The Furious M Workout Plan

Tired of working out in a crowded gym with people who are all taller, stronger, faster, and better looking than you? Good news! This revolutionary exercise program will propel you to the best shape of your life and the best part is you don't have to spend any money! No gym memberships, no home exercise equipment, not even some hokey BS exercise mat! That's right, follow this three phase program to a fitter, happier you!

Phase 1:
This is known as the Base Phase and is by far the most boring phase. The purpose is mainly to prepare for all the fun of the next two phases. There are only two parts to the Base Phase: five days a week you must run for at least 15 minutes, do 100 pushups, and do 150 crunches. You're allowed to do anything else you want in addition to that as long as the base is sustained. I can't stress how important this phase is to the successful completion of the others, though. Even if you have to do your 100 pushups 10 at a time, even if you're jogging barely faster than a walk, still do it five days a week. Phase 1 is over once you can comfortably complete all these exercises on a regular basis and not be sore.

Phase 2: Showing signs of Badass
Now the fun starts. Continue the base exercises but add some new ones. For legs and cardiovascular you need to run up something, whether it is a hill, a butte, a mountain, etc… A good example is to find hikes up mountains in guidebooks and see how much faster you can climb it than the recommended time. Or maybe there's a butte 5 miles from where you live: see how fast you can run from your house to the top of the butte and back. Mainly you need something with 1,000 to 6,000 feet of elevation gain to race up.

A good upper body workout in this phase consists of decline clapping pushups, concrete knuckle pushups, the upper body stair climb, and the ever popular vertical bars. Decline clapping pushups are pushups where you put your feet on a chair, lower you chest until it touches the ground, then explode upward with enough force that you are able to clap your hands together. Concrete knuckle pushups are, as the title explains, pushups on your knuckles on a concrete surface. To do the upper body stair climb you need a special kind of stairway as illustrated in the picture.

The exercise is similar to the monkey bars except you're going up and down quite a bit. One repetition on the upper body stairs is generally accepted as going up and down a half flight. This is the junior varsity version of the vertical bar climb, which is demonstrated in the pictures below. For the vertical bar climb you need a sturdy railing with metal bars and strong hands. The exercise consists of using only arm strength to climb the bars in the railing.

It is crucial to start the vertical bars by hanging. Using upward velocity from a jump is cheating of the highest order. Try to hang for about five seconds, then pull yourself up the railing with only your arms until your chin is above the horizontal bar at the top.

Chin up, then climb back down to hanging

A good set of vertical bars is typically 2-3 repetitions. If you find yourself doing more than four consecutively (your feet never touch the ground) then you should probably skip straight to Phase 3. Another tip for making Phase 2 more fun is to engage in the Feats of Strength. The Feats of Strength can be just about anything, ranging from declaring to somebody, "Listen up! The evening isn't over... until you pin me!" Or maybe having a contest to see who can lift the most weight/climb something/do the most pullups/flexed arm hang the longest, etc...

After a long, rigorous workout like the one described above, we recommend you perform a cool down set of 12 oz. curls. To do this exercise get two bottles of beer, one in each hand for the purposes of symmetry, and sit relaxed and leaning forward with your elbows on your knees. Alternate curling each bottle until they are both empty.

ONE

The other benefit of this exercise is that it allows you to determine your dominant drinking hand. When I rep the 12 oz. curls I have to work hard to get my right hand to keep up with my left, because the left bottle always empties faster. Curiously, I am right handed in everything except drinking.

Phase two is also a good time to start working up to a one arm pullup. Start by hanging from a single arm; once you can hang for a long time from each arm individually try holding yourself over a chin up bar with only one arm, then continue on to the one arm pullup. Once you can do that then you are at phase 3.

Phase 3: He-Man
At Phase 3 I have nothing left to teach you. You are now a He-Man, probably waking up every morning to drink a glass of wheat grass juice mixed with vodka (it's called a Lawnmower), do 20 one arm fingertip pushups with each arm, and then put on a 60 pound pack and race 30 miles through the wilderness. You are an inspiration to us all.