Video: Bad Protein Bar Challenge
Back with another video this week. This one had a fun premise: my kids were allowed to punish me by choosing 12 protein bars they thought I’d least enjoy. It was a bad protein bar challenge. I ate only those bars for an entire day, while also doing a workout meant to simulate a punishment-based workout that a coach might make his team do.
Food as Punishment: Protein Bar Challenge
As a father, I try not to use food as punishment, or the withholding of sweets as punishment, but it can be a powerful motivator both ways. I thought it would be a fun spin on the very common protein bars only for a day video to allow my children to choose the bars I would eat.
To qualify as a protein bar, the bar would need to have at least 12 grams of protein. My kids tried to avoid good tastes like chocolate or peanut butter that they know I like. They tried to go for fruit bars, which was a good call, but some of those bars proved to be pretty good.
The worst ones were the collagen protein bar by “Bulletproof”, the orange and lemon bars by RX Bar, and the Layers Bars by RX as well. Don’t ever buy any of the bars on the bottom row of the below picture.
If you’re going to be eating a protein bar, don’t make it a nasty one. Life is just too short to worry that much about what’s in your little brick of protein.
Exercise as Punishment
The main event of the workout was hill sprints. I ended up doing 21 of them (I lost count). The plan was to do 10, but I felt like doing more. Below is what I had planned ahead of time.
The sprints came after I tried to wall sit for 5 minutes (got 2:30-ish before failing. After the sprints was a bear crawl across the field. Then a max time for leg raise hold and max reps for jumping jacks (I got around 120). Those exercises were interspersed with some laps around the field.
But the extra calories and all the protein bars didn’t do much damage to my physique. In fact, I actually lost weight despite eating more than 800 calories more than I usually do. The workout and the extra activity helped.
Ideas for Exercise as Punishment
The ideas for the punishment workout came from feedback from my followers on Twitter and Instagram. I compiled them into a blog post, which you can read here. If you have other ideas, please comment on that post and I’ll update it over time.
