Preparations for the Navy PRT/PFA End Extra Sweet

A background story to set this up, if I may.

Before I passed last April's PRT, I had three failures. What made that PRT different was that I had trained for it like an event, months before even to the point of doing a 2-week load cycle for the pushups and situps. After feeling so banged up from that, I took a longer layoff than I should have, got a bad bout of food poisoning, then topped it all off with a broken rib that sidelined me for two months. While I did get a medical waiver because of the injury, it did not waive me from the bodyfat measurement - - - which I failed. Per the Navy's instruction, if I failed this PRT then my Navy career was through. To add to that, my unit's PRT was to be run in May, the end of my contract was on April 6 and my next drill was April 13-14 (can't drill with no contract). So I told the Navy Operational Support Center (NOSC) here at Bangor that I wanted to do my PRT early - - - in March. Pressure!?!

Fast forward to this week. While I could see visual improvement, I didn't want to leave anything to chance. I was recovering from a week of being overtrained: last week, I had two sessions that my lower back no longer recovered quickly from, and this Monday was no different: deadlifting and squatting three times a week plus using an SSB had caught up to me.
I did a 10 set of 3 workout on Wednesday for three movements(Hammer ISO Rows, Hoist Neutral Grip Chinups, and trap bar shrugs) since I wanted to make sure my neck would stay large. Tuesday and Wednesday, I went low carb and the HIIT aerobics on the elliptical was still a go. Thursday morning, the morning of the measurement, I took some time off of work. Weighed in the bathroom at 232.5 lbs nude. Drank some very strong coffee (no sugar) and some Motrin (my erectors still felt puffy), took my son to the bus stop and headed to the gym. Without shoes, weighed in at 235.1. After 45 minutes on the elliptical, weighed in at 233.1. Headed to the dry sauna and did two 20-minute sessions. Afterwards, had to go to the bathroom bad, because I forgot that Motrin on an empty stomach is not good. After a shower, I weighed in at 230.1 lbs. Went to the NOSC to get measured but the Corpsman who was going to do it was administering the PRT to a few people at the gym. When I got there, she wasn't there. So I waited for a while, hungry and thristy. When she showed up, I got measured and passed with my lowest bodyweight in 4 years (229), lowest waist measurement (37.5), and lowest BF (20% by Navy standard). So, that was out of the way. to put it in some kind of perspective, I was 7 lbs lighter than April 2006 but had only lost one lbs of lean mass.

Yesterday was the exercise portion, which I was most nervous about mainly because of the run: I hadn't run since mid-December 2006. That, and the pressure. Oh, and I was running this by myself with noone to pace me. My goal was a Good-Medium (44 pushups, 55 situps, 13:23 1.5 mile run time) because that's what I got last time and I didn't want to look like I had slacked off. I got it. The run was better only in that I had to walk and sprint less of it, but it sucked because I had no practice and no pacing. I was running a 12:00 pace the first two laps, than started to slow down a bit and was winded by the 5th lap of 8. I ran a 13:10, 16 seconds slower than April 2006 but I'll take it.

I reenlist April 5th. I'll do a lessons learned later.