Two Weeks to Become... SUPERHUMAN! **Pictures Added**

Over the past few months I've been lucky enough to have quite a few holidays, but for the last 8 or so weeks I've been progressing my training for the Superhuman event in Bristol in just two weeks time. Now holidays are lovely, but I must admit it's been tough to keep on track. In Canada and France I managed to keep active (snowboarding) and do extra exercise whilst maintaining a relatively Whole30 eating plan (lots of steak and chips), but a few weeks a go in Center Parcs I met my hardest challenge so far! I was faced with four nights away with five of my favourite people, alcohol and quite a few added extras thrown in (blame the bakery)!

To try and counter balance this way of eating, I made sure I ate a healthy breakfast each day (eggs) and once again opted for plenty of steak and chips for dinners, as well as choosing the healthier parts of the BBQ for my consumption, although some bread did slip through, along with more wine! 

My training didn't suffer too much though, I remained dedicated to the cause. I woke up earlier than the others each morning to get down to the gym for a 20 minute max calorie row (one of the Superhuman challenges) and even went for a hilly 5K, as well as the usual activities like lazer clay, field archery and a much needed spa break.

Since returning at the beginning of May I have been really good with my diet as well as upping my training each week. Every time I do a challenge I aim to see improvement, which generally I've been achieving. I'm struggling with upper body strength and stamina but I'm lucky enough to have a really strong and motivated partner for the games (here's me on the right)!

Yesterday we were tyre flipping and giving piggy backs to one another, today we attempted the beep test and achieved our personal bests, straight after we managed two of the 20 minute challenges, with ALMOST the weights needed on the day!

Here's what we need to do, I should say now that whilst we're both very competitive we are not Cross Fitters and have taken this on as a personal challenge (very much out of our comfort zones). Our goal on the day is to not score a big fat zero, which finally we feel confident in achieving (if you'd have asked us last week we would most likely have started crying):

The Challenges (you have 20 minutes on each challenge to complete as many rounds as possible):

1) 800m Sprint/Max Calorie Row. Person one completes 800m, tags person two to do their 800m and we'll then have the remainder of the 20 minutes to row as many calories as possible. We've hit the gym a few times to get our row on... Getting better each time but we still need to push harder as technically this should be our strongest event of the five.

2) 50m 160kg Tyre Flip/100m Partner Carry. Both ladies flip the tyre 50m before completing a 100m partner carry. We currently have a tyre to practice with but are unsure of it's weight!

3) 15 x 30kg Thrusters/30 x 16kg Overhead Kettlebell Swings. We can tag each other in as often as needed. We have practiced this a few times now and find this really hard due to flexibility, however we are improving each time and are now only 3kg off the weight needed for the thrusters on the day.

4) 15 x 40kg Atlas Stone to Shoulder/30 x Chest to Floor Burpees. We've been lucky enough to have a 20kg, 30kg and 40kg ball to play with at home. However, the 40kg only came out for the first time this week for a few reps, but today we succeeded with 4 complete rounds of this challenge with the 40kg (we'll take that)!

5) 400m Obstacle Course. 18 obstacles including traverse wall, balance beam, up and unders, monkey bars etc. We've not really practiced this but we have been doing extra gym work to hopefully make the monkey bars easier on the day. I guess we'll find out on the day what this involves! I've also rekindled my love for climbing as an activity as I thought it would help to improve grip.

Our bodies are in constant pain and there have been about a million times we've asked ourselves why we're doing this but we both agree we're really enjoyed the training and not only have others noticed the changes in us and think we're crazy, but we also feel fitter, stronger and healthier for it!

I'll add some training photos to this blog over the next two weeks (now added), as the adrenaline is well and truly starting to kick in! We're already looking forward to next year and hope we still feel this way in two weeks time... No doubt we'll take some time out to rest, relax and replenish but I have every faith that some of this style of training will remain in our workout routines, not as often as we've been doing but at least once a month, to keep our hand in.

If you are interested in chucking a quid our way, you can do so here, all money raised is split equally between Cancer Research UK and Stroke Association.

If you want something enough, you CAN achieve it!

More updates to follow...