At 57, Moses Mutulis defies age with 4am high-intensity workouts

He does not simply skip over the rope like a fourth grader; he mixes it up with speed roping, jumping rope as fast as he can, double jumps where he jumps into the air and spins the rope twice around him, then squat jumps.

He jumps and falls into a squat while spinning the ropes to the side and jumps once more up and down into a squat again. 

The exercise is about three minutes.

The 57-year-old, who has three years left before he retires from prison service after 35 years, reminds me of retired American boxers Sugar Ray, Mike Tyson, and Roberto Duran, who were known for adding this jump-rope technique to their workout routine.

“Jumping rope is not hard to master. But to jump and do tricks does take serious time and a high level of concentration. Also, jumping at your full speed with variations for just a few minutes is not as simple as it seems; you have to be focused,” Moses, who is the Kenya Prisons Chief Inspector in Kakamega.

At 57, Moses is bending the fitness rule book to fit his needs. Whereas most people would count the number of skips, he does not.

“I can’t really tell how many those skips were because with my workouts I don’t do counts or reps (repetition); instead, I attach time to every workout because I’m so used to high-intensity workouts. If I count, I tend to think I've undertrained,” says the father of two sons (32 and 27).

For Moses, a high-intensity workout is the best form of exercise that gets one shredded and lean as fast as possible, as it pushes the body to extremes, forcing it to burn fats at a higher rate by increasing one's metabolism.

Wakes up at 3am

In the past few days, Kakamega has been experiencing a heavy downpour, and despite the bad weather, it has not deterred him from waking up at 3am to begin his day with a workout at 4am.

“Last night there was a really big downpour in Kakamega. It was still raining when I woke up at 3 am. I couldn’t be patient for it to subside, so I did my 10-kilometre run in the rain,” he says.

At 5am, Moses jumped into another workout.

“I have a group that I mentor; we meet up at 5am and do an outdoor high-intensity session for 45 minutes with me as their instructor.”

Once he is done with the group, he proceeds to the gym for an hour of weight-lifting exercises, where he also gets to instruct a few of his clients.

“I finish my exercises for the day at 7am and rush home to freshen up, then proceed to the office.”

This has been Moses' routine in the last few years since he was posted to Kakamega. He trains Monday to Friday, with the weekends serving as rest days where he gets to eat, read a newspaper, and relax.

“I can easily become injury-prone because I engage in high-intensity workouts. This is why Saturday and Sunday I allow my body to recover," he says.

Moses has always been athletic ever since he finished high school in the 80s before being drafted to the Kenya Prisons Service in 1989.

“After the prison training, I got involved in the martial arts, training in Judo, something that gave me the discipline to exercise to this day,” he says.

His efforts did not go unnoticed by his bosses, who had him drafted as Kenya Prisons instructor at Kenya Prisons training school in Ruiru after attaining his fitness certifications.

“That is where I learned the discipline of early rising because you had to get up early to train 'makurutus’ (trainees). I did this job until 2018, when I left the training school,” he says.

Intermittent fasting

Moses has, however, had to slow down over the years.

“When you are young, your body naturally possesses power and recovers very fast, but as you age, as I have, you go slow on many things. The speed of my workouts has gone down. I am also careful with muscle repair after a workout because it takes time to repair as you age. This is the reason I eat more protein to speed up the muscle recovery,” he says.

On dieting, the chief inspector notes his problem with the term.

“I encourage people to eat what many consider bad food. I encourage people to eat lots of beans, which some fitness experts will argue is not good. Eat any kind of meat, red or white; our bodies need it. You can’t do high-intensity workouts without eating properly,”  he says, adding, "with high intensity, short sessions are more effective than spending hours in the gym as they shock the muscles, stimulating growth and burning of fat."

He is also not a fan of intermittent fasting, which has gained popularity among gym enthusiasts looking to shed excess fat fast.

“I see people getting into intermittent fasting with the hope of shedding weight/fat faster, but I discourage those attending my high-intensity sessions because they will not be able to keep up,” he says.

As his retirement nears, Moses' plan is to become a full-time fitness trainer as he enjoys bonding with his grandchildren.

“I am already a grandfather thanks to my eldest son, although he isn’t into fitness. Whenever we are together, people always joke that he is my father. I try to encourage him to take fitness seriously, but then again, he is a man of his own. My second son is into basketball,” he says.

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