DVD Days P90X to Tapout XT – Page 28 – Something Beats Nothing Every Time

Day 54 – A Long Way From England

Yoga X.

I do have some body shots from day 1 or thereabouts, but for now this will have to do. Last summer we went to England and I can’t believe in a country of 65 million people nobody mentioned that I looked this bad!

My weight went up and down during gymnastics season and I know that when I started P90X I was not that out of shape but let’s be honest, this was only about 12 months ago and if my math is right, about 40lbs ago. The problem is being able to avoid going there again. I had been there before, lost a ton of weight and ended up back there again. I know why, lack of attention and lack of motivation. I am older now, and even if I am not wiser I am certainly closer to death if I continue to eat like I am 25. I am happy that I have found P90X because it has taught me some really valuable lessons, things that have made me look at fitness in a new way. The thing that occurred to me this morning was the big difference between what I was doing in the gym and what I am doing now. That thing is very simply leaving the ground. With all the training that I was doing my feet never really left the ground. Everything was weights, static isolated weights. With the P90X program and with any circuit training program the key is getting off your feet. Whether it is getting down onto the floor to do bodyweight movements or getting airbourne doing jump training or Kenpo the philosophy is the same, get your body used to the impact of jumping and moving up and down and you will discover a whole new plane of exertion.

Look at that guy, you think he was jumping any fences on that holiday?

The “thing” that makes you feel like you are “fit” or “in shape” doesn’t seem to be size or strength for me, it seems to be mobility and feeling light on my feet.

Who ate all the pies, who ate all the pies…

Day 53 – Gumby would be proud

Flexible and green. At least 50% of what I need.

One of the best things about rest week is the requirement to do X Stretch. For those who choose to take Sunday (or day 7 whenever that is) off instead of doing X Stretch this will open your eyes to a new kind of workout. It is kind of like Yoga would be if it was really easy! Personally I choose to do X Stretch when I can but having it as part of the regular schedule in the middle of the week is a real refresher. I have to admit that although I am not the most flexible guy in the world I do enjoy X Stretch now. Working on my tendons, ligaments and fascia goes a long way towards my overall comfort and health on a daily basis. In fact, I noticed the other day that my back hasn’t cracked since I started P90X, a certain sign that the compression of my spine is far less than it was previously and that is always a good thing.

Day 52 – The Hamster Dance

Kenpo, my favourite.

Not only is rest week a great break from the hardcore workouts but it allows you to really enjoy the workouts rather than forcing yourself through them doing as much as you can. This extra enjoyment makes Kenpo an amazing workout. I got my recovery drink in the mail the other day and so I put some in my workout drink today since it was pretty hot in the basement. First let me just say that it really is not just hype about the drink, it has a good balance of nutrients but more importantly it really does taste great. Not since the first time I tried Met-Rx have I been impressed with the taste of a fitness product but I was truly floored by the taste of the recovery drink. I ordered mine direct from BeachBody and although it took longer than expected to arrive (by about 5 days) it was well worth it. Each packet makes 12 ounces which is about 350ml but I found that when I mixed it in my drink bottle (PureHydration bottle) which is 500ml it tasted just as good, not watery at all. By the way, I have a ton of reusable bottles, both composite plastics and stainless steel and I have never found one that keeps hot things hot or cold things cold like the PureHydration bottle does. It is literally mind blowing how good this bottle is. I had cold water from my cooler at home in the bottle which is black sitting in my Jeep. The bottle was in direct sunlight for over an hour and was hot to touch when I got to it. I opened the bottle and the water inside was just as cold as if it had come directly out of the cooler. Nothing much impresses me to be frank, but this really was amazing.

