P90X3: Day 2 of 90. Agility X. Crap, now I've done it! Again.

And, by 'doing it again,' I don't mean the Agility X routine.  I warmed up by doing 30 minutes on the treadmill.  All was going great until the first lunge set.  I felt a tightness in a muscle that has never given me problems before.  I pushed it for a couple more and it pulled tight on me.  Painfully tight.  I hit pause and backed out and stretched.  I didn't stop, just stretched the area that was affected.  I'm not sure, but I don't think it's the groin muscle.  If I look at a muscle map, it seems like it's the Gracillis.  Also, many pictures online show the muscle, oddly enough (and I say that sarcastically) with the leg in a lunge.

It's a small pull.  So, I kept going, I stretched frequently, and I modified to keep an eye on it.  Bottom line, I finished the workout.  But, it's pretty sore.  I iced the muscle and drank my protein and creatine shake when I was done.  For those of you over 50, that's spackle and glue for building up old muscles.  It'll be a few days of modifying the exercises that affect that muscle.

Here's the thing for you new people, kind of a "Coaching Moment" if you will.  When you feel your muscles pulling back in weird ways, hit pause before they react badly.  I've done this twice before in P90X and should have learned my lesson about listening to my body.  It's okay though, nothing permanent.  When it happened in P90X, I modified those exercises until I could do them again and did the rest with vigor.  Listen to your body.  Don't let your brain or ego write a check your body can't cash.

Here's the second part of this.  I'm not stopping.  I'll be on the treadmill for 45 minutes in the AM, and I will stretch it during the day so it doesn't get tight...and I will stretch better before each set.  Thirty minutes goes by quickly...if you need it, go "Cold Start."  I'll be doing heat before exercising and ice afterward.

So, it's deja vu all over again.  I pushed too hard and strained something.  I'll be fine.  Learn from my mistake (the third time) to listen to your body.  It's late.  Great Wildcard Weekend of NFL though!

P90X3: Day 1 of 90. Boy, Did I Screw Up

How did I screw up?  I will answer that one in a minute.  Today is Day One.  Think of it this way, if you commit to the next 90 days, this is the worst you will look for the next three months.  That is the only way you will survive doing your Day One metrics, to include the pics.  Just remember, it's all uphill from here.

So, I got up this morning and weighed myself, took my measurements and took my pictures.  Here are the shots to the left.  I know, most of you will keep these private.  Anyone who knows me well, knows that when it comes to this, I have no shame to speak of.  So you can see how I improve from here.

Here is the other reason I post them.  It helps me follow through.  When I motivate myself, I always make my starting point public.  When everyone else knows your stats and your commitment, you feel an added amount of pride in going the distance and a little more trepidation to let that promise go.  It's like a little more glue, holding you to the process.

I went through a very strict, medically supervised weight-loss program in 2008.  I had to do a liquid diet.  Why?  I was dying.  You can read my blog called "The Tipping Point" by clicking on the link above to read the detail.  The point is, I was SO physically unfit that I could not safely exercise rigorously.  It was causing other medical conditions that were shortening my life.  In that program, most of the people never discussed their weight, or their progress.  They kept it secret.  Those people who never discussed it, well, they either quit the program or failed to lose weight over a long period of time.  Doing the measurements and making them public makes you accountable to yourself in a way that you can't just silently slip away and quit.  It does make a difference.

Okay, how did I screw up?  Take a look at the pics to the left.  I am in worse shape now than when I started P90X in 2012.  I knew I was...deep down.  But, now I REALLY know it.  And so do you.

This is the journey for me in the next 90 days.  It's not some pipe dream, I know I can do it.

Screwing up?  I haven't been this heavy or out of shape since I lost my 85 lbs in 2008.  I let things in my life derail a ton of progress that I had made.  When I look at that 90 day picture, I know that I want THAT back.  I also know that I need a plan to NEVER let it get away again.  Over 50 years old, you lose your 'fitness gains' at an incredible speed if you just plain stop.  You need to make the programs a part of your normal life and you need to make it something achievable.  We will all have the moments when life derails us.  It's not the obstacle, it's how fast you get back up.  I didn't get back up.  Now, here I am, facing the big work one more time.

