March 2010 – Something Beats Nothing Every Time

Round 2, Day 38 – Spinning Wheels and Invisible Tony

I had a bad weekend, mostly due to the fact that I started to create a pass-through in our living room to get light into the dining room. That took a lot out of me on Saturday with the header building and the support work and then I had to coach on Sunday for one of the other coaches which took most of the day. Needless to say I didn’t get much working out done. So, to make up for it I went on the treadmill in the morning at work and then last night did a quick back and biceps workout even though we didn’t get home until about 7pm after going to see the 3D baby ultrasound.

So, a big few days. I have a huge hole in my wall, I got to see our baby daughter in 3D which was really weird and I made a bit of extra cash coaching all at the expense of my fitness. We have another ultrasound today, a medical one rather than an entertainment one and then coaching again tonight. Hopefully I will be able to go on the treadmill tomorrow morning at work again and then do some Shaun T tomorrow night.

The back and biceps workout is one of the workouts that you can easily do without Tony at all. In fact, last night I put on some music and got to work without even using the DVD (Invisible Tony, welcome, have a seat and be quiet). In some respects I wanted to see how I would fare without the DVD in order to figure out if I really need to take the laptop this weekend or if I just need my recording sheets. The workout was shockingly short. I blasted through way faster than I would normally maybe in part because my elbow was quite sore and so my weights and pull ups were down I am not sure. Either way, I was done the whole thing in under 40 minutes. I also skipped the warmup since I never warmed up in the 25 or so years I lifted weights… Sorry Tony, I know how much you love your warmup and stretch and it’s not that I disagree, I just know I will be fine without it.

This coming weekend will not be any easier, but the best I can do is to plan. We are in Niagara Falls from Friday to Tuesday so I will take the laptop and the DVDs and my P90X workout sheets and do what I can at the workout centre and in my room. Hopefully I will be able to get some workouts in especially since we are planning to do a “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” road trip to 3 or 4 of the locations near Buffalo. We have the house sitter and cat feeder booked, I have my laptop and my DVDs packed and ready to go so… Here is the plan, as far as I can make out:

Today: Off – Coaching
Wednesday: Pure Cardio with or without Cardio Abs
Thursday (Off work to finish wall): Legs & Back, Ab Ripper X + Coaching
Friday (Off work, go to Niagara): Cardio Power and Resistance
Saturday (Niagara): Chest, Shoulders & Triceps, Ab Ripper X
Sunday (Niagara): Plyometric Cardio Circuit
Monday (Niagara): Back & Biceps, Ab Ripper X
Tuesday (Niagara then home to coach): Off

I mean if I am on vacation at a place that has a gym there really is no reason I can’t work out. It’s not as if we have never been to Niagara before or we need to go sightseeing. It is also going to be in the 20’s this weekend so the weather will be beautiful for walking (even though Nicole is starting to waddle more than walk now).
I guess we will see, we already know how poorly I stick to plans I make but this is vacation, surely it will be easier?

Round 2, Day 37 – Plyometric Cardio and DIY

I was cruising the internet last evening looking for DIY stuff for my garage. Now I have a chin up bar out there I was looking for ideas for other home made items and came across this little gem of a dip station and also this video of a similar but even more creative solution.

Either way, they both motivated me to try and build something this weekend if Ihave the time. I will post my results here, of course. If you have any suggestions for other home made items, let me know, I am always open to suggestion.

So last night I was doing the Plyo workout by Shaun T and thinking that although it is better than the P90X version in some ways, I have a hard time getting up to speed with the intensity right away. I actually wish some of the Insanity DVDs were about 10 minutes longer with a more graduated warmup. I seem to have calf issues with the warmup for insanity and when I do it causes the whole workout to be far more difficult because I have to keep resting to stretch my calf. I am also concerned over getting shin splints so I end up being (probably) overly cautious.

I also noticed that Tony hasn’t cornered the market on creepy comments as I heard Shaun T say to one of hisÂ participantsÂ “You hadn’t ever worn a sports bra before this”, a comment which could be interpreted one of several ways but just seems a little ewww.

On an unrelated note, I found out how to display each post in full on the blog front page rather than just an excerpt of each one. I prefer this to be honest. All I did was to change the <?php the_content(”); ?> from <?php the_excerpt(”); ?>. I used to know this stuff, it’s just all changing so quickly now it’s hard to keep up.

