A military option?

I was in the weightroom recently and two Marines noticed my pullup ability. They thought I could be one of the few, the proud...

Maybe the Marines should recruit gymnasts.

Anyway, that planted a new thought in me: perhaps I should join the military.

I told the two Marines that I can do endless situps, but learned that they don't do situps! Who knew? They do crunches. So I investigated and sure enough. Army, situps; Marines, crunches. BUT what the Marines call crunches are more like situps.

A guy told me that the Army takes better care of their men than Marines. He is in the Army. I don't know if that is true.

I have to admit that I don't know much about the military. In college I've helped lots of guys in ROTC to improve their pullup ability. It wasn't hard since they are in excellent shape already. They needed help on form. I don't understand the guys who try "pullups" palms facing in (aka, chinups). That requires too much bicep work.

The better way is to do pullups is with palms facing out (aka, just pullups). This uses the lats which can easily be developed into strong muscles.

While I'm at it, a strong regime of dips can help improve pullup numbers.

The physical challenges that come with the military option are great for me. I also appreciate the unit cohesion concept. I felt in my frat I took a lot of physical abuse and that develped cohesion among those who liked to punch me in my midsection all those years.

I do appreciate throwing my lot in with a group of solders who become one.

But are these the right motivations? Or just great perks!

The quest begins...

I'm visiting my lifelong friend Brandon for the Labor Day weekend and enjoying the use of his wonderful Dell desktop. Brandon's brother Brad heard I was coming and drove in to see me. I've known them all my life. Brandon and I are both 23 yo and Brad is 21. We all three wrestled together in high school. They are family to me. Brothers I never had.

I've always had my gymnastics and wrestling teammates as my close friends. I graduated college a year ago and have gone through withdrawal. I moved far away from friends and am on my own this past year. I've joined two gyms, one to lift weights and the other to practice boxing and train my abs.

My muscularity and athletics has formed my core identity. I've surrounded myself with likeminded guys in my sports, but am now sans such friendships. Thus the feelings of withdrawal.

Don't get me wrong. I'm highly social and enjoyed an interesting yet abusive time in my fraternity (you might ask me about that).

Something is missing and so I'm on a quest...to find the other half of myself.

The Guinness world record attempt for situps

After doing 6,912 consecutive situps my freshman year of high school for a wrestling team fundraiser, I really started working my abs hard with the guys on the wrestling team. By the time of my junior year, I had developed not only very muscular and hard abs, but was into endurance abs training. A guy on my wrestling team came up one day and just said, "John, you should go for it." "It?" "The world record for situps." He talked it up with the other guys and I finally said, "Sure. Piece of cake."

We came into the wrestling matroom early Saturday morning all stoked. We had lots of gatoraid and ice, and a long vinyl tube to act as a straw so I could continue to do situps and suck away on the pale green fuel. We dragged over the fan in the mat. I took off my shoes and shirt. I stood there in my faded gym trunks that barely stayed on my hips. I was 17, 175 lbs, and had been seriously training my abs since I was a very young gymnast.

In solidarity with me, the rest of the guys took dressed in just gym shorts and pledged to take turns doing situps along with me. They would rotate around doing situps. We had a counter to keep track of my situps, a stop watch to precisely mark off the 5-minute break I could get each hour, and guys to take keep track and post my updates.

We were all set!

I stretched and hydrated with the green shimmering liquid fuel. I got in the center of the room in the middle of the mats. I had to do these "unassisted"--no one could hold my ankles. It was all now up to me and my years of strenuous abs development.

To cheers and whistles I started--hands behind my head and knees bent. I so looked forward to the fucking 5-minute break. During the break I rolled over and one guy massaged my lower back and one my upper shoulders. I then rolled onto my back and a guy massaged my tight 4 rows of abs. They took cloths soaked with cold water and wiped me down. That all felt so good! I lived for the massages!

"Time's up!"

I got back into my rhythm, refueling often.

Hour after hour. My wrestling team did situps for the first hour with my then chose to talk to keep me interested.

I took 2 bathroom breaks in 2 non-consecutive hours.

My neck was sore, my lower back muscles were beginning to get sore, but my abs were not bad. I haven't felt the "burn" working my abs since I was 14. So I was pysched.

As we got to hour 8, a custodian came in to clean. He saw a group of shirtless wrestlers watching me do situps. He asked what was going on.

"Hey, Mr. Wilsen. John's gonna break the Guinness world record for bent knee situps!"

"Really? How many is he up to?"

"19,600!" they shouted.

"Where's the Guinness Book representative?"

"The who??"

"The official who they send to certify this whole thing?"

"The who????........Holy Shit!"

I just kept doing situps not wanting to make a mistake. Finally we all realized that of course they aren't just going to believe a group of wrestlers that I had beat the world record--no matter how muscular my abs are!

I sat up and put my arms on my knees. Finally I lay back, covered my face with the cold towel and just cried.

Brandon came over and sat with me. He and the others apologized for them fucking up.

I felt like a piece of shit. I Brandon grabbed my hand and helped me to me feet.

I went to the wall with mirrors and just stared at my abs all pumped and tight as a golf ball. My abs were so contracted that they pulled my torse forward.

Tim came up and put me in a full nelson and slowly pulled me back to stretch out my abs.

Brandon felt my abs stretched and said, "Fuck! They are still so damn tight."

So I told Brandon to throw some punches to losen them up. Now Brandon has thrown punches to my contracted abs since I was 15. Now he was punching my stretched abs.

But I couldn't feel his punch. I felt a thud. You know when you go to a dentist and he injects the numbing agent? When he starts to work on your tooth he says, "You won't feel any pain, just vibration."

Well I felt the vibration of Brandon's fist punching me fucking hard but didn't feel any pain.

Andy came over and took over for Brandon. Andy's a huge strong wrestler. Same result. Finally I had enough.

That ended my Guinness world record attempt.

I felt deflated.

But on Monday when I came to school I got lots of people applauding and patting my back or grabbing a feel of my muscular abs. Only then did I feel I'd succeeded.

I got warm greetings from guys on the football team that I didn't think knew me.

A guy told me later that at my current pace that I wouldn't beat the record of over 100,000 situps in 24 hours.

Maybe it was better that I stopped under these circumstances!