“The Road to the Urbanathalon” (part 1)
The first step to any competition is knowing what lies ahead of you. That being said, the very first thing I had to do in order to take on this new challenge was research the race course itself, and what I found in my research was beyond exciting! The New York City Men’s Health Urbanathalon consists of 9.5 miles of running, jumping, crawling, climbing and shimmying your way through the City field, and World Fair locations of Queens. I realized that my training would predominately consist of aerobic and endurance training, while still having to work in some explosive strength and plyometric exercises.
Not the easiest of tasks especially when you have 5 weeks before the race itself. Needless to say I was a little behind, but I was fortunate enough to have been a leisure jogging fanatic, which offered me a solid base. On the weekends I could put in a good 4-5 miles on a good day and, now that I understood what I had to prepare for, I had to find out where I was physically in order to set realistic goals for myself. These goals would be the foundation of
my periodization program for the next 5 weeks. For those of you who have never heard of a periodization program, it’s an athletic training program designed to help you physically and mentally
peak at the exact time of your event. Some would say a well-designed periodization program is truly a work of art. (“Poetry in motion” in its truest form).
My testing sessions were divided into two days, back to back. Day one was all strength training. Usually I would look to accomplish a three-repetition max in my testing, but with the event being so close, I didn’t want to risk injury and since the event itself was endurance-based, I decided to “rep out” lighter weight until failure.
My test session results for Day one:
Day 1
Barbell squats at 135lbs………29reps
Bench press at 135lbs…………..17reps
Dips……………………………28reps
Over hand, standard pull up’s….13reps
Sit-up’s…………………………43reps
My “realistic” goals were set to increase these numbers by 6%-12% over the next 5 weeks.
Knowing my base strength, I was able to set goals that would help me maximize my performance.
Day two was a testing session of aerobic and endurance testing.
My results for Day two:
1 mile max speed time… 7:17
Front Plank (on elbows)… 4:14
Jog until failure for distance
(Measured by “Endomondo” app on my mobile phone)…..6.77 miles
Now that I have my base measurement, I know where to begin. I had one month and one week to improve in all aspects of my athleticism. In our next Facebook feed, I will show you the routines I used throughout the following weeks to build upon my new foundation…
“We must learn to adapt, or we shall perish…”
-Matt Holbok-
