Last Saturday, I went to Bonifacio High Street to join one of the Fitstreet activities, the F45 Playoffs.  It’s a great way of breaking the monotony of my weekend and a good way to help assess my fitness levels.  And I think I got more than what I bargained for…

The F45 Playoffs is hosted by a group-training facility of the same name and includes standardized methods of fitness assessment.  The challenge is composed of 10 stations of varying activities and you’d perform as many “good” repetitions as you can in 45 seconds.  Your rest in-between is 15 seconds.  The stations are (in chronological order):

1. Rowing
2. Bench hop
3. Push up knee tuck
4. Lateral hop
5. Box jump + burpee
6. Chin ups
7. Squat + press
8. Russian twist
9. Dead ball over the shoulder row
10. Sprint and lateral hop

Participants were grouped into batches of 10.  The first participant would have to complete his/her first station and move to the next before the next one would take his/her turn.  And so, the tenth person in the batch would play station 1 when the first participant is on station 10.

I was the fifth person in the second batch of the 5PM group.  It was good that we were not setting the numbers to beat and we could watch their execution but looking back, I wished I had paid more attention as going into my turn, I realized that I don’t really know how to do some of the routines properly!

We had some warm-up routines before our turn but my heart was already pounding even before that—I’ve not joined a competitive activity in such a long time!  I kept saying to myself that there should be “no pressure” and just aim to “survive” just to calm down a bit.  Before I knew it, it was my turn.

The first station was a breeze as I sometimes use a rowing machine to warm-up.  Besides, 45 seconds isn’t that long although the machine was set to some noticeable resistance.  The 15 seconds break was realistically just enough to dismount and move to the next station.  So far, so good!

The second station really elevated my heart rate big time!  I think I would add it to my library of active warm-up routines.  The main challenge for me here is landing with feet together on the floor at the same time.  I was already breathing from my mouth after my 45 seconds were up.

I haven’t really caught my breath when I came in into the third station.  I’m fine with the push up but my challenge was tucking my knees all the way in so by consciously thinking about it, I did much less than I hoped.

The fourth station was really simple but it is quite tiring!  It also does not give you a chance to recover as it increases your heart rate further.  Still doing good though.

When I got to the fifth station, I realized I absolutely had no idea how to do what was asked.  I know how to do burpee but I didn’t really know how to combine it with jumping onto that box.  I did try what I think I should do but I probably did not get a single “good” execution.

Chin ups is not really a big problem for me but I was really exhausted by the time I reached the sixth station.  I was purposely catching my breath on the relax phase as my body can barely recover from the intensity of the activities and the very short “break.”

Again, I was clueless on the seventh station.  I know how to squat and do military press, but not properly together to be counted.  The relatively heavy weight also did not help.

I did not realize until yesterday that I don’t know how to do Russian Twists properly!  I don’t really do this for my abs and now I have more reason to do it.  I did a few “good” ones though but since I don’t do this, the ball feels really heavy!

The ninth station was pretty straight-forward, pick up a ball from the ground, stand-up straight, and roll it over your shoulder.  The caveat, it’s a 25-kilogram ball!  At this late in the game, it was punishing.

The last station was also relatively simple, except that I was really drained by this time and was sweating profusely.  I just did as much as I can so I can finally finish!

It was just supposed to be 10 minutes but it felt like I did more than a week’s worth of exercise!  It’s crazy! It was the most intense 10 minutes of my life in recent memory!  It took minutes before my breathing and heart rate to return to normal.  At that point, I realized that I still have so much more to improve on, and those 10 minutes gave me a lot of feedback on what they are.

Now that I’m rested and have this back pain to remember the weekend, I think I want more!

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Thank you, Greenbulb Communications, F45, G Active, and Bonifacio High Street for a great weekend!

Looking forward to the next “Summer on the Street” activities.