I must say, today I was pleasantly surprised when I put myself through the Marine PFT again I actually found it all easier and managed to improve on last week’s score of 141.

After getting some pain in my knee after last weekend’s runs, I took a few days off to heal up. I actually saw a physio during the week who said I have weak glutes and a tight IT band which pulls my kneecap off track. A few stretches and some proper rest days later and today’s run was almost completely pain free, well in the joints anyway.

So on to the meat of the matter, how did I do today? I saw improvements in all three activities and put together a final score of 167, putting me in the second class for a male of my age. I’m pleased to have seen some progress despite only getting in two workouts since the last PFT, but I do wonder if that had to do with having a target to aim for. Either way, I’m pleased and aiming to raise my score even higher.

I want to get to 200 before Christmas and there’s an obvious area for improvement: the pull ups. If I can move that up from a mere five to double figures, I can achieve that goal.

So now that I’ve completed Rushfit it’s on to the next stage in my fitness journey. One of the mistakes I made with Rushfit was not taking any sort of before and after measurements to get some hard data, so that’s obviously the first thing to fix. The second thing to fix is the play a little more to my strengths, which for me is long, steady cardio work.

To achieve this, I’m using the 100 plus years worth of accumulated fitness knowledge of the United States Marine Corps. I’m going to be doing a Marine style workout five mornings a week, plus additional workouts in the evenings including weights and Pilates. Each Saturday I’m going to run myself through a Marine physical fitness test or PFT.

This test is pretty simple: as many abdominal crunches as possible in 2 minutes, as many pull ups as possible then a three mile run. Each activity is given a score out of 100 giving a total out of a possible 300.

Today I had my first crack at it and I have to say, it’s pretty brutal but then again what would you expect from a test designed to tax Marines. I’m pleased to say that for a male my age, I passed (thanks Rushfit) with a score of 141 putting me at the top end of the bottom class but you know what? The only way is up from here.

Roll on my first crack at the callisthenics and cardio work out tomorrow, I’m sure that’ll be tough too but that’s kind of the point, right?