Last week Sunday, one of my quad mates walked into the room and said, "Brian! You're just the guy I was looking for. We should do a push up and pull up challenge!"

Nearly a week later, the challenge is in full swing. It currently includes my roommate and four other guys on the quad, though not all of them are quite as into it as the original creators.

The idea is this. For an entire month (28 days, to be precise) we will do a designated number of push ups and pull ups every day. During week one, our goal is to complete 50 push ups and 30 pull ups a day. The first day was difficult, but as the week progressed the reps got easier. Today however, I felt a combination of wooden arms and heavy body, contributing to a tough day on our pull up bar.

The hardest part about the challenge was actually not doing the reps themselves, but acquiring the pull up bar. The doors in my quad (four rooms in a mini hallway, three hallways make up the floor) don't have moulding around the edges, meaning that there is no lip for a traditional mounted pull up bar to rest. This issue had plagued us for several weeks last semester, and I had given up trying to find an alternative. However, I heard about a different type of bar a few weeks ago at track practice. One on my teammates mentioned a pull up bar that is essentially a straight piece of metal with extendable sides with which to tighten into a doorway. I looked it up and ordered one that same night.

The bar I ordered came with mounting brackets and screws, but I figured that the university's maintenance crew would not take too kindly to me screwing into the walls. Instead, I simply tightened the rubber ends until the bar was secure enough to hold my weight. It hasn't fallen once, and has led to hundreds of pull ups since its arrival in our hallway.

This challenge has been splendidly motivating for me and the other guys in the quad. We have two pieces of paper taped up in the hallway, one for pull ups and one for push ups. Our names are on it, as well as a block for each day where we can record how many reps we each did that day. Having such a public display helps keep us all accountable. It's becoming common to open the door and see one of the guys in the hallway doing pull ups, and that's awesome.

The fitness aspects of doing so many reps may be questionable. In fact, we may start alternating squats and planks along with the upper body workouts. However, what matters more to me is doing this fitness challenge together and growing together as a quad.