Jumping Rope - Epic fail.

Ok so my personal trainer has proven to me time and again that i have no cardio fitness whatsoever, and because im in strict training right now she's encouraging my to find things i can do in addition to my gym workouts to keep me moving at home and burning a few extra calories.

Now i have some free weights that i frequently use but i tend to do most of my heavy work in the gym, going 5 days a week that doens't really leave many body locations that are available and arn't resting when im at home.

I also do most of my ab work when im away from the comforts of the gym and its big equipment, but i was looking for something to improve my cardio .. which of course led me to the skipping rope... Perfect i thought i don't even need to leave the back garden as having 2 kids as always prevented me hitting the roads running.

Not so perfect .... my first skipping experience did not go well .... i managed 30 seconds before i thought my head was about to explode ... i know my cardio fitness is bad but come on i can normally manage 40mins on the treadmill jogging .... anyway i rested for a minute or two and tried again several time managing only about 30 seconds each time ...

does everyone find it so hard??? anyone got any tips??

because there i was thinking i'd get up in the morning do a quick 15minute skip before work however im not even managing 2 minutes...i didn't even have the heart to attempt to put it into my burn meter for fear of it laughing at me.

Ok so i accept I'm terrible at skipping is it worth me keeping at it?? with such short stints is it doing me any good or am i just gonna hurt myself?  i know i'll get better but it just seems sooooo pointless when i can't even keep it gonig for a few minutes.

I belong to a boxing gym and had the same problem when we first started going. I had just finished a 1/2 marathon and ran regularly but jumping rope kicked my butt! I was floored at how hard it was.
It's just a totally different type of cardio and I've found that just because you can do one efficiently doesn't mean when you start a new type you'll be able to jump right in. You're body gets used to certain movements when running, and jumping rope is entirely different. Running is an efficient use of energy so it can feel easier... but jumping off the ground is exerting a different type of energy and working different muscles.

At the boxing gym we do 3 rounds of 3 minutes w/ a minute break in between...it took a good month or two of going regularly to not feel completely winded, but it did start to get easier and was also always a good challenge/workout.

So, I might suggest trying that- doing 3 rounds of 3 minutes- and then up the amount of time as you get better or up the intensity at the same amount of time... it will definitely happen! :)

There were some posts about the joys of jump rope here a couple months back.  I subsequently bought a jump rope and tried it.  It's way too hard and yep, I wouldn't dare log the minute or two I tried.

A good start for cardio is very brisk walking and then calisthenics.  Billy Blanks' Basic Training Bootcamp dvd has lots of calisthenics (push ups, squats, jumping jacks).  Or you could just try doing them to music on your own.  Jumping jacks are a good way to introduce your body to jump rope. 

I do Tabata intervals with the jump rope once in a blue moon (my preferred Tabata workout is the Tabata Thrusters, I'm masochistic that way..)

 20 seconds skipping as fast as you can, 10 seconds recovery, repeat for 4 minutes (8 rounds) or until you keel over, whichever comes first :)

Original Post by leiela:

Ok so my personal trainer has proven to me time and again that i have no cardio fitness whatsoever, and because im in strict training right now she's encouraging my to find things i can do in addition to my gym workouts to keep me moving at home and burning a few extra calories.

Now i have some free weights that i frequently use but i tend to do most of my heavy work in the gym, going 5 days a week that doens't really leave many body locations that are available and arn't resting when im at home.

I also do most of my ab work when im away from the comforts of the gym and its big equipment, but i was looking for something to improve my cardio .. which of course led me to the skipping rope... Perfect i thought i don't even need to leave the back garden as having 2 kids as always prevented me hitting the roads running.

Not so perfect .... my first skipping experience did not go well .... i managed 30 seconds before i thought my head was about to explode ... i know my cardio fitness is bad but come on i can normally manage 40mins on the treadmill jogging .... anyway i rested for a minute or two and tried again several time managing only about 30 seconds each time ...

does everyone find it so hard??? anyone got any tips??

because there i was thinking i'd get up in the morning do a quick 15minute skip before work however im not even managing 2 minutes...i didn't even have the heart to attempt to put it into my burn meter for fear of it laughing at me.

