The Murph

Each Memorial Day, we do a Murph workout.  Now if you know what a Murph is, you can sympathize.  If you don’t, here is a rough explanation. It’s a long, torturous workout designed to honor a fallen soldier.  Michael Patrick Murphy, “Murph”, was a Navy Seal who died in 2005 in the line of duty in Afghanistan. This was one of his favorite workouts.  It involves running, pullups, squats, and pushups. Lots of them. Plus, more running. A “fun” way to spend Memorial Day, but it is so worth it!

Mr. Strong Dad comes up with these great ideas to do crazy workouts.  The first time we tried the Murph, he decided three days prior that we should wake up and do this workout.  We found some sweet neighbor girls to babysit the kids while we did the Murph at home. Our babysitters’ mom does Crossfit, so they knew what we were getting ourselves into.

Our first Murph went like this: the babysitters arrived and then we started the timer.  During the first 10 minutes, the kids rode their bikes with us for part of the one mile run and they cried.  We finally had the babysitters veer off to the park and we just ran away. Literally! We knew they were safe and we just ran the mile.  On the way back home, we saw the kids in the distance at the park and didn’t hear any crying…. My headphones may or may not have been blocking it out.

Here is the Murph workout:

1 mile Run
100 Pull-ups
200 Push-ups
300 Squats
1 mile Run

If you are hardcore, you do this with a weighted vest and do each thing all the way through.  We are semi hardcore, so we just did it with body weight and broke it up.

We broke the workout into twenty rounds of 5 pullups (I used a band and do ring rows and the hubby did strict), 10 pushups, and 15 squats.  We both completed it and I actually beat Mr. Strong Dad because the last run kicked his butt the first time. 

We don’t run often.  I used to run half marathons but after my hip injury, I couldn’t run as much.  I am now able to do short distances and an occasional 5K. But, we can handle two miles!

Overall, the Murph was worth it.  We have started this tradition of doing this 1-2 times a year with our neighborhood workout group.   We have one neighbor that did a half Murph in full gear at the police station. Crossfit gyms do this workout at least once a year.

P.S. - The kids had fun with the babysitters and only cried for five minutes.  I think I may have felt like crying more than that after round 19. Now our kids ride their bikes while we run!

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