I do have one advantage that many of you don't have.  I know I can do it.  I've climbed this mountain before.  I also know something about you...you can do it too.  If you just follow along, you will make progress and achieve things you didn't know you could do.  Trust me.

Here is my "gym".  Check out the mat.  It's all measured up and waiting for me.  Notice something on it though, I measured it for Novice, Expert, and a spot in between.  I may have to start at Novice.  We'll see.  If I do, it's not failure, it's just Week One.  That last line is my goal by Day 90.  The line is already drawn.  Just like the photos, it's real and looking me in the face every workout.  So are my weights.  There are weights heavy enough that I may not use them...but they are STILL waiting for the day I can...staring at me.

I also did my measurements.



Day 30, 60, and 90 are waiting.  March 31st is not that far away.  90 seems like a lot.  It's not.  Okay, enough typing.  Time to warm up and get to "Total Synergistics."  Follow along and let me know how YOUR journey is going.  I'll be following you all too!  You are not alone.  Don't stop.

P90X3: Mindset. Your New Body is Thoughts Away

Do you think the toughest part of P90X will be the workouts?  No doubt, they are difficult and challenging.  Would a better diet help?  Yes.  If you were in better shape right now, would the workouts be less difficult?  Yes.  If both of these things were present, would that guaranty your success?  No.  The one thing that will guarantee your success is your MINDSET.  No matter what your physical state of being is, if you are not mentally ready to do this, it will be nearly impossible to succeed.  That statement is not meant to apply only to P90X or P90X3.  It applies to your life.  What you do, in P90X-3, is going to change the way you view everything.

Your body is more energy than it is mass.  Think about that for a minute.  Your body's cells, at the atomic level, are made up of this tiny solid nucleus, surrounded by energy that bonds it to the other atoms.  The space between two atoms is far greater than the size of the atoms.  That energy is a part of this massive neural network in your body that is tied to your brain.  When your brain feels great, it affects all aspects of your body.  Also, when your brain feels awful, you feel that too.  Your brain reacts to whatever you feed it.  Feed it negative stimuli constantly, and your whole body is affected.  Feed it positive stimuli, the inverse.

Also, we do react to the world we live in.  We don't live in some jar, disconnected from external stimuli, and with the luxury and ability to just be a being in peaceful bliss.  That is true.  But, how you process that external stimuli to your brain, that IS in your control and that is your MINDSET.  You can paint almost anything in your life as positive or negative.  That's your choice.

Are you telling me that all I have to do is think positive thoughts to feel better?  Yes.  There is actually some evidence that it can affect physical healing and how your body deals with ailments, but even if you don't buy into that completely, processing in a positive manner will improve how you feel.

This may shock you, but your brain does not know the difference between thought and reality.  Locked away inside your body, your brain reacts to what is fed into it.  Whether you see something "real", or a picture of that same thing, your brain reacts to it the same way.  The same goes for any thoughts you have.  Your brain processes the thoughts you feed it.  Based on those thoughts, your brain then interacts with the neural net in your body and releases various hormones, etc.  Your physical response will react to the thoughts you fed your brain.

This is wonderful!!  How the heck does this relate to P90X??

The physical challenges ahead of you will be greatly assisted by your MINDSET.  If you picture yourself as thinner, in better shape, athletic...your mind will do everything in it's power to get your body there.  You have to do the work, but the physical work you are performing is assisted by the brain and how it programs the energy in your body.  How you view food, how you view exercise, how you process 'pain' and 'soreness'...all of that will dictate your rate of success.  If you constantly are telling yourself, "I want clean food.  Fruit, water, salad, nuts, vegetables.  I am hungry for that," then you will be shocked how your body will condition itself to satisfy that desire.  If you tell yourself, "The soreness and aches don't matter," you will be shocked how your body responds and allows a few more minutes of work, giving you an edge.  If you keep seeing yourself as a thinner person, and really focus on that, your brain will help to deliver that result.

MINDSET.  Find five positive affirmations.  Even if you don't feel them right now, especially if you don't feel them right now, write them down.  How do you want to be and feel ninety days from now?  Make those five short statements something you repeat to yourself over and over.  Make one about diet, make one about exercising, make one about how you want to look, make one about how you feel about yourself, and make one about removing something toxic from your life.  As you are going through your day, begin to see yourself in this way.  Repeat it over and over.  As you do all of the reps of the exercises, tell yourself these things over and over again.  It WILL become you.

