Last week, on Memorial Day, I made a commitment to do a Murph every day for the next month. It has been exactly a week since I started the challenge, and here is how it has gone so far.
Day 1
Pre-workout run: 4:51
Post-workout run: 8:42
Full workout: 1:03:00
Day 1 was by far the most difficult day. I had no idea what to expect or how to pace myself, and it felt like it was never going to end. In the beginning half of the workout, I attempted to do let-downs instead of pull-ups, but those ended up still being too hard, and I downgraded to band rows, which were much easier. While running at the end of the workout, I got Charlie horses in both calves and it slowed down my pace for the final run tremendously.
Day 2
Pre-workout run: 5:01
Post-workout run: 5:35
Full workout: 48:50
Day 2 was much easier because I did only band rows in the pull-up slot, and I knocked them all out at the beginning of the workout. This made it easy to focus on the harder parts of the workout (run, squats).
Day 3
Pre-workout run: 5:34
Post-workout run: 5:50
Full workout: 58:11
Day 3 was when I decided that band rows were much too easy and decided to reverse push-ups instead, which is what I ended up sticking with until the end of the week. These are much harder, but work my pull-up muscles much more and should help me eventually be able to do 100 full pull-ups (hopefully even with a weight vest). Although the time was a lot slower, I felt like I did good.
Day 4
Pre-workout run: 4:52
Post-workout run: 5:59
Full workout: 46:27
Day 4 is when I decided to try a different strategy. I started trying to do smaller sets but also smaller rest, so that I was taking more breaks but not long breaks that wasted a bunch of time. I pushed really hard in this one because I wanted to get a new best time, even though the last best time was made while doing band rows.
Day 5
Pre-workout run: 4:19
Post-workout run: 5:35
Full workout: 45:14
Day 5 is when this workout started to become easier for me. I wasn’t getting as sore anymore and was able to push even harder, aiming for a new best time, which I got.
Day 6
Pre-workout run: 4:25
Post-workout run: 5:16
Full workout: 41:18
At this point, the workout was very easy for me to complete quickly. I just had to keep pushing myself harder than the day before. This time around, I decided not to look at the clock until before the final run, and see how fast I can push myself. I was able to get a much better time than I had before, and I feel like it was a great finish to week 1.
Day 7
I decided to listen to my body and take Sunday as a rest day. My knees had been aching because of all the running, which my body is not used to, and I thought I should give my muscles a chance to recover before diving into week 2.
Thoughts on Week 1
I feel like this week went really well. I wasn’t sure that I was going to make it through 3 days without quitting, but now I feel confident and excited to the rest of this month. It was a learning process in the beginning, but once I got it figured out, I could focus on pushing myself harder than I had the day before.
Plans for Week 2
My plan for week 2 is to keep doing the same workout with the same strategy, with a few changes. First, I am upping the run distance for the first run to a full mile. Second, I am going to be attempting to go from knee push-ups to full push-ups for all 200. Lastly, instead of 10 rounds of 10, 20, and 30 reps of each movement, I will be changing it to 5 rounds of 20, 40, and 60 reps of each movement. This is to get me more prepared for having to do all 100, 200, and 300 reps in a row.
AJ, I am so impressed — first of all that you made such a commitment at all, but secondly that you have made it your own. I love that you have morphed the Murph to realign to your abilities and to stretch your limitations. I did six CG workouts last week, definitely not my norm, and thought of you and this commitment, as I pushed past my own limitations of both mind and body. Great job!
You are SO strong! I would NOT be able to do that.
I am super proud of how far you’ve come. That first day you had a really hard time, but by the end of the week you were doing it easily. This is a huge commitment and I am so proud that you have stuck with it. On to week two!!
WOW!