Ok so i accept I'm terrible at skipping is it worth me keeping at it?? with such short stints is it doing me any good or am i just gonna hurt myself?  i know i'll get better but it just seems sooooo pointless when i can't even keep it gonig for a few minutes.

get a mini trampoline and jog on it for 15 min......trust me....it will whip you into shape for the jumping rope thing- I may be fat- but I am not able to jump and jump and jump and jump!!!

i think you are being too hard on yourself. i think you set the time expectations too high for your first time doing it. skipping rope isn't easy, as you found out. a few years ago, i started to. i had to start with 5 minutes, with recoveries. then added on. its helped my calves which are pretty puny. and doing it to music, because it is such a repetitious exercise, is key. pretty soon you'll be looking to do some other rope moves.

Yeah maybe ... well i got up this morning and took the rope outside for a spin, i did a few sets with little rest breaks inbettween but i found that 10seconds wasn't quite enough because when i got too out of breath my co-ordination and timing went out the window and i kept getting caught up in the rope which of course didn't get me very far at all.

I can see how my calf's are going to benift though 15mins (3 Sets doing maybe 2 minutes of actual skipping per set) and this morning my calves where really quite sore, i havn't been this sore since i did my first set's of squats, im gonna try again tonight i think ...

I'm thinking a short set in the morning before breakfast and slightly longer one in the evening while im cooking dinner (bettween checking the food haha) every day a execept the day i actually "do legs"

Do you think this is a good plan?? or am i working my calves enough to warrent weight lifting type "healing breaks" ... you know to let my legs recover???  

 

:D

i just bought a rope for tabata-at-home purposes. this thread makes me feel like less of a ****. thanks guys!

haha i know what you mean i just feel better im not the only one struggling with this....

funny i always remeber being quite good at jump rope as a child ...I don't ever remeber it being this hard, it seemed so much easier when i was 8 it suddenly makes me feel really old haha

 

 

Not sure if it has the same benefits of jumping with a rope but in Turbo Jam (DVD) Chalene often separates exercises by pretending to jump with a rope. You are still jumping over an imaginary rope but don't have to worry about getting caught up in it..........

leilela, its good to try new things, i just think you may have found it harder than you thought because of all the exercising you do anyway.  starting from the beginning again.

im adding in rowing to one of my weekly sessions, the next day after my legs to save them (im trying your weekly routine since you've gotten great benefits from it). i would normally row for either a warm up or cool down. yesterday i tried to do it for 20 minutes, but couldn't row fast enough to get my heart rate up. so i tried adding intervals but i know i need to do it slowly as its easy to put my back out of place.

i tried for th 1st time today .... and twisted my ankle  .... but its not so bad... i then checked couple of web-sites.... and i found out that i was jumping too high and bending my knee.... both of which isnt right 

i'll try it next time 15-20 at a time with interval breaks in between .... and do it for 5 mins ...... 

 

lets see ...... 

Last time I jumped rope?

I snapped my neck from not landing with soft knees, had a headache so bad I was crying, and couldn't move my neck much in any direction for two days.

 

screw jump ropes.

OUCH  ....... that sounds really painful ..... now am having second thoughts about this 

it totally sucked, but I think it's just because I'm completely uncoordinated and a klutz more than anything!

Building up the duration of your jumping actually takes a lot less time than you'd expect! I started just like you did, I couldn't manage more than 30 jumps before stopping...crapped me out big time...I started doing it every other day and in about a week, I was able to go up to 2 minutes of intense rope jumping without stopping...I'm not working the jump rope anymore though :p I've switched up my cardio but I'll be getting back to it in a few weeks.

haha... i know what u mean by being a klutz.... i cant walk accross the room without hurting myslef ..... and i have scars all over my body now  

 

and as desert rose says...... hopefully in a weeks time i'll be atleast OKAY with jumping rope 

I wouldn't worry about not being able to jump too long at first - it may be discouraging but you'll improve.  Just try to jump for as long as you can at the fastest speed you think you can maintain.  Then rest for as long as you need to and start again.  

You'll also miss less jumps over time - I know I couldn't go 10 or so without missing when I picked it up in August.  Now I usually only miss when I'm getting tired toward the end of the workout.  I regularly get in about 150-200 jumps per jump period (about 2 minutes) without missing now.

The interesting thing I've noticed about jumping rope, since I got a heart rate monitor, was that jumping really tops out your heart rate - way more than I expected.  I regularly hit 94% max with an 80s% max average when doing a jump rope workout - the average still encompassing the time I spend walking to recover.  And that's even with resting LONGER than I think I need before I feel like I could jump again.

So I guess what I meant to convey is that don't just consider your actual jump time - your body is still working hard during the recovery periods.  A 15 minute work out, including resting period, is quite a workout in its own right even if most of it is rest time.