On November 15, Tom will take on a challenge to complete 1000 ring muscle-ups for a good cause: to raise money for the local cancer care foundation Solas Centre in Waterford, Ireland. Along with his box members, who will be doing a 1000 burpees challenge – an annual event held at his box.
The motivation
Tom’s mission is heavily influenced by his father who was diagnosed with skin and prostate cancer back in 2009. Following a tough treatment, the cancer luckily went into remission.
“He is the hardest worker I have ever known and his mental toughness is amazing. He wakes up every morning when the sun comes up and chops wood for the fire and works in the garden. If Crossfit was around in his youth he would have been a world champ.”
Why muscle-ups?
“I have done 1000 burpees three times already so this year I wanted to do something different. I love muscle-ups so that is the movement I picked,” says Tom. He also applied to the Guinness Book of Records to have it recognized as an official world record.
Tom is not the first one “to WOD” 1000 muscle-ups for time. Lacee Kovacs did the same challenge in 2012, finishing it in 8 hours, 41 minutes and 25 seconds. Lacee will also donate a signed t-shirt which will be available for purchase.
The plan
“I am going to start at 6 am and hopefully finish within 12 hours.” With a little bit of mathematics, this means:
Goal: 1000 muscle-ups under 12 hours.
12 hours = 720 minutes.
One muscle-up every 1:12 (one minute and twelve seconds).
83-84 muscle-ups per hour.
The training
Tom follows Ben Bergeron’s competition training which is a 5 days per competition program. For the muscle-up challenge he is stepping up his game: “I am adding 1 extra session per week specifically dedicated towards peeking in November to be able to complete 1000 muscle-ups.”
Watch Tom’s videos where he explains how he trains for the challenge:
The first session was 100 muscle-ups for time.
Tom’s time was 29:38.
Second session included EMOM 60 minutes: 2 reps each minute.
Eight weeks out.
“I am doing one muscle-up session per week in the time between now and November 15,” explains Tom. His goal is to gradually increase the number of reps (and the session time) to reach 250-300 reps before reaching for full 1000.
So far CrossFit Games athlete Lacee Kovacs is the only man to complete all 1000 muscle-ups. He finished the challenge in 8 hours, 41 minutes and 25 seconds. You can see the recap in the video:
We will follow Tom on his journey to 1000 muscle-up. Stay tuned to BOXROX for all news regarding the challenge. You make your donation over Tom’s page: Tom’s 1000 muscle-ups page
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