Sloane's TRX Challenge - week 4/8

In this weeks' TRX Challenge, I selected some good lower-body and upper-body exercises that would challenge both strength and balance and endurance.

Each exercise had to be completed for 1-min with only a 30 sec rest interval between exercises.  The exercises for this week included the following:

1. Hamstring Curl
2. Low Row
3. Suspended Lunge R
4. Suspended Lunge L
5. Atomic Push Ups

I have a video of Janessa and Brian to show that these challenges are not just for the strong man.  Brian is very strong in his upper body.  Janessa is also very strong, but her strength is in her legs.  You will see in the videos that Janessa has a little more endurance than Brian also.  Both put in solid efforts, however, neither did enough reps to win this week's challenge.  Jordan, who has also been competing in the challenges each week cranked out 193 total reps to take top honors.  With his win he gets a $25 gift certificate to Backporch Coffee

Janessa - 173 reps

great form on all exercises but didn't have the strength left in her for the Atomic Push Ups

Brian - 167 reps
Brian's form started to diminish towards the end of the Low Row's.  You'll notice how he begins to use his hips more than his lat muscles towards the end of the minute to pull himself up.  Being a bigger guy, he also began to run out of energy during the Atomic Push Ups.

I like to use these challenges to help myself and the participants discover their "weak link".  We all have our strengths and we all have our weaknesses.  It's easy and more fun to always work on our strengths.  For instance, if a person can bench press 250lbs., more than likely he/she will continue to do the bench press since they are good at it.  However, if that same person can only squat 150lbs, odds are that he/she is weak in the lower body muscles (or could have a low back issue).  Instead of trying to bench press 300lbs, I would recommend that this person make it a goal to try and squat 250lbs.  And as an added bonus, by increasing his/her squat significantly, more than likely he/she will increase his/her lean mass amount leading to a more lean physique.