Did you ever make up a story and then retell it so many times that you have a hard time distinguishing the reality from the made up?  That's because you told the story so many times that your brain stopped being able to tell the difference between "reality" and what you fed it.  You can tell your brain a different story.

What will your story be?  Write it today, five sentences, and begin making it your story.  Your brain won't know the difference.  And, in 90 days, you will see what that did for you. 
 

P90X3: Commitment! One week away!

One week away.  That's what I think as I look in the mirror.  It's not procrastination, it's preparation.  I am putting myself in the mindset of commitment.  You have to commit, one hundred percent.

What's my commitment?  Ninety days.  Ninety days of eating right...of sleeping right...of watching my progress...of not letting people and situations stop me...of doing every workout, every day.

This workout is thirty minutes long each day.  Seriously, if you can't find 30 minutes in each day, you don't want this...you WISH this.  If you can't put aside 30 minutes, you aren't trying.  My daughter SHOWERS for almost 30 minutes...I have the hot water oil bills to prove it.  A TV sitcom is 30 minutes long!  COMMIT.  That comes first.

How have I committed this week?  I have watched almost all of the videos I will be using in the first 30 days of the 90 day period.  They are the same DVD's for three weeks.  I have gotten my pullup bar back out and checked it out for support and band issues (I use pullup bands off of the bar due to shoulder issues).

What else?  I have modified my eating,  more fruit and slowly eliminating sugary type items.  I have started drinking more water and less caffeine.  Hydration is key.  I am breaking out my mat this weekend and mark it according to the DVD workouts.  There is an agility set that calls for floor tape...I just use a Sharpie on my rubber mat.

As I look in the mirror, I can see the person I did not want to become again.  Months of sedate living has put me right back where I worked very hard NOT to be.  I'm not obese, but there is a much larger person in that mirror staring back at me than I am used to.  I don't want to be him.  I also know that the person in the mirror has only a short amount of time left.  Because I have done this successfully before.  How did I do it?  I committed 100% to the program.  The person in the mirror is slowly dying...he is on life support.  The person in my mind, the one I always see when I think about me, is ready to return.

I begin next Saturday, January 4th.  The rest of the group is starting on January 6th, but I always start on Saturday so that Friday is my break day.

Put this word in the top five of words you think of for the next 90 days.  COMMIT!!

Insanity: "Alone Again" Day 5 of 60

Challenge Groups are a great thing that we are encouraged to do as Beachbody coaches.  It helps a lot for those working out to know they are not going through it alone.  Many ask me that question, “Who do you work out with?”  The answer?  “Nobody.”

If you work out alone, how does it affect you? 

I work out alone.  Even with the Challenge group format, you are a solo act because it is primarily social media driven.  There is no physical presence.  In spite of that, I probably push just as hard when it’s only me as I would if someone were with me.  I guess, for many, that’s not the case. 

Let me rationalize my perspective.  I have the DVD’s and there are plenty of people in them.  If I were at the gym, it would be the same.  People would be standing around me, sweating while I sweat.  When I work out, I don’t converse, I work out.  I do the same with the DVD’s.  Oh, sometimes I found myself talking back to Tony Horton in those P90X workouts.  Sometimes I mimicked him. 

“You’re lookin’ at me, I’m lookin’at you!” 

“They’re working hard, I know YOUUUU are!!” 

“That’s it, get a close up of my little calves.”

When I did P90X, I could be heard mocking Wesley Idol’s lack of energy in Kempo X, or making fun of Dom the bouncing frog in Plyometrics with his awful form and lack of thigh and butt power.  I would smirk at Dreya’s overly made up face while noticing that she bore a slight resemblance to Michael Jackson.  Sophia made me smile just because she did all her exercises with a pleasant grin and without weights as though she hadn’t a care in the world.

So was I alone?  Not really.  Certainly, no more alone than I was in the 70’s and 80’s when television kept me company.  Steve Austin and the Fonz were my buddies.  Charlie’s Angels were the women in my life.  Archie Bunker kept me laughing.  They don’t talk back to you…but they get a rise out of you.