As a final note to get you back on the fitness track, someone sent me this short piece this morning which basically reinforces the notion of eating smaller more frequent meals:

The Dreaded 4:00PM Hungries

Neil Peace, MD, General Practice, 02:17AM Mar 17, 2010

Every one of my overweight patients describes intense hunger (or at least food seeking) at about 4 PM. Why? Mothers blame it on stress – kids come home – time to prepare dinner – and they eat. Executives say it’s the pressure – deadlines looming – and they eat. The builder says they finish work and suddenly hunger – and they eat. Many reasons are given. The 4 PM phenomenon is universal.Is it Ghrelin? This hormone from the stomach correlates with food seeking. Cummings¹showed a rapid rise in Ghrelin between 2 PM and 6 PM. But this 2-6 PM rise in Ghrelin is similar to the 8 AM to 12 noon rise in Ghrelin, before lunch, and yet people do not report the same intensity of food seeking before lunch. Frecka²concludes that Ghrelin is more a follower than a leader – of eating patterns. The evolutionists say the 4 PM food seeking drive dates from 100,000 years ago. Then, you needed food before the sun goes down (a strong drive at 4 PM enhanced survival).

Ghrelin or not, I know that to ignore the 4 PM “hungries” invites weight loss disaster.

It seems most overweight patients try to “get through from lunch to dinner” without a snack. In my experience, this long gap is followed by over indulgence at dinner and a tendency to keep eating after dinner. “I had a full dinner but I didn’t feel satisfied, and I kept nibbling.”

Research is moving towards the “small and often” eating pattern. I urge patients to eat at about 4 PM. If the snack is ready beforehand, then there’s a chance it will be the correct energy intake. If the snack at 4 PM is a spontaneous purchase, then, in my experience, there is a high risk of excess energy intake.

I think the three-meals-a-day gorging-style of eating is out of date in 2010, but that debate can wait.

It is not easy to convince patients to stop at 4 PM and eat. I wish employers understood this phenomenon and catered to a short break at 4 PM.

Many Family Physicians are employers.

As a Family Physician what do you do for your own 4 PM “hungries”? What does your staff do at this time?

Round 2, Day 36 – Chest, Shoulders and Triceps and Home Bench

invisible-bench-press

I am really happy with this workout now that I have substituted some of the weaker exercises with more bench work. When I bench I feel like I am really working. I have a hard time getting out of the gym rat mindset that unless you are throwing massive amounts of weights around then you really aren’t working. At least this way I get to stress my body, feed my desire to push 45lb plates around and still get a great varied workout.

The bench has been my partner for so many years. From being frustrated at my inability to push 2 plates right through to my bloodvessel busting 395lb singles we have come a long way together. My new partner is the chin up bar. Around a year ago I decided that my lifelong inability to do chin ups was finally going to be a thing of the past. I remember vividly not being able to do more than one chin up, and for a person who (yes I admit) thinks ofÂ themselvesÂ as pretty strong it was a real disappointment. After all, what kind of person can shoulder press and bench press well over their bodyweight and yet can’t do chin ups. It was an embarrassing secret. I committed to doing more pulldowns and to doing jump releases which are basically jumping up to full chin up and lowering yourself slowly. After much work I found that I was up to around 10 or so, something which I have to admit I always thought would be impossible. My introduction to P90X came shortly after that and since then my chin ups are where they probably should be, although not at Tony’s level, I can certainly hang with the other guys in the videos.

Maybe this is a hangover from the goal setting spiel from yesterday I am not sure. Either way, I find the bench to be a warm reminder of my many many years in the gym and the pull up bar as my hope for the future. I am missing the gym less and less but every so often it’s nice to reminisce with some heavy straight and close grip bench.

Round 2, Day 33-35. Planning your work, working your plan.

Most people don’t plan to fail, they just fail to plan.

I am disappointed in myself. Well, maybe disappointed is the wrong word. Frustrated maybe.

So far the workouts have been fine, I am working hard and although I constantly feel like I am not pushing hard enough that is not the problem. The problem is discipline with my eating habits. So far this round my weight loss has been disappointing and while I know that for most people weight loss isn’t the goal with P90X, for me it is the major aim. I don’t have a reason, and I assume that I am just like so many others out there who really don’t have a good excuse why they are still snacking at night, still buying crap at the coffee shop and waking up feeling like crap every day because they just can’t seem to stop the insanity.