So I am into rest week 2, feeling fine, but starting to get a little apprehensive about what to do after the 90 days are up. I have a gym membership that I want to maintain because I love to bench and the equipment allows me to do lots of variations that I can’t do at home. However, I don’t think that I want to go back to my old weights routine. I have come too far to slip back into that static strength stuff. So now I have to develop a training method that works both weights and the P90X methodology into a single package. Ideally I would like a system where I could do the workout at home or at the gym so if I feel like throwing in a DVD instead of going to the gym one day it would fit with my program. Then I will market the system as a whole revolutionary fitness breakthrough and make millions of dollars. That is one plan anyway. You see, the problem is that people who love the gym almost always love it for the social aspect as much as the workout. I don’t necessarily mean social interaction but rather social exposure. I enjoy the gym for social exposure, seeing people, listening to them, doing that man-nod thing to acknowledge them but I definitely don’t want to interact with them. Ewww. So if you can take the precise approach of the P90X and mix it with the ability to be in the gym with the other gym rats and cardio queens you would surely have a winning combination. Especially since in order to get that type of workout you have to be with a personal trainer. If I can provide a personal trainer quality workout regime that can be done at home or at the gym or even in a hotel room but more importantly can be done in ALL locations I am sure some people would go for it…

I’m gonna let the hamster in my head run the wheel on that one for a while…

Area 51 – Bodyparts (Abs, who knew?)

I will put up before pictures but at the moment I can’t stomach them so these will have to do. Just goes to prove that anyone can find some abs, even if it is only one or two! I am having a hard time imagining that I will be significantly different than this at the end but I hope that at the very least my final pictures will be even a slight improvement over today.

Core Synergistics – The wannabe workout.

Core is a weird workout, it’s not difficult enough to be a real challenge which is good for rest week but at the same time you get the feeling that the moves you are doing are just the cast offs that didn’t make the show. They are the red headed stepchild of the other 3 weeks, they are the returning houseguests that didn’t make it in to the house again this season. Although the quality is there and the workout is still a good one, you can’t help but feel a little sorry for the exercises that didn’t quite make it on to the first team.

My weightloss has stalled, I have weighed about the same for 2 weeks running now and although I feel like my body is still changing I would like to see a better reflection on the scale. People say that numbers don’t matter but in fact that only really applies to people who are already at their desired bodyfat level or who are working out with weights for the first time. NOT the first time in a while either, but the first time. Even then, the ability to put on weight as muscle is so incredibly difficult that saying that you are “losing fat and gaining muscle” is completely bogus. In actuality, and any bodybuilder will attest to this, you are always either gaining muscle OR losing fat but to do both at the same time is insanely challenging once you are past the first few months. For this reason I know that my stagnant weight is nothing to do with muscle gain, but is more a reflection of my “alternate” food choices over the last couple of weeks. It may not seem like much to say that I had one bowl of low fat ice cream and fell short on my vegetable intake for 3 or more days but at this level when you are trying to balance your diet carefully those things have a huge impact.

So this is how Rest Week 2 looks on the Classic Program:

YogaX Â Â âˆšDone
Core Synergistics Â Â âˆšDone
KenpoX
X Stretch
Core Synergistics
YogaX
Rest or X Stretch

Day 50 – REST WEEK 2 BEGINS!!!

Yoga – Rest Week 2

I made it to rest week 2. I learned from rest week 1 not to expect much of a break but rather to understand that the rest is only to give you a break from pullups and free weights. I thoroughly enjoyed it last time and felt a great deal of recuperative effect from it. This time around I am in a position where my body is sore, I am feeling tired and a little battered but since I know how good the week off will feel I am filled with confidence for the last 30 days of the program.

I am also deep into my nutrition course and learning about the kinds of lipids, proteins etc. and coming to realize just how delicate of a balance good nutrition really is. The human body is an incredibly resilient thing, forgiving even the most ridiculous dietary mistakes however I now understand why when people finally get their diet right they say that they have more energy than they know what to do with. It is largely because it is virtually impossible to accidentally get your diet right. I don’t want to sound negative towards the honest attempt to eat right but in reality even the “more fruits and vegetables” approach leaves gaping holes in the dietary requirements. I would estimate that without specific nutritional knowledge and counselling that a person “eating well” would be able to get around a 75% on the “right diet” scale. The balance of vitamins and minerals, the combinations of nutrients and hydration is so specific that in order to get towards that 100% right diet you really have to examine every single piece of food that your diet contains and combine it specifically with the dietary components in the right amount at the right time. It is something that is extremely complex and worse of all, it is something that like exercise is constantly changing as new discoveries are made. Now, let me just explain that in order to be a healthy person that 75% diet is more than enough. To push past that 75% takes a little more work and a little more time but the benefits are definitely noticeable. To get to the point where you are bursting with energy and feel like a million bucks you are going to have to push past that 75% and up into the 80’s. It is not simple, it is however easy once you know how to build the right diet for yourself. There are several tools included in the course that help you to figure out exactly what you need to hit those high numbers and I will share those as time goes along. I have a new found respect for nutritionists and dietitians though, I can tell you that.