So here I am, alone again.  Working out to the DVD.  For Insanity, I now have Shaun T.  There’s a whole new cast of players for me to warm up to…or not.  I already like some, and dislike others.  There are the ones that actually hide behind Shaun so their pokey effort isn’t caught on camera.  There are less stealthy ones who, after they know the camera is on them begin to pick up their effort.  The girls in front really give their all, while the guys in back kind of drag.  Then, there’s the guy from the fit test.  He looks like an accountant who got tossed in by accident and hasn’t worked out since he played racquetball in business school.  So I am not really alone.  I have all these people to watch critically.  It’s not that I dislike them…it gets me through the routines.

So tonight, its back to the mat, all alone again.  But I will get results.

THE WORKOUT

Plyometric Cardio Circuit.  Round 2.  I did this on Day One, so now I am going full circle.  I got through the warmups with no problem and the sweat started pouring out during the stretching.  When we went into the circuit, I was ready for it.  I made it through the first circuit fine, the second circuit was a different story.  The pushup, run it out…followed by the ab jumping thing…killed me.  I had to break.  It’s not the cardio mind you, my muscles are failing…I just have to stop because I can’t go anymore.  Everything else is fine, but those two in a row just break me.  So that’s my goal…to get through the third circuit without stopping.   

Everyone should put their goals in front of them.

I also owe Shaun T. an apology.  I was saying earlier in the week that he didn’t warm up the calves enough.  I may have been a little too harsh.  You DO have to stretch them a bit prior to the warm ups.  But if you stretch correctly with him during the stretching phase, and don’t bend the knees, you will stretch those calfs out…but you need to use proper form at all times.  I really focused on that tonight and it helped a lot.

Also, I have had success with the treadmill post workout, so I did another 20 minutes tonight.  Ab Ripper X tomorrow and I get tomorrow night off!  Good night!  

Insanity: "Clean Eating" Day 4 of 60

First, a quick fitness update.  I did AbRipperX from the P90X program this AM.  I got up, had breakfast and then did, as I recall Tony Horton saying, “Three hundred and fifty ab crunching exercises.”  I love AbRipper.  It takes 17 minutes.  Up at 6AM, make breakfast, post my blog, do the 17 minutes, hit the shower, and then out the door by 7:15AM for the 7:30AM train.  17 minutes.  We all have 17 minutes.  Right? (I am smiling right about now)

Okay!  Clean Eating.  What the heck is THAT?  That’s the thought that went through MY mind when I first heard it.  All lifestyle changes for health involve eating right and exercise.  In fact, when people say it, “Eat right” always comes first!  It is also the first thing we toss aside as we do the exercise.  I did it too.

When I got P90X, it came with an exercise guide and a nutrition guide.  There is nothing I hate more than the “Nutrition Guide.”  Generally, they are recipe books.  So I toss them.  The Beachbody book, I will fess up, is also very much a meal planner and recipe book of healthy alternatives.  I hate to cook.  I eat in ten minutes.  I don’t know how anyone can enjoy it.  So I tossed the book to the side and opened the DVD’s.

When I got Insanity…first thing I saw was a nutrition guide.  What? No exercise guide?  I think I got gypped!  Nope, insanity only has a flyer.  But, it does have a nutrition guide too.

When I eat, I want simplicity.  I do not want to think about it.  I eat almost the same thing every day.  But, again, I don’t think about it.

As I was doing my Challenge Group in P90X, I was having some energy issues.  My diet was not giving me the energy and recuperative fuel that my body needed.  I sent my diet to my two Coaches, who came to the conclusion that it had enough calories but I wasn’t getting enough nutrients.  In the course of our conversations, Lisa Barker, my primary Beachbody Coach and sponsor, said, “Wow, Dick, you eat really clean.”  I did not know what that meant.  Embarrassingly enough, I knew a lot about fitness but not a lot about nutrition.  As people say, “I knew just enough about nutrition to be dangerous.”

From the time I lost all my weight on my liquid diet, I had a new meal plan for my life.  I have been modifying it over time.  Apparently, I created a meal plan for myself that typified something called “Clean Eating.” 

I have Oatmeal in the morning (not processed, the real oats that take five minutes to cook) with all natural Applesauce (not the stuff with high fructose corn syrup, the ingredients say ‘Apples, water’), a palmfull of raisins and natural ground cinnamon.  That’s my breakfast every morning for the last four years.  There isn’t one processed food in that breakfast.  No chemicals, no additives.  All of it is the way it arrived on this earth.

