Image courtesy www.travelblog.org
Its been a while since I had a post that wasn’t me being depressed, pensive, overly thoughtful or whiny. Sorry about that. I think it has been a mixture of no time to exercise, being too injured to exercise, and working from dark to dark which = no vitamin D. So lets get back to health and fitness!
Since the rollerblading incident, I have not been able to do much in the way of exercise. Just Monday I was going to try some burpees and after doing one discovered that my tailbone was NOT ready to do burpees. Ouch. I haven’t lost much in the way of looking fit despite not working out hardly at all for the past couple weeks but I am getting to that point where I really want to do SOMETHING.
I have started doing those exercises that I know I CAN still do. Mostly light work, jumping jacks, punching bag, push-ups and pull-ups… that type of thing. I have been getting a little creative too and that is where I discovered this one… I have a new activity that I am enjoying incorporating in my exercise and it is awesome.
Crawling… yes crawling. This is more exercise than you can imagine.
I don’t mean getting down on your hands and knees and shuffling around like a baby. I mean get down in a plank type position… feet and elbows on the ground, butt low and really crawl. Keep your tush down and go for it. Don’t believe me? Go try it right now.
Forget planks (ok well don’t forget planks.. they are still good but..) this will really engage your stabilizers. This feels pretty primal too… think of Grok sneaking up on prey, or hiding and escaping a predator. Maybe their is a tribal war going on and rocks and spears are flying overhead! Stay low and move fast!
Try it out! Let me know what you think! When your co-workers ask about your rug-burns… just smile.
*P.S. I updated some of the colors on the site to enhance readability. Let me know if it helps or not.
May 6th, 2009 - 2:34 pm
Nice to see the positive vibe come through the post my man.
Will try the crawl…
Marc
May 6th, 2009 - 3:03 pm
I am going to the beach this weekend and I think I will try crawling in the sand!
May 6th, 2009 - 4:08 pm
Nice one.
Reminds me of the spiderman pushup I saw on someone’s site the other day. As you’re going down into a pushup, bring one knee up to your elbow. Alternate knees as you do pushups.
May 6th, 2009 - 4:50 pm
Crawling is a great exercise. I saw another variation of planks that works well.
Start in plank position and then get into push up position (top part, arms extended)…basically just going from elbows to hands…then go back down from hands to elbows. Continue for 2-3 minutes. Hope that makes sense. It worked pretty well for me the other day.
Glad to hear you are feeling better! It sucks to want to workout when you are injured. I’m sure you will be back at it soon.
Have a great one!
Rusty
May 6th, 2009 - 8:57 pm
SOG – I’m not recovering from an injury but rather illness. Funny – I put a similar title on yesterday’s blog posting. It’s how I felt after about a week away from doing anything physical.
Hope you a speedy recovery from the rollerblading incident. Hey, at least it wasn’t the Thruxton. BTW – wife is looking at getting a GSXR-600.
May 6th, 2009 - 10:22 pm
Search the internet for videos of spider walks and bear crawls. Pretty similar to what you are doing…not sure if you can do ‘em before you are healed up a bit more though!
May 7th, 2009 - 8:04 am
Glad you are happier today! Now I have rugburn on my elbows. Primal, primal rugburn.
May 7th, 2009 - 1:02 pm
I can tell you that crawling is hard work – as can anyone who’s done basic military training! Depending on the terrain you choose to crawl on, you might want to consider knee and elbow pads, and maybe gloves…
May 12th, 2009 - 7:26 am
@gcb: Agreed.
SoG, if you want to try out a couple movements the military employs, google monkey walk or leopard crawl, tiger crawl or bear crawl. All are high energy movements, definitely good for a good kick to your heart. I would recommend sticking with 50 yard bursts at first and then moving up to 100 yards. That way if you ever encounter overhead fire, you’ll be ready…