Introduction

This entry is part 1 of 5 in the series Parkour Travel

I’m putting down my thoughts on “Parkour travel” for two reasons: First, I’ve found it immensely fun and rewarding, and so I hope to encourage others to travel. Second, I’ve seen enough things first-hand (as a host and as a guest), and heard enough stories, that make it clear that some bits of helpful knowledge are not universal. In this second area, I can only hope to raise some awareness.

This series will necessarily cover a wide range of ideas which I’ll try to cram into a few broad categories. Eventually, I’ll share my thoughts on all of the following (and more): Why travel at all? What do I mean by ‘Parkour travel’? How to be a good guest? Where to go?

This series is not about the nuts and bolts of traveling lightly and enjoying the experience. Although that’s a closely related topic, it’s an entirely separate series.

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§6 – I Choose To Fall!

This entry is part 18 of 37 in the series Study inspired by Pakour & Art du Déplacement by V. Thibault

I’ve now read the entire book several times, and Chapter 6 never ceases to inspire!

Three thoughts:

I may not be the strongest. I may not be the fastest. But I’ll be damned if I’m not trying my hardest.

~ unknown

It ofttimes requires heroic courage to face fruitless effort, to take up the broken strands of a life-work, to look bravely toward the future, and proceed undaunted on our way. But what, to our eyes, may seem hopeless failure is often but the dawning of a greater success. It may contain in its debris the foundation material of a mighty purpose, or the revelation of new and higher possibilities.

Failure is often the turning-point, the pivot of circumstance that swings us to higher levels. It may not be financial success, it may not be fame; it may be new draughts of spiritual, moral or mental inspiration that will change us for all the later years of our life. Life is not really what comes to us, but what we get from it.

~ Chapter 14, “Failure as a Success”, from Self Control, Its Kingship and Majesty, by William George Jordan, 1907

The application in the Ways is to falls in life. To be able to take a disaster or a great failure, with the whole personality, without shrinking back from it, like the big smack with which the judo man hits the ground. Then to rise at once.

Not to be appalled at a moral fall. Yet it is not that it does not matter. The judo man tries by every means not to be thrown, but when he is thrown it does not hurt him and in a sense it does not matter. It matters immensely, and yet it does not matter.

‘Falling seven times, and getting up eight.’

~ “Falling”, from Zen and the Ways, by Trevor Leggett, 1978

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Seriously, this again?

This entry is part 32 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

Two weeks ago I started back into putting some numbers on the board. But this just-past-week I hurt my back. Tuesday I did 80 bar precisions (an easy number), but my back was feeling tired. Then Wednesday, I was really pushing it. No, actually, all I did was stand up from my desk chair. *bam* So the brunt of last week was rest, and recovery. Again. :/

On Saturday, I was feeling much better so I eased back into some normal activity. Ran for 20 minutes (with someone who is a faster runner) then did 45 minutes of QM on a tennis court — managed to go 45 minutes without standing up and with only hands and/or feet on the ground. Then I had firewood delivered about 9:30, and spent four hours of hard labor stacking it all. (I clearly don’t understand what “ease” means.)

Today, my back still feels good; it’s still recovering but on the mend.

We’re going to our regular parkour class today from 3-5. Should be beautiful weather – for heat stroke. After that, we’re heading over to the pool for some lounge time in the shade.

Monday I’ll start back into putting some numbers back up. But THIS time, I’m staying on the resistance bands longer to make sure my back is ok.

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Back in the saddle

This entry is part 31 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

woo-HOO, it feels great to be back in the saddle!

I did this week’s workouts as planned. I’ve 80 bar precisions to squeeze in on Saturday. It’s a busy day, but it won’t be a problem. Monday and Wednesday I did the 80 pullups in sets of 3, WITH an assistance band. Today I did ten sets of 5 with the band, then 10 sets of 3 without any band. I think next week I should be good to go without any assistance band on the pullups.

This week I added 240 to the odometers. That’s WAY too slow to make the 10k-in-a-year goal. I’d have to rack up 500 per week to make it. I’m not ruling out some crazy miraculous rabbit-out-of-hat finish… but I expect I’m going to run over the one-year date.