Sadly, I don’t have a solution. Well, maybe I do. There are people who will say that your motivation isn’t enough. You don’t have a big enough “why” to drive you on and in some respects that is true. However, there are people out there with massive motivation, huge goals and reasons for being healthy who still can’t get the job done. The question is why? I believe it is simple, you just haven’t committed to the goal you need to set. Motivation is one thing, having a reason to do something is separate from having a goal and I think that is where I have stumbled a little. Having a reason to succeed is like being back in high school and having a crush on the head cheerleader. It’s great to think about, it makes you feel good but in reality unless there is a plan to go along with the goal that matches the reason you are just some creepy guy who stares too much. What you need is a goal, something concrete that your mind can work on while you sleep, something you can plan for and build action items towards. Without a plan and waypoint goals (with rewards, by the way) your vision is just a pipe dream.

Here is what you need to do. Get a pen and write this stuff down and stop wasting your time.

1. Write down your reason. This should be easy. Mine is to get down to a healthy weight (bodyfat level) before the baby arrives some time in June. You can have more than one reason, come up with two or three. If you can’t think of reasons to be healthy then think of reasons why you don’t want to be dead of anÂ aneurysmÂ or heart failure by Christmas, that usually works.

2. Write down your action plan. Make it basic. For example you should plan to work out at least 5 or 6 days a week and adhere toÂ whateverÂ nutritional guidelines you set for yourself. Some people want to avoid starches and sugars, some want to go vegan. It’s up to you what you do, just pick one and make it part of your plan. This is still pretty simple since it is a large framework that you should have little problem staying within. If you are having difficulty sticking to the 6 days a week thing, don’t sweat it. You are lazy. Just resolve to not be lazy 6 days and be as lazy as you want the other day.

Your plan should also include what method you want to use to get to your end result. You may decide that you are going to do P90X or Insanity or just to go the gym but decide what your vehicle will be. Also, plan ahead for what you will do afterwards. 60 or 90 days is a long time, and to be honest most people won’t make it but the ones who do are often struck down at the finish line by a lack of planning of “what’s next”. (That was me, by the way). The plan can get pretty detailed but if you are using a program like P90X then it becomes very simple.

3. Most people don’t plan to fail, they simply fail to plan. Make a list of your goals and rewards. This is where you start to get concrete. This is the detail that goes into your framework with dates and goals attached. These don’t need to be daily goals, they can span the year if you wish, just make sure that they are measurable and attainable

GOAL	COMPLETION DATE	REWARD	Next Goal
Workout 6 days a week for 4 months (96 days total)	June 1 2010	Vibram 5 finger shoes	Another 4 months
Weight to 250lbs	May 1 2010	Patriot Media box for TV	240lbs
Waist to 36″	May 15 2010	New Jeans and Khakis	Waist to 34″

If you structure your goals along with your plan then you have it all in place, you just need to execute the plan. If you find yourself slacking or not executing, then start paying more attention. Write down your progress daily like so many of the online blogging community does. State your goals to people around you or post them in your cubicle or on your fridge. You will find no lack of commitment and drive when you take time to think about your goals. The problem is keeping them at the front Â of your mind with so many other things going on. If you have a goal such as a certain waist measurement or a certain number of chin ups then write down your progress on a chart where you can see the improvements.

This is what I need to do because my problem is that my reason is overshadowing my plan and my goals. I spend lots of time thinking about what will happen when the baby gets here and not enough time thinking about what I need to achieve before it happens.

Round Two, Day 32 – Pure Cardio, Pure Hell

Pure Cardio is the epoch of everything that is wrong with the Insanity program. Well, let me rephrase that, it represents everything that is wrong with the way I am approaching these workouts. I am so used to Tony giving us breaks and time to recover before again blasting the bodypart that my feeble brain is trying to comprehend the logic to Shaun T’s method. You see, Insanity is not the same, not by any measure. The fact is that it will take you at least one run through of each Insanity DVD before you get the hang of it. Maybe it’s just me, but I like to know where the end of the workout is so I can focus on it and work towards it. I can’t push myself hard not knowing when the break will come, it’s just not rational for me. So I end up taking breaks in various places and ending up not having worked at my optimal rate. However, now I know what Pure Cardio is like, the next time I do it I won’t be taking breaks because I will know that there is really only 18 minutes or so of pain to the workout.

