3100 Burpees 31 Days
I hate burpees. Like I really hate burpees! On the surface it appears to be a simple movement. You fall to the ground, get back up on your feet and repeat. In reality the burpee is one of the toughest and most hated body weight exercises out there. During the month of March, I decided to do 100 burpees a day, every day. In this article, I will bring you along on my journey of attempting to complete the 3100 reps and what I learned along the way.
The Origin of the Burpee
The burpee was invented all the way back in 1930 by US physiologist Royal H. Burpee. It was popularised by the United States Armed Services after they adopted it as a way to assess the fitness level of recruits when they entered World War 2.
The original burpee consisted of the following movements;
- Squat down and put both hands on the floor in front of you.
- Shoot your feet backward into a plank position.
- Bring your feet back forward.
- Stand straight back up.
These movements combined were thought to be a quick measure of agility, coordination, and strength for newly enlisted recruits. A good recruit was expected to perform 12 burpees in 20 seconds. Any less than 8 was considered poor, any more than 13 considered excellent. By 1946, recruits were expected to perform burpees for a full one minute.
Overtime the exercise has evolved and many different variations now exist including;
- Box-jump burpee
- Burpee broad jump
- Burpee push-up
- Devil-Press burpee
As I come from a CrossFit background, being a part-time CrossFit level 1 trainer, I decided to do the CrossFit style burpee standard. This standard consists of the following movements;
- Place hands on the ground shoulder-width apart.
- Jump to push-up position.
- Lower chest and thighs to the ground.
- Jump feet up to hands.
- Jump vertically with full hip and knee extension.
- Arms extend vertically overhead during the jump.
So why did I decide to do 100 Burpees a day?
Like I mentioned at the beginning of this article, I really hate burpees. Burpees and body weight movements in general have always been something I struggled with in my CrossFit WODs (workout of the day). As I would be considered a heavier CrossFit athlete, with my weight ranging from 90kg up to 100kg, I was always drawn to the weightlifting side of CrossFit. I loved workouts that consisted of heavy deadlifts, snatches, cleans, etc. My main goal was always to get stronger and never really focused on improving my pull-ups, push-ups, handstand push-ups, dips and of course burpees! These did improve gradually over time but my progress slowed as I neglected them over other aspects of my training.
With my gym, CrossFit Ireland, being closed due to current Covid lockdown restrictions this meant I had limited access to equipment. This presented me with the perfect opportunity for me to improve my bodyweight exercises. I was also hitting a bit of a slump and not training as much as I used to. I was beginning to get comfortable doing nothing except watching Netflix and playing video games in the evening and of course boredom eating more than I should. As a former overweight individual I recognised this was a very slippery slope for me and something had to change.
The above photo of me was taken back in 2016, when I topped to scale at 125kg (or about 275lbs). I was smiling in that photo but inside I was not happy. After playing team sports my entire life, I virtually stopped after college. I had sustained a pretty bad knee injury which required 2 surgeries and 13 months on crutches. I was afraid of exercising as I didn’t want to go through that again. The extra weight I gained added pressure on my knees which I couldn’t afford to carry. I was only 25 but felt 50. Thankfully, I found CrossFit a few months later and my life took a complete 180. I lost the extra weight and fell in love with exercising again. I competed in many a CrossFit competition and eventually became a trainer at CrossFit Ireland. For that I am forever grateful to them for.
A switch went off in my head that made me realise that exercise isn’t a chore but rather a privilege. There are hundreds of thousands of people around the world that aren’t in a position to exercise due to illness, disability, etc., and would love the opportunity/ability to train like I do.
In recent months I forgot this, but hearing the harrowing stories of people struggling to breath and placed on ventilators due to Covid was a real wake-up call for me. I wanted to fall back in love with exercising so I decided to undertake this challenge. I needed no equipment; it took me under 15 minutes to complete, and it was something I found difficult and wanted to improve on so I decided to give it a go.
The Rules of the Challenge
The rules I set myself for the challenge were simple. All 100 burpees had to be completed in one session i.e. I couldn’t break the burpees up over the day, like 50 in the morning, 50 in the evening, etc. Each session had to be timed and recorded. I used the timer on my iPhone and sent a screenshot of my time to my partner Orla just so I stayed accountable. I could not miss a day. I had to complete 100 burpees a day, if I were to miss a day, I couldn’t accumulate days i.e., do 200 one day if I missed the previous day. After I set these rules out March 1st soon rolled around and the challenge began.