Next week, I’m going to repeat the same plan (80 reps on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday). Just to make Saturday and Sunday completely free (from this stuff, I do other things ;) I’ll do all the bar precisions on Tuesday and Thursday. 6 sets of 20 is a nice workout. Next week I’ll be just shy of 6,000 reps of everything, so maybe I’ll squeeze in a few extra sets to ring that bell too.

Spreadsheet snapshot as usual. This week filled in. “Planned workouts” in yellow cells:

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Back on the wagon

This entry is part 30 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

I’ve been resting/recovering my shoulder for almost 5 weeks. Yesterday, I did 80 reps (broken into sets with rests) of push-ups/pull-ups/body-weight-squats and 8×10 second handstands… The pullups sucked, as I was standing on (I think it is the) 1-1/2” resistence band. Well, not standing, but keeping my knee bent to lessen how much force the band is adding. It’s probably 15 pounds or more at the bottom, and goes to zero before I reach the top of the pull-up. It made for a good forearm burn, but no hint of shoulder problems. So I think it’s safe to get back into this level of effort regularly. (My shoulder is definitely still in recovery though.)

Today I’m going to set up the precision bar. (The scaf is all there, but I pulled out one of the precision-jump bars for something else). I’ll do at least 4×20 to get back on the horse for bar-precisions.

The rest of this week I’ll stick to “easy” and just repeat the 80-reps workout Wednesday and Friday. I’m working further on hand/skin improvements. I did the first 40 pullups bare hands (on the indoor, 1” bar; I think the larger outdoor scaf is easier on the hands). When it’s starting to hurt, I put gloves on and save my hands for the next workout. So I’ll keep doing that. I’ll also work at getting off the band.

I was just reading an article about something like “sprint weight loss”. The idea is to leverage your short-term motivation to push your weight down, and then settle back to your regular eating/living routine. So I’m working on sticking strickly to my 16/8 IF this week. I’ve slowly eased down to wobbling around 220 pounds now, and have touched 218 once. So I think a couple weeks of diligent IF and actively thinking about carbs (that is, avoid them) again will get me to “wobbling around 218 pounds”. Which would be a great thing to help with pullups.

I’ve also now gotten an honest assessment of what happens if you take 5 weeks off from the body weight workouts. Definite back-sliding (no duh) but it’s not a train-wreck-total-start-over. So I hope I’ll feel more comfortable reigning things in for future injury, or injury-prevention, situations that arise.

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Moving forward

This entry is part 51 of 72 in the series My Journey

I really struggle with believing that small, daily efforts lead to long-term changes. On the treadmill of life, I always seem to want to start sprinting to get ahead, especially when the treadmill picks up speed working against me. I find little injuries or other setbacks are really demoralizing. Curiously, I don’t seem to be demoralized by the things I’m not yet able to do. (“Scale that wall? meh. Some day, maybe, not really a major concern though.”)

So any time I manage to go to a class, or an event, or a simple workout, or a run, or whatever… and I put in solid effort without injurying myself or pushing anything too far (pushing “too far” is for special occasions ;) …well, after those workouts, then I really feel vindicated and motivated to continue my journey.

This morning I managed to get up, get out the door, run and do my QM work alone. It was nothing major; Just a half hour of easy running and a half hour of “easy” QM.

It ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.

~ Rocky Balboa

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Another setback and refusal to quit

This entry is part 29 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

About three weeks ago, I over-did it… raking in the yard. :^/ I’m presuming that was just the final straw on top of everything else I’ve been doing.

At that time, I paused all my 10K workouts, but have continued training parkour, running, and even doing some shoulder-intensive quadrapedie conditioning work (shoulder loading modes which don’t cause pain). Watching the calendar tick away to my one-year deadline on the 10K project is the hardest part. Unfortunately, it would be a miraculous come back to make it at this point.

