Thurs, 23 Nov 17
My Thanksgiving Tradition
After talking with mi amigo Nick O'Brien about whether or not I would be engaging in my annual Thanksgiving tradition of pushing the prowler for a mile or not, I reported I would not be for a number of reasons, but I wished him well in his own marathon prowling. Well the more I thought about it, the more I realized all my excuses were total whiny bullshit and by Thursday morning I had decided I would in fact do my sixth (I think) prowler mile. There were definitely some differences in this one though.
Firstly, I was not using my own prowler. Instead I used one of Brute Strength Gym's prowlers (they have 3 of them!) with the drive pads on it. Second, I had to push it inside because all their prowlers are set up with the plastic skis for indoor use on rubber flooring. The rubber flooring was another new twist. I adjusted the weight down to zero pounds on the prowler based on a long history of indoor prowling at Brute and at the gym of my good friend and possibly long lost brother, Steve Mattheu - Iron Athletics. Finally, I have always done my prowler miles outside and have measured out 1,000 feet or the longest distance possible so that I don't lose track of how far I've gone, although I still managed to screw it up two years ago on Thanksgiving when I went an extra 1,000 feet over the 5,280 that I needed. This time I was limited to pushing it 60 feet at a time which means that I had to do it 88 times. This was one of my reasons I had told Nick I wouldn't be doing it this year because trying to keep track of 88 runs of 60 feet each sounded like lots of room for screwups on my end.
I got warmed up and really didn't want to start, which just solidified my resolve to do it. Stopwatch started (I always time the prowler mile) and I was off in a cloud of weasel piss. The first few pushes were pretty easy and I briefly considered that I might actually need to add weight to the prowler. This feeling was short lived though as the cumulative effects of prowling began to build up. I made tally marks in my notebook after every 2 or 4 pushes with split times at the half way and 3/4 marks. At 44 runs I was at 26'44" - a solid pace to finish in under an hour, which is always my goal and which I've done twice. When I was 3/4 done after 66 runs I was still only at 44'55", but as you can see I was starting to slow down. I did record in my training notebook that after 66 runs I was feeling "baaaaaad." The last 22 runs were beyond terrible. Thankfully I don't really remember them that well because my brain either blocks it out or is just so low functioning that no new memories of the insanity are recorded. Pretty much all I remember is that I had to verbalize everything I was doing in order to keep going. I had to tell myself, "turn around" at the end of each 60 foot push, "go" or "move" to start each push, and then I had to count from 1 to 4 out loud while I was making my tally marks to be sure I was writing them all down. I still had hopes of finishing in under an hour right up to the end, but the last 10-12 pushes or so I couldn't catch my breath when I would rest after 4 pushes so I dropped down to 2 pushes and I still coudln't catch my breath. This slowed me way down and I had to start taking additional short rest breaks after each push in addition to my longer rest breaks. I made myself step up and do the last 6 pushes in a row in an effort to try and finish in under an hour. I pretty much yelled all the way down the last 60 feet and stumbled over to my stopwatch - final time was 1 hour, 1 minute, 27 seconds. Dammit!
After many minutes of struggling to breathe and/or live, I cleaned up the prowler and sat down to do some stretching. Based on the awfulness, my time, and all other factors I can say that the empty prowler on rubber floor with indoor skis is equivalent in difficulty to the prowler with a plate on each post pushed outside on asphalt, at least when pushed for a mile. Nick also hit his own prowler mile a little after me since he is out in Cali Land. His time was slightly worse than mine, but he also was forced by his schedule to do a training session prior to the prowler mile. I can't even imagine starting of the mile in an energy deficit post-training so I consider his slower time to be more respectable than my faster time. Hats off to any other guys or girls out there who have ever been dumb enough to do a prowler mile and Happy Thanksgiving to everyone from Virginia Beach!