My lunch is a salad with about 3-4 ounces of grilled chicken or fish.  The salad is iceberg lettuce and spinach, broccoli, tomatoes, green peppers, olives, jalapeno’s and the meat.  The dressing is balsamic vinaigrette and is pretty much the only processed thing in the meal.

My dinner is Shakeology with fruit blended in.  I will grab some real meat protein if it was part of dinner that night but otherwise, a handful of nuts and raisins with maybe an apple round out dinner.

After exercise, I eat more trailmix and fruit.

All of my snacks during the day are natural foods except the Protein bar I have mid-afternoon.

My diet is pretty clean.  What is “Clean Eating?”  It is basically eliminating processed foods.  Foods with chemical additives.  Foods that have been manufactured (like Twinkees).  Foods that have been drastically altered with transfats and refined sugars and chemical sweeteners.  It’s actually the simplest thing in the world…if your food doesn’t come with a label (like chicken, fish, fruit and salad), it’s a pretty good rule that you can eat it in modest quantities.

If your food HAS a label…and reading that label brings back nightmares of High School Chemistry…don’t eat it.  You know what real food is.  There is stuff on a label that is NOT on the food pyramid…anywhere.  High Fructose Corn Syrup.  Hydrogenated anthing.  Aspartame?  Olestra?  All of these things are toxic to your body.  Not necessarily poisonous (although some actually are), toxic.  Toxic means that they do not belong in your body and your body naturally wants to eliminate them.  Toxic also means that prolonged ingestion of these things will imbalance your metabolism, weaken your immune system and leave you exposed to health issues.  While your body (and primarily your liver) is processing all the toxic junk from your food that you have eaten, it cannot do what comes naturally, which is turn the real fuel into energy and burn your fat.  So you are tired and you gain weight.

While the body chemistry is somewhat complicated, eating clean is not.  The only reason to get recipe books on Clean Eating is if you really love food.  If eating to you is some kind of passion (and it is NOT to me…not judging, that’s just me) maybe these books will help you create beautiful clean meals.

Bottom line here is, while exercise has changed my life, the change in my everyday diet to cleaner eating habits has probably influenced it even more.  My cholesterol of 163 (down from almost 270 in my really big days) is just one body marker that tells me the diet has been beneficial.  I will include more about Clean Eating as I educate myself further but for now, just read the labels.  Only eat foods that are delivered to you the way they were delivered to this earth!

Exercise later today!!

THE WORKOUT

Pure Cardio tonight!  It went really great.  The first two nights were hard (and I don’t count the Recovery Night).  I went into tonight really hydrated because I know how much the twitch muscles are going to be used.  They have to be hydrated or you will pay.  I also stretched before and after on the advice of a coach who answered something I put up on the Team Beachbody bulletin board.  I went into the exercise ready to kill it…and I did.

I felt so good afterwards that I went on my treadmill for about 25 minutes to burn another 200 calories and stretch out those calf muscles!

I was ready for the pace and rhythm of the routine tonight, and that helped a lot too.  Oh yeah, knowing how to DO the routines…that was valuable.  The first two nights, I had to look up and check and recheck my form.  I only screwed up one time tonight, the drop into push up position and then hop back up and jump.  Can’t remember the name, a true indication of ‘week one-itis’.  I was not just going to plank and hopping back up, I was doing Tony Horton prison pushups.  I burned out around 45 seconds.

So, all in all, a real great night.  Tomorrow we do the first repeat.  I love the first repeat night because there is ALWAYS improvement.

Okay, see you tomorrow. 

Insanity: "Sense of Humor" Day 3 of 60

When I commit to doing something, for me, it’s serious business.  My wife even looks at me at times like I am a little nuts.  The word “obsessive” comes out and sometimes even, “addicted.”  That said, I do think it’s important to keep your sense of humor in check.  I certainly needed it yesterday when I was on my knees huffing and puffing trying to get through Day Two.  Along those lines, I have to come clean on a funny story for a friend who has heard me mention it in passing but never heard the details.  It goes back to my obese days…

We were on a family vacation.  I was at my max weight, about 285lbs, and very big around the middle.  We went to an amusement park.  Let me say, right at the top of this, that obese people have a difficult time gauging exactly how big they are.  I know I did.  There was a time when I bumped into a lot of stuff because I was certain, looking at a doorway or some other restricted passage, that there was room for both me and everyone else.  Obese people actually look at things and think they can fit like a normal person.  That’s why you get jammed in when they come sit next to you on a bus or a train…they truly think they can fit.  Absent a measuring tape or a camera, you can’t prove it to them…but it’s true.

