Free Max Arena by Jamie Doyle

jerking, till it hits your gut.
Make sure you squeeze your shoulder blades together as you lift.
Don’t try to just use your arms because you’ll fail and probably
pop a bicep along the way. At the top, hold the bar and squeeze
your shoulder blades as much as you can for a full second and then
slowly lower it down again. Do ten if you can. If you can’t, just
lift it as many times as you can. Make sure you keep that back
arched and your butt out. Okay?’
    ‘Got it,’ Max
replied, reaching down to grip the bar as instructed.
    ‘Right. Take it
slow,’ Kris said, stepping out of the way.
    With his grip
on the bar, Max looked up in the full length mirror to confirm his
form. Staring himself down, he pulled the bar off the ground.
Fifteen seconds later he had completed ten smooth repetitions with
no falter. Placing the bar back on the ground, he straightened and
looked in the mirror at Kris who was already returning the
look.
    ‘Let me guess?’
she asked. ‘Double?’
    Max nodded.
Kris flicked a glance at Elsa who shrugged in reply. Kris then
turned and walked over to grab another heavy weight plate, her
frown deepening.
    Thirty minutes
later and now on the squat rack, Max eased the bar back onto the
pegs and off his shoulders. Ducking out from underneath the bar, he
looked sideways at Kris.
    ‘What’s next?’
he asked.
    Kris just
looked at him, her frown now permanently ingrained. Silence settled
over them, its strength as potent as any drug. Kris switched her
look across to Elsa who shifted uncomfortably on the bench on which
she was sitting, but remained quiet.
    ‘There’s
nothing left to lift,’ Kris finally said. ‘I’ve made you work every
muscle group across every inch of your body and maxxed the weights
and machines out at the same time. You’ve pulled and pushed
yourself around the gym and lifted more than I’ve seen most grown
men do and I’ve seen some seriously big men and on top of that, I
can’t even see a drop of sweat on you. Hell, you just squatted two
hundred kilos like the bar was empty. I...I don’t know what
to...’
    Kris trailed
off shaking her head. She looked askew at the ground, her frown now
verging on worry. Elsa stood up and walked over to Max and they
silently looked at each other. Max then flicked a glance up to
Peter, who was looking right back at him, his face like stone, his
eyes hard and piercing. Max also glanced at the other two security
guards in the room and they too were looking at him. Elsa had also
noticed that the spotlight had centred squarely on her husband. She
leaned in.
    ‘I think you
might have just scared everyone,’ she whispered.
    Kris’ eyes
snapped up at hearing the whispering. ‘Clear some space,’ she
quipped. ‘Time for some cardio.’
    Max and Elsa
glanced at each other again and then watched Kris start to drag a
bench off to the side of the free weights area. Max stepped in and
helped out by pulling two more benches clear to make a space in the
centre of the mat in front of the mirror. Elsa stepped back to
stand by one of the benches. Sneaking a peek up, she found Peter
and his two comrades no longer looking at Max. That at least made
her feel a little more relaxed.
    Kris turned to
Max and said, ‘So, we just established you can lift pretty good,
but that’s only half the story. If you really are fit, you can do
more than just pump iron. Let’s check out your cardio. Cool?’
    ‘Cool,’ Max
replied.
    ‘Right, you
should be warm after all those weights, so I think we can crack
straight into a tabata. Do you know what that is?’
    ‘Yep,’ Max
said. ‘Elsa whinges about them all the time and that you make her
do too many, but just to check, it’s twenty seconds flat out for
the first exercise then ten seconds rest and then twenty seconds
flat out for the second exercise and repeat three more times. All
up that’s four minutes right?’
    ‘That’s right
and flat out are the key words. We need one hundred percent.
Don’t leave