It’s funny, I consider myself someone who knows a lot about working out and nutrition. Reading the Personal Trainer manual for the CanFitPro program I realized that I really do know my stuff in the gym. Reading the nutrition book I realize that I really have a lot to learn about food.

So I kicked off rest week with a yoga workout in an air conditioned basement. It was over 40 degrees today with the humidity so we had the air on in the house. It didn’t stop me from sweating bullets but it did make me uncomfortably cool. Hopefully the humidity will break tomorrow so I can get the basement door open and enjoy the warmth of the afternoon as I do Core Synergistics (I think, I had better check on that!).

I have to admit that when I do Yoga I can see myself in the mirrors on the wall and I am amazed that during this process I have dropped a few pounds and a few inches but I have really maintained my size. I thought when I started that I would shrink as I usually do when I increase my cardio workouts but this time I am happy to say that I appear to be the same size. In fact, I may not be, I may appear so because of my lower bodyfat levels but the most important thing is that I don’t feel smaller. I know, it is an ego thing but when you have spent your life being proud of your muscular size it becomes a defining characteristic of who you are. I am glad that I have not lost that feeling.

Day 47-49 Weekends are fun! Program mixups are not!

I don’t want to fall into a pattern of losing touch with the proper schedule during weekends but for some reason last week’s mess with the wrong workout on the wrong day and then an extra day off really messed things up. It sent ripples of disturbance through this weekend causing me to perform a shortened Yoga workout on Sunday in order to set up for the real Yoga of rest week on Monday.

Friday was Day 47, I was already a day off schedule due to last week so it was supposed to be Yoga but actually I did Plyo since I switched them again, something that would come back to bite me. I do love the Plyo workout so it was easy to complete, enjoyable and easy to push myself. I did find that my legs were sore afterwards, something I was surprised at but I put down to the fact that I had pushed very hard during the lunges at the start. Saturday I did legs and back and found that my hamstrings were very tight after doing 30 minutes on the treadmill in the morning. Maybe it was the very hot weather recently but I find myself a little sluggish and with a very heavy feeling in my legs. I mentioned this last week but I thought for sure it would pass quickly enough. Not yet. I am thinking that on the days when I do double workouts that I am not replacing the glycogen well enough and that is causing me to hit the wall prematurely. It also would explain the lack of fullness in my legs and the sluggishness (I think). Saturday we went to the market early and I don’t recall feeling heavy and slow at that point so maybe it is the extra cardio after all. Sunday was supposed to be rest day on a normal week, this week it was supposed to be Yoga since I had skipped Monday and switched the Plyo and Yoga days. I checked the schedule for next week (REST WEEK 2 WOOHOO !!!!) and found that day 1 is supposed to be Yoga. I had really screwed myself. I knew I couldn’t do 2 days of Yoga back to back so I ended up doing about half the Yoga workout and some extra stretching to make sure I was not Yoga’d out by Monday. That workout was fine, the flexibility piece is getting easier, but the moving savasanas at the start are still a challenge, especially the last one with the half moon and twisting half moon.

I guess it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that if you start to change stuff around you are going to run into problems with the schedule. The fact that it was an accident was little comfort when I realized what the changes had done. Anyway, I am going to be on rest week next week so I will have plenty of time to recover from the mix ups.

So there you have it, end of week 7 going on to rest week 2 and with only the last 1/3 of the program left to do. So far so good and I think this rest week I will try to post some measurements and some body part shots.

Don’t hold your breath.

Day 46 – Wedding Gifts and Dancing Queens

Back and Biceps, Ab Rippler

Nice Camera, uses Memory Stick Pro Duo though...

Nicole decided that we should donate our digital camera to her dad for his new business – www.torontolandlordagent.com. That opened the door for us to go to the Bay and use some of our gift certificates from the wedding to get a new digital camera. We chose the Sony CyberShot W230 which not only does 12MP shots but also is capable of HD quality movies. So thanks to all those who gave us Bay Gift Certificates for the wedding, although it has taken us almost 2 years we finally spent the cash!! So if you know of anyone who needs to rent their condo / apartment / house, just give John a call!