So there I was in the amusement park looking at a ride called ‘Nightwing.’  I have loved rollercoaster and spinning rides since I was a kid.  This one was unique.  It’s based on the Batman movie and is meant to simulate flying…flying horizontally like Superman.  Every passenger lays on it on their stomach and gets pancaked into the thing.  If you need a mental image, visualize a huge waffle iron and you being a waffle.  There’s a top section that has to snap into place, squeezing down on you and holding you horizontally, and safely, in place.

So me, the obese person that I was, decided to try it.  This was summer.  In an amusement park.  In a tourist mecca.  The line was very long.  Let’s just say that the heat must have made me delusional because I clearly had enough time in line for reality and physics to creep in somewhere.  But it didn’t.  I stood in that line and waited and waited, until it was my turn.  Finally, I was next.

You know how parks hire college kids in the off-season?  This one was no different.  Two enterprising and athletic looking youths were running the ride.  “Come right this way, sir!”  Who the hell was ‘sir?’  I’m not that old.  That’s what I was thinking as I stepped up and laid myself into the bottom of the black wing shaped waffle iron.

Now, I was one of the last people to get on the ride.  The wings are in pairs, side by side and they like family members and friends to ride together.  I noticed that the one to my left was empty.  Now, if you have ever waited in the heat of summer to get on an amusement park ride, you know that by the time you get on the damn thing, your patience is fried.  Also, this particular ride was black.  It had been sitting in the sun all day.  So everyone was laying on the temperature equivalent of black asphault in the form of this winged ride.  With everyone looking on in anticipation, the two kids finally got to me and started to push down the top and snap it into place.

As the top comes down and squishes me, I am laying there listening for the familiar snap of the safety harness.  The one I heard from every other rider as I was laying there.  Nothing.  I kind of want to hear the snap because I know that it is the only thing stopping me from becoming the unwilling participant in a Road Runner cartoon as I fly across the park through the sky.  These kids push down harder…NO snap.  Not to look away from a challenge, and notwithstanding that there is an actual human being under him, one of the kids climbs on top.  He is now using his body weight to push down the top onto me.

Through compressed lungs I squeal, “That’s okay, I can get off!”

The other kid, the one NOT on top, looks at me assuredly and says, “Don’t worry man, we have gotten fatter people than you to fit.”

Now I am looking around at the faces of the other people, now clearly melting in their 120 degree waffle irons.  They are wishing I would die.  Based on how much lung capacity I have left as the kid hops up and down on my back, I just might.  Everyone on the ride and in line is looking at this spectacle.  My wife and kids are outside the fenceline watching me and they are in hysterics.  Some are clearly very mad that I am holding this whole thing up.  I’m not easily embarrassed, but this is pretty close to the highlight of my life.

Finally, the kid on top looks at the other one and says, “I don’t think this is gonna work.”  I breathe a sigh of relief.  I can get off this damn thing and stop being the elephant in the circus.  Then he says, “I think this car is broken.”  Oh, crap.  Really?!  Come on kid…I’m TOO BIG FOR THE RIDE!!  “Come on sir, hop in this one right here.”  I look at him, “Really, it’s okay, I can leave.”  “No, no, one of the cars was busted, I think this is the one.  Get in this one.”  Now the people on the ride are really mad and the people waiting are laughing harder.

The same process happens again.  No snap.  More time passes.  The other kid, slightly bigger, hops on top this time.  SNAP!!  Really?  Did I hear right?  God, I hope I did.  This thing better be fastened.  They both smile.  Conquering heroes.  One looks at the other, “I knew I could do it, man.”

It’s one thing to make yourself an obstacle to your own health, it’s another to put out others in the process, but it takes the cake when you become an athletic event and you are the goal.