Week 1
I’m not going to lie; I was anxious beginning this challenge. In my prime, when I was training 6 days a week, I was able to complete 100 burpees in 8 minutes. I didn’t want to see how far I slipped. I knew my fitness had decreased and on top of my weight increasing I wouldn’t get close to this time. I completed my first set of 100 burpees in 10:54.93.
I honestly hated every second of it! I felt slow, lethargic and heavy, but I was proud I finished it. As the famous Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu once said “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”, or in my case 1 burpee!
Over the next few days, I completed the 100 burpees religiously. Some days I was faster, others I was slower, but the most important thing was that I got them done. A breakdown of my times each day can be found below;
As you can see my times did fluctuate during the week. My time steadily went down until day 4 and started to rise again. I think this was due to me being fatigued and sore because I wasn’t used to doing so many burpees every day and also the fact the CrossFit Open (a worldwide CrossFit competition) started that weekend (day 6 to be exact), which meant I had to do an extra workout before my burpees that Saturday. My average time to complete 100 burpees for week 1 was 10:29. I felt a great sense of accomplishment after consistently completing Week 1 and I was motivated to start tackling Week 2.
Week 2
As you can see from the above graph my times did continue to improve. I began to consistently get my time below 10 minutes and the 100 burpees began to feel a bit more comfortable/manageable to complete. Similarly, to the prior week my time did spike up on the Saturday (day 13) due to the CrossFit Open workout which unluckily for me had some box jump burpees thrown into the mix, which meant I had 100 more burpees to do after completing over 50 in the open workout! My average time to complete 100 burpees for week 2 was 10:12, so 17 seconds faster than my average time the prior week.
Week 3
Similar to previous weeks my time steadily improved. I must have had a triple shot of espresso on day 16 as I completed the burpees in only 9:03! My time was starting to be consistently below 10 minutes. Again, I had another CrossFit Open workout that Saturday before I completed my burpees which caused the sharp increase. My average time to complete 100 burpees for week 3 was 9:53, so 19 seconds faster than my average time for week 2 and 36 seconds faster than week 1!
Week 4/5
I was on the final stretch of my burpees. I had 2100 done only 1000 more to go. I arguable found the final stretch of burpees the most difficult. My motivation to complete the burpees was waning. Some days, I would leave the burpees until late in the evening, which I would not recommend! Despite this I successfully completed the challenge. Those final 100 reps hurt but the sense of accomplishment after completing the challenge made every burpee worth it. For the majority of these days, I completed the burpees under 10 minutes. My average time for Week 4/5 was 9:43, 10 seconds faster than the prior week and a full 46 seconds faster than week 1!
So what did I learn?
My most important takeaway from this challenge was what I learned about the difference between motivation and discipline.
Both motivation and discipline help you attain your goals. At the beginning motivation is the main driver. You are excited to begin and that is enough to get you working towards your goals, no matter how lofty they are. When things begin to get tough discipline becomes your main driver.
As you can see from my graphs above, success is not linear. You are inevitably going to reach bumps in the road. These bumps can demotivate and make you want to stop, this is where discipline steps in. You have to be disciplined to keep striving forward even when times are tough. Progress may be slow, but any progress is positive.
After completing 3100 burpees in 31 days, I can now 100% determine that I still don’t like burpees! But I know they are good for me and are helping me get back on track to my fitness goals. As I am writing this on April 11th, I have now completed a total of 4200 burpees to date. 100 burpees have now become part of my daily routine.
My level of fitness has definitely improved and the number on the scale has improved also. I am 6kg (or just over 13lbs) down in 6 weeks. This isn’t just down to the burpees; I have also started intermittent fasting which has been working very well for me. I am looking forward to returning to the gym when it reopens ready to tackle my usual CrossFit workouts and by continuing my burpee routine, I believe this will aid me getting there.
To anyone reading this who is currently in a slump I recommend you partake in a similar challenge to kickstart your fitness journey. It doesn’t have to be 100 burpees, it could be doing 10,000 steps a day, 50 squats, sit-ups, push-ups, etc. Just make sure it is something realistic and attainable. From there you can build on it and get where you want to be. I wish everyone reading this the best of luck with their future fitness goals!
REFERENCES
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burpee_(exercise)
https://www.sherylburpeedluginski.com/health
https://barbend.com/how-mr-royal-h-burpee-invented-the-most-despised-movement-in-fitness/
