CHAPTER 18: CHASING RECORDS AND BREAKING PLATEAUS

Just when you think you know what pain is—there is more!

This week I learned about pain.

Everything had been going along smoothly, and I felt like I was doing pretty good work and making some real improvements. I was up to thirty-five push-ups, and I was doing nine repetitions of a new exercise Uncle Jake had taught me called dips. My swimming was coming along. So I was getting better and was feeling pretty strong in just about everything—except the most important thing: PULL-UPS.

That’s right. Despite all the hard work I had put myself through over the last month, I was stuck on pull-ups. The most I had gotten in a row was four. And I seemed stuck there. Each workout, I would do a few more push-ups, a few more dips, a few more squats, a few more sit-ups than the last time. But for the last few workouts, I had been stuck at four pull-ups, and I didn’t know what to do.

“I’m stuck, Uncle Jake. I can’t get past four pull-ups. And I don’t know what to do.”

“Well. You’ve been following the workout. You’ve improved what you have been eating. So. This must be a plateau.”

“What’s a plateau?” I asked.

“It’s when you reach a level that you aren’t breaking through. You’re not improving the way you should be. Sometimes the body just adapts to the stress you’re putting on it and stops improving.”

“Oh, man,” I said. “That’s horrible. Does this mean I won’t be able to get to ten pull-ups? Or even five?” I asked.

Uncle Jake shook his head. “No,” he said, “it doesn’t mean that at all. It just means we need to break through the plateau.”

“How do we do that?” I wondered.

“Well, you know how I said your body has adapted to the stress put on it from working out?”

“Yeah, I guess.” I was pretty sure I understood this.

“Well, here is what is happening: You make the body work hard—or you ‘stress’ the body—and then, in order to deal with that stress, the body builds muscle and gets stronger—or it ‘adapts’ to that stress.”

“So my body has adapted a little?” I asked.

“Actually, your body has adapted a lot. You have gotten better in every exercise. You are just stuck. But we will get you through that.”

“How?” I asked.

“Simple. More stress.”

“More stress?” I didn’t like the sound of that. AT ALL!

“Yes. More stress. We are going to push you harder—the hardest you’ve been pushed in your workouts—and we will do a workout specifically based on stressing your pull-up muscles to smash this plateau and get your pull-up numbers increasing. Be ready for a good workout tomorrow morning.”

“Good? What do you mean by good?” I asked, worried that Uncle Jake’s definition of the word good might be a little different than mine.

“I guess I mean pain. Be ready for some pain in the morning.”

That’s EXACTLY what I was afraid of!

The next morning, the workout was PSYCHO!

It started off pretty normally. We did some push-ups, then some sit-ups, then some squats. Then we got to pull-ups, and Uncle Jake said, “Today you are going to do one hundred.”

“Pull-ups?” I asked in shock.

“Yes. Pull-ups. You are going to do one hundred.”

“Maybe you are forgetting, but I can only do FOUR PULL-UPS, UNCLE JAKE! HOW THE HECK AM I GOING TO DO ONE HUNDRED?????” I asked.

“However you can,” Uncle Jake answered. “However you can. Now get up there and get started.”

I stepped up on the box, reached for the bar, and did my first set of four. “Good,” Uncle Jake said. “Now do it again.” I grabbed the bar and did another four. “That’s eight,” Uncle Jake said. “Keep going.” I took a little rest, then reached up to the bar and did another three. “And that is eleven. Eighty-nine to go.”

So that is what he meant. I was going to do a hundred pull-ups. But not in a row, in sets. Since I could only do four at the most, it was going to be A LOT OF SETS!

But I kept going. And going. And going. I was able to do sets of three for a while, but then around fifty, I could only do sets of two. When I got to eighty, I could only get one pull-up at a time.

Right in the middle of number eighty-seven, I felt a pain in my hand. When I got off the bar, I looked down at my right hand. One of the calluses had been ripped off. There was a trickle of blood coming out.

“I think I’m done,” I said to Uncle Jake, showing him my hand.

“Thirteen more,” Uncle Jake said.

“But my hand. It hurts,” I told him, hoping he would have mercy on me.

“Thirteen more,” Uncle Jake said again.

I stepped up onto the box and grabbed the bar. I did another one. It hurt. Then I did another one. Then I adjusted my grip a little so I was holding on with just my fingers, and I found that hurt a little less. I did another and another and then a few more.

Then, finally, I finished. ONE HUNDRED PULL-UPS.

My hands were sore and bloody. I had blood on my shirt. I was sweating. But I had done it.

“Good job, Marc,” Uncle Jake said. Then, in a very serious tone, he added, “We don’t quit. Ever.”

I nodded. And I felt good. Really good.

The next day, Uncle Jake told me not to work out at all. And that night he took me to a movie and to the Classic Malt Shoppe for a double cheeseburger!

Three days later, I got up on the bar, and I did six pull-ups. I was on my way; the plateau had been broken—but I hadn’t been.