The ride was really very cool but I will say that I began to look at my relative size a bit differently that day.  It was funny.  My condition wasn’t, but what happened that day was.

You have to keep your sense of humor.  Life is too short.  But if you don’t take your physical condition seriously, it may be shorter than you think.

Tonight….Insanity workout number three!!

THE WORKOUT

Cardio Recovery.  Thirty three minutes??  Oh, cmon!! I was ready tonight.  Really, really, ready.  Tonight was a ‘recovery’ night.  The workout was not very intense at all.  It was a smattering of last night.  I have to say, my calves did hurt from the past two nights.  So, I probably got some benefit out of not hopping, jumping and leaping around.  However, I LIKE working out and when I put in the time, I want it to count.

The Cardio Recovery is only 33 minutes long.  So, I threw in P90X Chest, Shoulders and Triceps (the first half).  I have decided that I enjoyed P90X and the muscle workouts so much that, in addition to doing AbRipperX three mornings a week, on two mornings I will do half of P90X Chest, Shoulders one day and Tri’s and then do half of Back and Biceps the other day.  On week two, I will do the second half.  So, tonight I threw in P90X CST part one.  Then I did the treadmill for 25 minutes.  I have to feel like I really worked out.  The last two nights have been intense.  I wasn’t looking forward to another intense night and then really put myself in a state of mind for it.  Then it didn’t happen.  So I compensated.  Okay, AbRipperX in the AM and back to the Insanity grind tomorrow night.

As for tonight, the exercises were not Cardio intense.  They were, however, real muscle burners.  A lot of the leg dips burned pretty good toward the end of the exercise.  The one thing I am having issue with on these DVD’s is being able to see the exercise and doing it with good form while also rushing to do it.  Some of the stretching is rushed and I need to make sure I am using good form.  My advice would be to watch these things ahead of time before you do them.

One more piece of valuable advice.  Your calves.  Mine have been hurting at the top of my calf, behind my knee.  I left some messages on the Beachbody message board and apparently this is very common and well known.  If you think you might have calf weakness, you might want to do some calf stretches prior to the workout.  Okay, time to turn in. 

See ya tomorrow.

Insanity: "Commitment" Day 2 of 60

For all of you who are not familiar with my blogging approach through the life of an exercise program, it goes something like this.

I exercise every night during the week and I work out in the morning on the weekends.  I typically blog every day, but may make exceptions on the weekend and sometimes condense my Saturday and Sunday into one blog on Sunday.  I write my blog in the morning when I go to work and sit on the train (which is where I am right now) and let you know how I feel and how I am going to approach my day.  I then post the blog in the AM.  After I exercise at night, I usually append the blog and write about how it went.  I then update the post that night.

In retrospect, most people read in the morning to afternoon.  They don’t read at night after 9PM and anything you post then is buried by the AM.  I have this feeling that no one saw my updates at night when I did P90X.  With that in mind, I am taking a new approach to Insanity.  I am going to write on the way to work, update at night, and then post the following morning.  I just want to see how that goes.  Additionally, I am posting to my normal blog and copying to my Beachbody blog as well.  Same content.

My blogs are kind of a personal commitment.  Just like the program I undertake.  I have been thinking about the word commitment all week.  It’s an important part of successfully beating any challenge in front of you.  It’s also something I take for granted a lot.  I think that happens because I structure the challenges in my life in such a way as to ensure that I beat them.  So, I set up a framework for commitment.  I do it almost unconsciously.  There are folks, however, that are challenged by commitments…and I also understand that.

Structuring your day around the commitments you have made is truly the only way to succeed without the fortuitous condition of luck.  When you commit, you are saying, “I will not let anything derail this effort.”  The only way that I can succeed in pursuit of my health goals, is to structure my life around them.  When I went on the Optifast diet four years ago, I firmly believe that is why it worked for me.  Three shakes a day, plus one small meal at night, add in 40 minutes for exercise…done.  After four months, I had lost 85 lbs.  I just stuck to the plan.  I didn’t deviate.  In fact, I ate almost the same thing for the one small dinner meal every night!  My thought was to make it simple.  It worked.

