Found this site in a roundabout way when reading up on Rob Downey Jr.'s training for Iron Man 2... apparently he gets easily bored, so his trainer had to find some routine that would keep him interested. Part of that routine was sledgehammer training. Being a big celtic barbarian myself, I was thrilled with the idea of working out by beating the hell outta something with a large, heavy hammer hehe. Sure enough, later that night I caught some UFC fighters training with sledges on Spike tv, which reminded me to check it out online. Lo and behold, Shovelglove!
Anyway, I rangered my butt over to Home Depot and got started (without the wrapped sweater... I have enough space, and I kinda like looking at the massive blunt iron head of the hammer as I imagine my battles heh), and boy is it ever a workout. I'm 35, and haven't worked out regularly in about 10 years, but for off and on spurts. I was heavy into powerlifting when I was younger though, and I still carry a good portion of 7 years worth of muscle, though, maybe, just mmaaaayybbee, it's been padded over some in that time. My old clothes just shrunk through repeated washings. Yeah, that's it.
So far I've only been doing it for two weeks, but what gets me about this type of training is that I cant imagine getting bored with it. I'm either swinging a big hammer, or beating a big tire with a big hammer. Either way, I've got a runaway imagination, so each time I'm playing my own little Conan movie in my mind heh. Since I've fallen in love with it so quickly, I've been mouthing off about it to anyone around me interested in working out, and I've already dragged in a few converts in just two weeks heh.
As for music, while everyone's tastes vary, I've made a playlist of Corvus Corax songs.
http://s0.ilike.com/play#Corvus+Corax:A ... :m22558527
They're a German festival band who play a version of modernized medieval music with period instruments they've all crafted themselves. Watching them is absolutely amazing, and their music just gets you moving with an almost mindless, primal energy. I play Mille Anni Passi Sunt, Saltarello, and Platerspiel, which is about 15 minutes of music. It breaks down into about 4 minutes of moderate pace beats, then 4 minutes of balls to the wall hammering, followed by 4 minutes at moderate again, and finally 3 or so minutes of "omg did I remember to fill out my will yet" frenzy. That's usually followed by about 10 minutes of pretending I'm a sweaty, panting throw rug
Anyway, that's me. Thanks for the great workout, and, Hi!