The workout was good today, with the basement door open these hot humid days really kick up the sweat factor which is great. My chinup bar is doing well although there is a slight bend in it from the close grip pull ups. I still have way more confidence in it that that flimsy chinup bar we got from some fitness place. Maybe once I get down to the 200 mark I would feel better about it. Don’t hold your breath people!

My progress with Ab Ripper is still moving along. I cheat a little head start as I have previously mentioned but now I am able to do 25’s on at least 8 of the 11 exercises, even bicycles which I frigging HATE!!! I still can’t do leg climbers, in fact if I didn’t see the video I would debate the validity and the mere possibility of that particular move. The Mason Twists at the end are a particular sticking point for me due to the stupid arm size issue. I am not able to touch the floor with my hands clasped together. Not going to happen, biceps too large, chest too large, shoulders ridiculously huge. I still get a really painful stretch through my lower back doing crunchy frog but at least I can make it through. The ones I have the issue with are the full situps and the situp with the Vsnap kicker. My upper body significantly outweighs my legs so even with my legs straight it is a struggle to counterbalance myself to get all the way up.

In other news, Jeanine won So You Think You Can Dance last night, something we are very happy about. Our favourite, Kayla, who is a dead ringer for our private class dancer and star of the stage Laura, came 4th which I think was very strange especially since that useless weasel idiot who came 3rd beat her. Anyway, congrats to Jeanine on a job well done and to Brandon who is a stellar performer in his own right but who was just too similar to last season’s winner.

Day 45 – The Turn

**Note to future self – That Nutrition course is bullshit, most of what you will hear is bullshit. Paleo is the answer to the lipid hypothesis lies and deceit. I can’t believe the state we are in due to the Canada Food Guide or the Standard American Diet – August 2011

Plyo – August 7 2009

Today is a milestone. I can’t believe that it is half over already and that I have actually managed to stick with the program. I don’t want to come off as arrogant or egotistical but I am certainly proud of myself so far and just a little bit impressed with my achievement. I feel younger and have less pain than I have in a long time and I am hoping that both those conditions will continue to improve. It is a great feeling getting out of bed in the morning and not having back pain, something which I can say I actually experience every so often now. I can’t remember any time since my surgery where I have had more than the occasional pain free day so this is a major improvement for me.

Plyo was fine, I am really enjoying it. Although today at the end of the workout I felt a little like I had not tried hard enough. During the workout my legs felt really heavy almost as if I was dehydrated but once I was finished I felt like I wanted to do more. It is a really weird phase that you go through when you are trying to modify your diet and you are missing something. Depending on who you are and what your tolerances for things are it can be a glycogen shortage, a deficiency of something like potassium or zinc or something as simple as dehydration. Whatever it is, you are robbed of short term energy so have a hard time being functionally effective during the workout but after a very short rest, usually 3 or 4 minuntes, you feel completely recovered. Very frustrating.

I have finally been studying for the Nutriton exam and learned a lot about carbohydrates today. Tomorrow I have to finish lipids and then get on to protein. I did about 25% of the course over 2 days, I think by the end of the weekend I should be over 50% done. The course itself is very interesting and raises a unique approach to nutrition that I think most people don’t realize is the way your diet should work. The theory is that you take all the calories and vitamins and minerals that you need for the day and find the foods that will give you enough of those requirements. That usually entails some lean protein, lots of fruits and veg for minerals and vitamins and some complex carbs to meet your glycogen store requirement. Once you have met all your requirements you will have a few discretionary calories that you can use for “free” food, stuff that you can eat because you already met your dietary requiremetns for the day. Those discretionary calories are what you would use to eat things like chicken wings or a slice of pizza but once you do the calculation above you come to realize that in fact if you are meeting all your dietary requirements you are already eating enough food that you won’t need to eat garbage like that. The actual calculations are a little complex due to the specific vitamin and mineral requirements for the specific individual and their lifestyle but the basic point that comes out of every calculation is the same: Eat what your body requires and you won’t need to eat anything else. You also probably won’t crave anything bad because cravings are basically a manifestation of some deficiency. Really fascinating stuff.

Day 44 – The Return of the Mack

Tuesday August 4 2009. Chest Triceps and Shoulders.