I’ve decided that I’m not giving up on the 10K goal. I’ve never tried (let alone completed) anything of this scale, so I *really* want to finish it. I’ll either pull off a miraculous come back, or I’ll simply be happy with over shooting the date. To that end, after a good two weeks off from the five exercises, I’m going to start back into doing some numbers. I may even start pullups with resistance band assistance to be 100% sure I do no further damage to my shoulder.

I already have a good, morning recovery habit (stretching, and dynamic range of motion stuff) which I am now doubling-down on to do in the evenings too. I had been focusing on hips (hip ROM being something I really need to work on) but I’m reorganizing to be focused on shoulders. I’m rather happy about my (apparent) ability to pause one goal/focus to retool for this shoulder recovery work. In the past, I’m sure I’d have just tried to *add* shoulder recovery to my overflowing pile.

I continue to shave off fractions of pounds. I was “around 223” and am now wobbling around 221, seeing 220 occassionally. (Some quick body-weight strength checks, and performance in parkour, lead me to think I’m not loosing significant strength.) Weight is the best thing for me to work on at this point as it translates immediately to less “strain” and easier next-day recovery. I’m planning my most ambitious parkour trip ever in late-July and August, and it will involve weeks of all-day moving. It’s also (obviously) the go out and play time of year, so my general activity level goes up.

In other news, I bailed out of a possible trip to rock climb in Colorado, partly due to time constraints, but mostly due feeling it was “off-focus” for me at the moment (if that makes sense).

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Reality check from 2008

This entry is part 50 of 72 in the series My Journey

My mom dug this photo up from somewhere. It was taken in 2008, and there may have been a few changes since then.

I think this is now my favorite inspirational photo.

Why inspirational? Most of the changes I’ve accomplished have been in the past four years. If I can accomplish what I did, without killing myself (literally or figuratively), while having a tremendous amount of fun… then I cannot wait to see what comes next!

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5,000

This entry is part 28 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

5,000. five thousand. FIVE. THOUSAND!!!

So excited to be half way through the numbers of my year-long project. I have about 110 days remaining to do the second 5,000 reps of all the activities. But at this point, it is now possible to do 120 reps (pull-ups being the limiting activity) in a single workout. Granted, that workout takes about two hours but it means it is finally possible to warm up, get started, and get it done.

Last week was a lot of random-seeming numbers of pull-ups just shoved into every day. That took a real toll on my arms. So I was particularly careful about getting back on the pull-up bar.

But first…

5,000 bar precisions…

This seems inconceivable to me. I remember starting all of this…. and now? Well, here’s the worksheet from the last workout on bar precisions:

Screen Shot 2016-04-02 at 10.59.06 AM

I did 260 bar precisions (I still have the bars set at 64″ like in the video I recently posted). This seems like an insane number when you step up on the bar. But I start counting to 26, then make a mark in my little book… and then do that 9 more times. It is VERY difficult to stay focused for the entire time. I mean, REALLY REALLY difficult. I don’t see how I can fully convey the experience here (in a quick update), so I’ll leave it at that. I’d love to talk about it some time… so chat me up. :)

Meanwhile, I had planned to do the magical 5,000 milepost workout of the other activities on the following day (Thursday, in the screen grab above.) I headed to the bar, did a bunch of range-of-motion movements, some joint rotations, etc. Then tried a pull-up and OW! …not happening. Normally, the FIRST pull-up always sucks, but on Thursday I felt discretion was warranted. I mustered a LOT of courage and pushed the workout back until my arms felt better. (ie, so it didn’t feel as if they were going to be ripped off my torso at the same time my forearms exploded.)

5,000 pullups!

…also, 5,000 pushups! 5,000 seconds in handstand! 5,000 body-weight squats!

Saturday morning, it was conveniently raining (delaying our plans to tackle yard-work) and I decided to get at it. I warmed up and spent just over 2 hours trying to stick to a ten-minute circuit combining pull-ups, squats, handstand, sitting in a resting squat position (another of my projects is to get a full resting squat). Note the screwball “42” pushups in this workout; That’s just a result of a recent push-up challenge I was doing with some friends where I banked a pile of pushups, so in this workout I can just coast to 5,000.