Last night, regardless of my back pain, I worked through the Pure Cardio DVD and was happy with the workout as a whole with the exception of the timing being difficult to manage. What I did realize at the end is that unless you really push yourself as Shaun encourages you to, you may not get the workout you were expecting. It is easy to underachieve during these sessions if only because they are so short. As long as you go in knowing that the counter on the screen indicates the total time left minus about 4 minutes you will be fine. Work as hard as you can for as long as you can and then take a break. But… if the counter is sitting at 8 minutes, push through. You can do anything for 4 minutes or so can’t you? For me, the workout was a little frustrating. I was tired, I was pushing but I was in pain. It was not a pretty site. By the end I was left wanting more, only because I had neglected to heed the timer. Had I realized what little time there was left, I would no doubt have pushed harder. Next time…

Pure Cardio, then, is in fact everything that is right with the Insanity program. It is truly a High Intensity workout with only around 18 minutes of lung busting cardio as long as you don’t include the “warmup”. Learn to manhandle that 18 minutes and you will learn the joy of Insanity. It may not be for the faint of heart or the “fat burning zone” treadmill losers but in order to get what you can out of it you should be prepared to push yourself harder than you have done before and that, my friends, is no joke.

Round 2, Phase 2, Week 1 – Back Tweak = Back Day!!

I am sporadic in my updating only due to the fact that I am sporadic in my work. I tweaked something in my back the other day and being cautious doesn’t really jive with what I am trying to achieve. However, I have found if I am careful and warm up properly that I can still achieve what I need to while hurting. The Insanity Plyo was the worst. Trying to keep up with Shaun T while feeling like you have daggers up and down your spine is not optimal. But, as they say, you do what you can.

I am really happy to be in Phase 2 if only to enjoy the “other” DVDs in the P90X set which you only get to do during weeks 4-7. Maybe it is a reflection of my enjoyment of a good shoulder workout I am not sure. Anyway, I managed to get through my Back and Biceps day yesterday despite being incredibly uncomfortable. I figured if I was going to be home all day with a sore back, the least I could do is try and get some bodyparts done. As strange as it may sound, doing pullups when my back is sore is a great benefit. By the time the workout was done (it took me almost 90 minutes) I did feel a great deal better. However, I couldn’t manage any Ab Ripper today, it was just agony.

For those of you who have sore backs, don’t let the workouts slip if you can. Especially if it is a back day. I have an inversion table which works wonders for me, but before I got it, doing pullups was an acceptable substitute. The one thing it took me many years to figure out was that moving, exercising, walking and doing chinups made me feel better not worse. The temptation is to lay down and do very little, in fact I posted a page once on what to do when your back goes out however when I wrote that page, I was still far from understanding that the key to rehab of a back injury is exercise. I was also under the impression that back pain was in your back. Since then I have come to understand that my personal pain is a mixture of piriformis, ITB and hamstring issues all rolled into one causing pain through my sciatic nerve and down my leg.

So I am moving a little slowly, just around the time that I am realizing that I am not doing enough and need to step it up a notch.

Round 2, Phase 2. Day “29”. The Next 3 Weeks

I am posting this again only because I had a hard time finding it the other day. Today is day 1 of Phase 2 which means technically it would fall on day 29. I am currently on day 26 having skipped the rest days and probably employed some horrible math.

Day 1: Chest, Shoulders & Triceps, Ab Ripper X
Day 2: Plyometric Cardio Circuit
Day 3: Back & Biceps, Ab Ripper X
Day 4:Â Pure Cardio with or without Cardio Abs
Day 5: Legs & Back, Ab Ripper X
Day 6: Cardio Power and Resistance
Day 7: Cardio Recovery

I will most likely kill Cardio Recovery in order to ensure that the 2 days coaching are my days off. In light of Tony’s rant that I posted yesterday I am going to stop being “a bitch” and taking that additional day off. It’s time to man up, Tony style!

Today saw the return to Chest Shoulders and Triceps and that also meant a return to using the bench in the gym. Some of the tricep stuff that Tony does is what we in the weightlifting community would refer to as “finishing” moves. In other words, they don’t do much but give you a pump but really aren’t useful in any muscle building way. Any tricep extension that you are only using 10lbs for isn’t worth anything. Not even the time to hit next on the remote. You see, the triceps are a vastly underutilized and underestimated muscle group and in order to get any kind of response from them they need to be worked very hard. Dips and close grip bench are terrific exercises for triceps. Overhead extensions, not so much. If you really want to see your bench press (or in P90X terms, your push ups) improve, blast your triceps with heavy weights for a few weeks, you will be amazed at the results. Of course, this would require you knowing just how powerful your triceps are… Let me just say that in gym terms, you should be able to do about 75% or more of your heaviest bench in a close grip bench grip. If you rely on push ups as your benchmark, you should be able to do 75% of your max regular push ups in military and at the very least 50% in diamond. If not, it could be that your triceps are lagging and need heavy work. Doing anything with a 10 or 15lb dumbell just won’t cut it I am afraid.