When I started P90X in February of 2012, I did the same thing.  Same breakfast, lunch and dinner almost every day.  Oatmeal for breakfast with natural applesauce, a palm full of raisins and some natural ground cinnamon.  Granola snack before lunch.  Salad at lunch with about 4 oz of grilled chicken.  Shakeology for dinner with fruit blended in.  Recovery drink post-workout and some nuts and fruit as a snack.  Sleep.  With the exception of Friday Pizza Night, on which I have pizza and allow myself a cup of ice cream as a snack, that’s it.

With P90X, there was an added element of control that helped the commitment.  The routine itself.  Before I had P90X, when I was going to the gym, I did the treadmill until it was boring.  I did some weight and situp routines here and there.  But I basically made them up...they weren’t balanced.  I wasn’t getting the right level of exercise or a program that addressed all areas.  I certainly couldn’t work out every night.  P90X is a program designed to be done every day but also has been designed around an exercise discipline that allows for the repair of the body while you exercise another.  It is not arbitrary.  On the infomercial they say, “Just push play.”  It sounds simple…because it IS simple.  But there is a subtle elegance to that simplicity.  You don’t have to think about it.  You just have to do it.  That’s your whole focus.

The commitment to get more fit is actually enhanced by a program of this caliber.  You work with a program that helps you NOT have to think and take the chance on derailing your commitment.

I tried many other ways to succeed in accomplishing goals.  Having something set in stone works the best.  It’s too easy, without the rigor of the scheduling, to blow off a day here or there.  Next thing you know, you are saying to yourself, “How many times did I exercise this week?  Wow.  I think only once.”  Then the guilt creeps in, and you resent the commitment.  The discipline of a good program helps because when you get into the routine (and this takes about two weeks), you don’t want to miss it.  If you do miss it, you aren’t guilty, you’re mad.  You’re angry with yourself for getting derailed.  Being mad with yourself is so much more productive than feeling guilty and resentful.  The guilty make excuses, the angry work out harder the next time.

For anyone interested in P90X or Insanity, when you wonder why I am doing it, the discipline of the routines are the reason.  It is said over and over, but you really have to experience it.

If you want to make the commitment easier, my experience is to find a good program or plan and…

Just push play.

If you are doing your own program, JUST KEEP GOING.  If you want to know the different Beachbody programs, there are many from beginner to advanced, just reach out to me!

Have a great day, Insanity tonight!!

THE WORKOUT:  

Cardio Power and Resistance.  Alright, it's Day Two.  Do you know what the picture up above is?  It's a set of rubber floor tiles.  Beachbody should sell them along with the recovery drink and the bands and Shakeology...etc.  Why?  Because you are going to need them to protect the rest of your house.  You will need them if, like me, you are doing Insanity and sweating out every ounce of liquid in your body.  I had to wipe the damn tiles tonight more than I wiped myself off!  I got them for cushion because after yesterday, I knew I was doing a program with a lot of jumping and hopping.  Little did I know they would be more valuable to me as sweat-catchers.


I am still trying to figure out why they labeled the Insanity workouts with catchy names.  I have no idea how the name relates to the exercises.  They all seem the same to me...they should just call them "Hell, Part One" "Hell, Part Two" etc.  This is way harder than P90X.  I have to keep reminding myself how bad I felt after that first week of P90X, because it was bad.  But either I have Alzheimer's or I am losing my mind, but I don't recall P90X feeling like this.  I was exhausted.  The only difference today is that I was ready for the rhythm of the program in terms of the number of exercises in a cycle.  Other than that, I am glad I had the extra cushion, it was much more comfortable when I was on my knees trying to catch my breath.


Here is a tip.  HYDRATE.  Don't forget.  If you like coffee...you better consider limiting it or double your water intake during the day.  You are going to need every inch of those twitch muscles and you are NOT going to want them to be brittle or tight.

I did manage to pace myself better tonight.  The one thing I am struggling with is the correct form.  Shaun doesn't really point it out and just jumps into the exercise.  Then...I look to the people on the disc and many are doing it different ways.  Some are going slow, some are not deep into the squats.  I guess there is a rhythm that I will have to get.  I am not in a position to judge here, I can't really see anyone too well with all the sweat in my eyes.

All right...let's see what tomorrow brings.  You know, I used to look forward to each new day of P90X because it was always so different.  With Insanity, I find myself looking forward to finishing it, NOT starting it...because I know what's coming...work and sweat.  It will pay off, you know THAT!

Later!