Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Backpack Hunting 2016 fitness/workout thread.

No. But the only guys I know who'll put up with a row for 30 minutes are married.

JCM- Better, but not 100%. I hope to get back to it a week from next Monday. Cross your fingers I don't re-injure it next week taking care of a dead buffalo...

Glad to hear you're healing up. Hope you have an injury-free dead buffalo care session!

Eliptical 20minutes, bike 20minutes.

Weights: 40minutes: BP, Squats, planks. 100 walking lunges.

Squats sets of 6: 275, 315, 335, 345
Cleans sets of 4: 225,225

Starting phase 2 of p90x3 tomorrow. Can't say enough good things about this program. Draw results come up on the 19th, and if an elk is in my future, I'll start doing more Vek style workouts.

My routines are fairly simple, and focus on muscular endurance.

Today I did an upper body workout:

150 pullups - starting at 10 per set. less as I go along but finishing still doing 4-5 per set.

200 pushups - on 6" blocks, slow, wide grip, deep. Starting with 15 per set, down to 9-10 per set at the end.

200 shoulder shrugs - 35lb dumbells, starting 20 per set, finishing 10-12 per set.




My leg routine has been simple too:

150 sumo squats - 35lb dumbells, starting at 15 per set, slow and deliberate (bad back).

200 calf raises - on 6" blocks, starting 30 per set, finishing about 20 per set.



I alternate upper/lower body. The push-ups tone the core pretty well. Usually get in 5-6 workouts per week.


Some days I'll vary the upper workout with dumbell bench presses, tricep bombers. Get in some treadmill now and then.

My workouts consists of hiking up big mountains year round with 20-50 pounds of weight shed hunting and scouting.

I hate weights...

4mile fast walk with the Dogs. Ran a little, but it was ugly.

26 miles ridden with a buddy, pre- Super Bowl junk food binge. We kept a good pace and did a couple big climbs. Great aerobic exercise and a ton of fun- anyone else here a road cyclist?

For exercise the last few days, I cut down a 100+ foot cottonwood and got the rounds out of the woods along with some other smaller trees. Big damn tree, very hard work. Had to roll them out until they were quite small; that stuff weighs at least as much as oak, I think! Getting the next year's firewood in, split, stacked (about 4 cords) has been critical winter/spring exercise for decades. Love it.

Stacking firewood is a way of life around here, but it won't get you in shape to pack 45lbs up a steep mountain for 5 hours.

Treadmill 3.4 mph 15% grade for 2 miles (35 minutes +/-).

The only good workout involved with cutting firewood in my opinion is sustained maul and axe swinging: arrange as many rounds as you can on end in a tight pack, put on some good, stiff, full grain leather boots that allow you to stand on anything while protecting your feet and shins against shrapnel, and go to town. You'll be swinging from overhead and sidearm as the halves and quarters fall against each other, and as you scramble over the split pieces to swing at the next ones. This is big work, especially if you can't get the halves to split with an axe and have to use a maul. It's not dangerous if you're not an idiot, and you make sure your feet are set before each swing. Saves a lot of handling work as well. Try to swing continuously and effectively for ten minutes - it's a gasser. Trouble is, for the 3 cords I burn per year, the splitting is done after maybe one solid hour (not including rest breaks, which are many...) of splitting like this. This is good Lat and abdominal work - as good as anything, particularly if you're having to put full effort into a 6# or 8# maul to get the big rounds halved or knotty/twisted halves quartered.

And before the alarm is raised, if you can't figure out how to control the sidearm or off-hand swing of an axe such that there's no chance of it caroming into your feet, then stick to heating with gas...

Still doing the StrongLifts 5x5 with biking on the trainer M-W-F & treadmill runs on T-Th. Got some stump shooting in with the boys yesterday roaming the PA hills.

Benchpress and squats today. Pretty robust workout so I downed two protein shakes afterward. I hadn't been to the gym since Thursday so I felt the need to hit it hard today.

Squats - 200 reps with 35 lb dumbbells

Calf raises - 200 reps

Yesterday:
Elliptical 30minutes and weights. Leg, back evolution.


Today:

Bike intervals and weights. Chest, arm evolution.
1.5hours woods hike with the Dogs. Temps around 21 with around 15mph winds. Cold for this area.

Youngest son pulled a good one on me this morning. I planned to do a 2-2.5 mile run on treadmill at 10:00min/min pace. Jumped on and started walking to warm up after stretch, no issues. Started running and heartrate climbed quick and could feel the burn in lower calves. Thought maybe I overdid it yesterday on the weights. Got 8/10ths in and had to go back to a walk because heartrate was high. Walked until it dropped and started running, heartrate climbed to the limit pretty quick. Continued this interval for 30min. Was walking to cool down and then noticed the incline was set at 5%. The 8 yr old minion had been on it Tuesday night, didn't set it back to 0%, and I didn't see it on the display. Made for a good workout.
Glad there was a good reason for the tough workout but paybacks are headed his way.

Upper body and then a few miles with the dog yesterday. At 10 with one eye, he still likes chasing coyotes, go figure. I'm finally back to where I can use my hand for dumbbells and resistance after wrist surgery.

Yesterday:

30 minute bike intervals and mixed body weights with body cardio between sets.

Today:

30minutes elliptical and 100 pushups.