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There it is. April 2nd… 5,000 across the board.

Next week…

I’m going to tweak the circuit just a bit so I can get 125 reps into a workout. At that rate, I have this miraculous spreadsheet projection, where one thousand reps happens in just 8 workouts. boo-YEAH!

…assuming of course I can manage to follow through on this ambitious pace:

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What’s your next dragon?

For a few weeks, life is grand. Everybody wants to hear how great you are. You start saying things like “I’ve earned this” more and more frequently.

And yet…

Something is missing.

~ Steve Kamb from, The Tale Of The Dragon Slayer

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This has, in retrospect, been a very important part of my personal journey in recent years. I’ve written a bit about “short term motiviation” and I think this (what Steve has written) is probably a better take on it: The idea that by continuously figuring out what the next “dragon” is, has kept me interested and motivated. One pushup, run one mile, climb a ten-foot wall, etc. …dragon after dragon.

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pull-ups pull-ups pull-ups…

This entry is part 27 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

The more I work on this stuff, the more I’m certain I’ll never be done; I’ll finish this challenge, but, “move, exercise” is just an infinitely deep rabbit hole.

The past two weeks, I’ve been working on trying to increase daily numbers. Pull-ups remain the limiting exercise, so it’s a game of how many pull-ups can I do in a day. Last week, every day, I did anywhere from 1 to 4 separate workouts. I did circuits with small pull-up sets to a total of 24 or 25 pull-ups in each workout. (Circuits of pushups, squats, handstands and seated/resting squatted. But that’s all easy stuff.) So the number of pull-ups on each day last week ranges oddly from 24 to 96.

My forearm continues to feel better. It’s now a sort of “remember to be careful about that”, rather than a feeling of impending doom if I do one pull-up incorrectly. I’m continuing to generally push hard with training, but I’ve no qualms about pulling up short if the arm bothers me at all.

I’ll pass 5,000 reps of everything this week!

I’m planning only 2 workouts this week. They will both be the largest number of pull-ups I’ve every attempted in a day. I’m aiming for 120 reps spread into four workouts. This week would still be a slightly “light” week since it’s only 2 out of seven days with workouts. The following week, I’m tentatively thinking of trying two days with 125 pull-ups in each day. I’ve never managed more than about 70 pull-ups in a single workout, so I’m tempted to try to do one big workout to see if I can do 120 pull-ups in something silly like 40 sets of 3.

If I can do 120 reps on workout days, I can still finish this whole challenge in time (but with literally just a few days to spare.) That seems too finely-planned, so I’m hoping to get up to 125 reps on the work days. This is definitely going to be physically challenging to make it by the end of 365 days.

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Shut up about the universe

In one spot in the part of the universe we can see—and probably in an infinite number of spots in the part of the universe we can’t—there’s a small blue-green planet with thin film of bio-matter on it. Among other things, this film supports some bipedal mammals who like building things they can set on fire.

~ Peter Welch from, Shut Up About the Universe

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Douglas Adams meets irreverent atheist. Many smiles. Much like.

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Damaging my hands is not a good thing

This entry is part 49 of 72 in the series My Journey

I used to think blisters, busted skin, and crusty scabs were badges of accomplishment. But now, I think that if my hands are wounded I have done something wrong.

If I have a bashed shin, a bleeding elbow, or a bruised rib then clearly I’ve done something wrong to damage those body parts. So why did I think that injuries to my hands were cool or something of which to be proud?

tl;dr: Hubris.

Almost everyone I know has soft hands. I know a very few people who work in trades who have tough hands, and I know some Parkour people with seasoned hands. So I thought it was cool that I could sometimes show off my “I worked hard hands.” Turns out that was just a way for me to brag. (Boo! Bad, old me! Time for me to re-read My Oath.)

Even worse, there were times where I’ve left parts of my hands, or even blood, on walls, obstacles, etc.. That’s actually pretty gross, and is the exact opposite of the leave-no-trace mentality that I want to cultivate in myself.

