DEAR CROSSFIT DORK: Your workout sucks. I have zero desire to learn a Russian twist, Romanian deadlift, or Bulgarian split squat. I refuse to do burpee box jump combos "for as many rounds as possible." I won't even Google "Turkish get-up." Instead I'm going to train my Spartan body the AMERICAN way... playing air guitar to metal music. I'll start with a light warm-up, Danzig's "Mother." Then I'll move on to Metallica's "Enter Sandman," or "Master of Puppets" if the shoulders feel good.
C'mon people, this is Portland. We ride unicycles and play with hula hoops (or at least some of us do). We have fun here—especially if it looks dumb. You look pretty dumb yourself, humping that pull-up bar. So just keep on copulating with gym equipment... I'm heading to the basement and cranking AC/DC or Motörhead (RIP, Lemmy). You laugh, but do you make fun of cardio kickboxing? Air guitar is metabolic training for rock 'n' roll athletes. It's fat-torching, face-melting P90X with devil's horns.
When I shred to Van Halen's "Everybody Wants Some!!," I work legs, core, posterior chain, even grip strength. I do lawn mower pulls with my strums. Wood choppers when I whip my air guitar across my body. Sumo squats, Jefferson deadlifts, off-the-couch depth jumps. Medicine ball slams when I smash my air guitar like Pete Townshend. Neck work when I'm headbanging.
That adds up to intervals, plyometrics, dynamic stretching, and ab work all in less than 10 minutes. A total-body workout that digs into muscles you won't reach hoisting bar-bells. It's also existential: as in "the rush." I feel like Johnny Utah skydiving without a parachute. Primal.
I'm the Tyler Durden of fitness. I want you to feel alive—I want you to rock as hard as you can. Aha! I knew that Fight Club reference would pique your interest. So give this blistering air guitar workout a try:
Put on Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Free Bird." It's more than nine minutes long. That's serious work. To make it even harder, I want you to throw in 20 sumo squats, 50 landmine rotations, and duck walks for as many rounds as possible. Don't worry about form, just make sure you air guitar the whole time. High-rep headbanging may cause some thoracic rounding, but don't look like Mick Mars unless you suffer from ankylosing spondylitis, like he does.
The air guitar is the anchor—like a fighting stance in martial arts. With it, you make shapes with your body that promote circulation and oxygenation. You're not just jumping around like an idiot, you're releasing toxins. You're moving qi. Forging mind-body connection. Putting distance from the grave with each pantomimed power chord.
That's why you should air guitar every day. It's fitness heroin. You'll crave feeling Ronnie James Dio in your bone marrow. Take it from musician Eric Melin: "Air guitar gives me a pure physical rush like nothing else, not even playing a real instrument." He's not only a real drummer, but an air guitar world champion. That's right, Captain Competitive, you can compete in air guitar, right here in Portland!
So go ahead, get off that pull-up bar and pick up an air guitar. Your workout of the day: three rounds of Ozzy Osbourne, pelvic-thrust-into-360-degree combos. Light weight, baby. Light as air. And... go!
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