That being said, the workout is good, if you substitute enough tricep work to make it worthwhile you will definitely be sore the days following.

Tony Goes Off

OK I admit, Tony is a certain way on his videos that some of us find a little hard to take. However, it’s about getting the message across and in case any of you were in any doubt as to Tony’s true feelings towards you and all those P90X users out there then check out the Tony Rant from the chat room some time ago. It’s a good read and puts Tony right back at the top of the respect list where he belongs. Just until the next time he does the bait and switch with the 40lb dumbbells and hangs his participants out to dry.

TONY GOES OFF – AND USES CAPITALS THE WHOLE WAY!!!!

Round 2 Rest Week 1 Ends – Quit the gym, build your own.

I am not claiming to be the best handyman, you won’t see me on the next season of Handyman Superstar Challenge but I was impressed with myself at getting the chin up bar installed in the garage. It is nailed to the rafters and is high enough so that a) my feet can’t touch the ground and b) it is above the garage door when it opens. This also keeps my ego in check and will prevent me from doing workouts in the garage with the door open. Not that I would dream of doing that now… but who knows about the summer. I am also going to build some crossfit boxes that you use to jump up onto in order to increase leg power and in addition, I am thinking of building some dumbell holders that I can then install in the basement to get the dumbells off the floor.

I also quit the gym this weekend. I have put the membership on hold indefinitely so that I can spend the next few months on my DVD based fitness and taking full advantage of the gym I faithfully built in the basement. It will also save us $70 a month which will, I assume, go towards a cloth diaper service and not towards a new exhaust or HID headlights for the Jeep or Tony Horton’s 1 on 1 fitness.

The buildup was pretty simple, I suspended 2×4’s from the ceiling joists using 4 large nails each. I will eventually put a lag bolt through each one but for now they are OK. I had bought a hollow metal bar, 48″ long and drilled a similar sized hole through each 2×4 as you can see. I simply threaded the bar through the holes and as you can see, the last support is a little off in alignment. That was due to the fact that when I drilled the holes, at least one of them was at a slight angle. I am not sure how you would combat this without the use of a drill press but it doesn’t seem to have affected it in any way.

The bar was around $25, the wood I had laying around as spare pieces as I did with the nails. I will have to buy the lag bolts / carriage bolts.

I am around 260lbs right now and the bar I set up in the basement (which I will discuss at a later time) has a very slight bow to it now after some vigorous use. However, that one is across a 36″ door frame. I don’t expect this one will bend at all given the 3 support points.

My plan is not to hang from between the 2x4s since I would bang my head on the central support, but rather to use one hand on the outside of one end support and the other between the two far supports to give my head room to clear the bar.

Round 2. Rest Week Review.

So I have been at this a month already and pitifully I find myself unable to crush the workouts like I did during round one. I know I am still some distance from the weight I was during round 1 and that may be enough to explain however I find myself disappointed at my effort level. This week, being rest week, does nothing to assuage that feeling. In fact, I find that I am angering myself by not pushing harder during the workouts. However, this being a week “off” I am not really supposed to push that hard. So I opted for 3 sessions of Core Synergistics from P90X and 3 sessions of the Core, Cardio and Balance from Insanity. With the delay in scheduling due to coaching I am taking approximately 10 days to get through a rest week which is, lets admit it, sub-optimal. So much so that I am thinking that tonight I should bust through into Phase II with a Chest, Shoulders and Triceps workout. I guess I will have to see how I feel however since I will be able to leave work at 330, maybe the planets are aligned in my favour. The two rest week workouts I have been doing have been pretty good, enough of a rest from weights, enough of a boost from cardio. However, the test will be getting back to Phase 2 and seeing if I am really rested enough or not.

So it is time to plan for Phase 2. I am uncertain as to whether to add the Max line of workouts to the mix yet. I think that is going to have to happen at least 2 weeks from now, maybe even into Phase 3. I still have Cardio Power and Resistance, Pure Cardio (with and without Cardio Abs) and Cardio Recovery to add to my current schedule. So here is the plan for the next 3 weeks.

Day 1: Chest, Shoulders & Triceps, Ab Ripper X

Day 2: Plyometrics

Day 3: Back & Biceps, Ab Ripper X

Day 4: Yoga X

Day 5: Legs & Back, Ab Ripper X

Day 6: Kenpo X

Day 7: Rest or X Stretch

I am modifying slightly to go back to a 7 day workout, given that I will still be off 2 days with coaching at least this will give me an opportunity to fit all the workouts in. Once I have tried Cardio Recovery, I may scrap day 7.