The light-bulb moment for me was the last time I went indoor bouldering. I climbed for several hours (at a leisurely pace and without damaging ANY body parts). When I was done I found myself thinking, “AWESOME! Look at my hands! All these pull-ups and scaf work are paying off!”

Lest I get pushed under the bus by hardcore people, I want to be clear: I train hard. I love “MDK”, “gauntlets” and mental/physical challenges. I do push parts of my body to their limits. Usually, I discover those limits were farther out than I expected. But, just as I do with the rest of my body, I am now going to do my best to take good care of my hands.

I’m happy with progressions for everything I do; Now I’ll try to also be happy with progressions for my hands. If it turns out that I have to stop doing something (or tape my hands, or *gasp* put gloves on) because my hands are going to give out, that tells me what I have to work on next: Toughening up my hands.

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Ramping up pull-up numbers

This entry is part 26 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

Quick check in…

Time to start ramping up to larger numbers. Need to be doing 120 pull-ups in a day if I’m going to be able to do work-rest-work-rest-rest the rest of the way to 10K before the deadline. So Monday I’m going to try doing 4 trips to the bar with 25 pullups (rather than 5 trips of 20), then I can add a fifth trip in coming days to move above 100 reps for the day. We’ll shall see. :P

200+ bar precisions is doable, so I think I’ll plan for a while to double up (two days’ reps, in one bar precision workout) since it’s easier to just go out less often and crank out numbers.

The ladder push-ups thing is still going. I think we’re within a week of it ending though (when the guy rotates home from deployment) so I’ll shift to something less weird-looking at that point.

Also planning ahead to keep Saturday and Sunday open this coming weekend.

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Working on bar precisions

This entry is part 48 of 72 in the series My Journey

I’ve been doing a lot of rail precisions (approaching 5,000) as part of my “10k reps” project. The goal is simply to do 10,000 rail precisions — not at any particular height or distance, but to simply get comfortable landing on rails.

But on Saturday, i spent a couple hours pushing the distance out…

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That which gets measured

This entry is part 47 of 72 in the series My Journey

I’ve often heard, “that which gets measured, gets improved.” (…and you have to actually plan and work to realize improvements.)

Ten years ago, I saw 270 pounds on the scale and decided to start tracking. The first step was to work on getting proper sleep (followed by many more steps – but that’s another story.) I’ve been tracking health related things – weight, hours of sleep, dietary supplements, habits like stretching (whatever little projects I’ve had going on) for almost 10 years. This enables me to trot out amazing things like this when I’m looking for some inspiration…

Highest weight from memory: 270
Dec 2006, earliest recorded weight: 265
Jun 2012, started Parkour: 254
Jun 2014, ADAPT 1: 240
Aug 2014, rock climbing in Colorado: 232
Mar 2016: 221

Me, excited? You betcha!!

I’ve said it before: Find the smallest first step you can make towards your goal. Take that step. Tomorrow, look back and say, “well… I’ve come this far, may as well take the next step!” The hardest part of any journey is believing the journey is possible.

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It’s not a priority

This entry is part 46 of 72 in the series My Journey

Starting today, you are no longer allowed to utter the words: “I don’t have time.” Instead, you will say, “It’s not a priority.”

~ Steve Kamb from, Why “I Don’t Have Time” Is A Big Fat Lie

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Years ago, when I discovered the Lehigh Valley Parkour community’s inside jokes, I started avoiding the word “can’t” — if another LVPK member hears you, there’s an immediate 5 pushups penalty. (Very annoying in markets, subways, when driving, you get the idea.) Instead of saying “I can’t do that…” you start to say “I can do that when I am able to [insert something I need to work on].” Changing your words, changes your thoughts, changes your actions, changes your life.

Well, this one is my newest addition. No more “I don’t have time”; It’s all going to be, “It’s not a priority.” Go ahead, try a few of these out loud:

I don’t have time to eat healthy, becomes… Eating healthy isn’t a priority.

I don’t have time to exercise, becomes… Exercise isn’t a priority.