I’m back! The weekend ended up being a bonus in a way, I feel better, more capable, and most of all a lot less sore than I did on Friday. The workout, then, was not easy, that’s not what happens with P90X. I was able to do more than usual, it was just as hard but the output was better. Of course, as I sit in my pool of sweat at the end of the workout the weekend recovery seems eons away. I once again landed on my head doing the inverted shoulder press, something I am not impressed with given that before I started I could shoulder press 275lbs. However, this time I had my feet on the bench, not the upturned bucket so I was almost completely inverted with my feet as high as my knees. My single pervasive thought through the whole workout was next week’s rest week. A whole week without pull ups or push ups. A whole week to give my shoulders and elbow a much needed break but also a week where I need to pull myself together and drop some more pounds.

I know I did this more as a challenge to myself than as a weightloss tool however I think the last month I should really try to push my nutrition boundaries to give me the best shot at getting rid of a few more pounds. I am close to my lightest weight in almost 8 years, back to the weight I was when Nicole and I met and being there again with a large degree of control over my weight would be amazing. I remember that back then the reason I was in such good shape was not because of my diet but because of the Stairmaster. I would spend 2 hours in the gym every morning before work, an hour of which would be on the PT4000 climbing the stair to nowhere. As soon as I was not able to do the work any more, the weight came up. My experience has taught me that in order to be successful at weight control it is not about the 2 hours in the gym, it is about the 22 hours out there in the world. The gym is the easy part. Ironically, I used to tell my Personal Training clients that. I guess I just wasn’t listening.

Days 40-43 Major Malfunction, Long Weekend

So I kind of messed up this week. I did Kenpo on Thursday because I was sure that was the right thing to do. I realized once I checked the schedule that I was supposed to do Yoga on Thursday and Kenpo on Saturday. I actually ended up taking Saturday off (well, I did 45 minutes on the treadmill instead) instead of Sunday and then doing Yoga on Sunday. Then on Monday I built a large TV shelf to sit on top of the fireplace in the living room that would accommodate the tuner, the Satellite box, the DVDRW and both the Wii and the PS3. However, between fixing that up and installing it which took around an hour with the ridiculous amount of cabling involved and the small but significant amount of gardening that I did I managed to miss out my workout all together. So I now find myself on Tuesday without having done my Monday workout which means that I will now have to go without a day off this week.

So here is the plan.

Tuesday: Chest Tri Shoulders
Wednesday: Plyo
Thursday: Back and Biceps
Friday: Yoga
Saturday: Legs and Back
Sunday: Kenpo

This will get me back on track for next week which coincidentally is a rest week which fits perfectly.

So what did I do with my 4 days off? Well, I completely finished revamping the garage so that I actually have room to work and room to park the Jeep again. I built the shelf I just mentioned and installed it however if it works out fine and we like it, I will have to take it down and paint it black so it fits in. I did a good job with it too, routed the edges and everything to make it look professional! I also bought and installed a new stereo head unit for the Jeep, one with a USB port on front so you can use a flash drive for your music instead of CDs. That means I can get an 8GB memory stick and put every song I have ever heard on it! Nicole thinks we need a road trip now so we can listen to all that tuneage!

pioneerp3100 I did manage to fix the broken fence on the walkout deck and do some gardening, attempting to rescue our front yard flower bed that I built last year from the grass that has overtaken it. Weird how I still have stupid holes in the actual lawn but the grass grows like crazy everywhere I don’t want it to. I also “fixed” the mirrors in the basement, ever since I installed them I have been meaning to glue them to the wall instead of having them rest on the rail I built for them. I had assumed that if I glued them to the wall they would all be aligned properly and would look perfect. Not the case. In fact, the wall is so messed up that the mirrors are even worse than they were. Oh well, lesson learned that if you want a mirror wall, get a large mirror, don’t try to make one from small mirrors. Actually, it would probably have worked OK if I had stuck the mirrors to a surface I knew was flat and then against the wall. Maybe I will try that if I can get them off the wall now. Stick them to a piece of MDF and then attach that to the wall… hmmm…

So there you have it, a few days of major achievements around the house but not the greatest outcome on the P90X front. Although, even though I missed 2 workouts I added 2 days of cardio. Maybe that will all even out in the long run.