to military fitness'
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Sunday 12 February 2012
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