I don’t have time to sleep, becomes… Sleep isn’t a priority.

Oh, well brain, if you’re going to think about it that way… our whole life is going to change.

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Couple hundred at a time

This entry is part 25 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

No major changes…

Last week I did two good work days. Did the pull-ups in 5 trips to the pull-up bar over five hours, and still doing very small sets 4×3,4×2 to get me 20 reps without over-working my forearm. I’m going to stick with that plan this week. For the last workout of this week, the numbers-game will work better if I can go up to 120 reps — so that will probably be 6 trips to the pull-up bar.

Also last week, I did the 200 bar precisions in one session. It’s not physically demanding, but more of an aerobic, get-in-the-zone and work on the quality of each jump. I may do that on Wednesday, simply to move the bar precisions to be on a different day from the pull-ups.

There should have been a third workout in last week — but I was away in NYC/Brooklyn for several days (the red blocks). Huge amounts of training, and huge amounts of “hey that’s noticably better” as a result of all this body-weight work. (Also, very little sleep and scattered eating — and, hey look, I think I’m sick again :/

Anyway.

Next week there are way too many “120”s on the workbook. That’s just me moving numbers down without bothering to go farther out and reshuffle numbers (yet). I just passed the “4,000”s mile post last week, and now — FINALLY — with these sized workouts, the “5,000”s milepost is in sight. At a rate of “120”s workouts, on a work-rest-work-rest-rest pattern of days, I can still finish this all in sane fashion before the 365th day.

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4,000

This entry is part 24 of 36 in the series 10,000 Reps Project

I passed the 4,000 reps mile-post last week! Woo-HOO! 6,000 reps to go. Booooooo!

Last week was a Herculean effort on bar precisions to dig out of the hole I created. I did 700+ bar precisions in 3 days. It was deliciously decadent to have Saturday/Sunday off from this project. (I spent the days “off” by driving 3 hours to play/train with friends in upstate NY, driving home, and then going to regular Parkour class on Sunday. “Rest” may not be the right word.)

After last week’s “no plan” plan turned out well, I’m going back to my regurlarly scheduled work-rest-work-rest-rest 5-day pattern. I’ll do 100 reps of each, and my goal (over the coming weeks) will be to bring the pull-ups closer together. Currently, I’ve been doing ~100 pullups scattered in bunches of 8’s (as 3,3,2) or 7’s (as 3,2,2) spread through the day. I’ll work on making pull-ups into larger bunches of 9’s (4,3,2), 10’s and so on. The dream being to get to 10×10 pull-ups in one workout. My right forearm/grip is feeling better, but nowhere near 100%; so I’m keeping this as an odometer race, I’m not going anywhere near max rep’s on pullups until my forearm feels 100%.

A note about handstands: I’m going to keep doing them as 15-second stands. I was increasing the time per stand, but I realize now that I need more practice on the kick up and balance. So doing lots of shorter stands gives me lots of practice. I’ve managed a few instances of 5 seconds of complete free standing after kicking up onto the wall.

Next week, I’ll consider going to 120-rep workouts. That would bring the pace up sufficiently to finish 10k well before July 20. (Alternatively, I might invite friends out for a day of hurt to try to do something crazy like 500-of-each-exercise in one sprint to the finish, but that seems risky to me.) I would LOVE to wrap this up early so I can move on to other things.

For the long view, I sketched out doing 100-rep workouts on my 5-day pattern and it now comes up short at the one-year date on July 20. Astoundingly, it comes up exactly 500 reps short. (Except for pushups which are weird now due to that one-a-day ascending pushups thing that is going on unrelated to this 10k challenge. I’ll fiddle with pushups in a few weeks when that’s over.)

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Working on controlled precisions

This entry is part 44 of 72 in the series My Journey

Fun with controlled precisions: I finally got around letting the camera run while repeating a jump. Here’s two that I was working on yesterday. These were just a wee bit odd for me to sort out. This is the aspect of indoor gyms that I love; being able to set up something very specific. This was taken at Innate Movement Parkour -Kingston, NY.

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