R6 I:A Day 10 – Relief (I Discovered The Truth) It’s Gameday (plus bonking)

Truth is, for me at least Insanity:Asylum is going to turn out to be a filler for other things rather than a program by itself. I am finding that my love of the RKC and associated strength training has a hold on me I can’t avoid and as such I find no value in Back to Core, Relief and so on. It is probably better for me to use I:A workouts in order but with RKC and Olympic lifting as my mainstay. I had hoped that I:A was going to be a standalone program much like P90X was but I have to admit as a full blown schedule I am a little disappointed. I am not, however, disappointed in the workouts that I like, both strength and Vertical Plyo have earned a place in my schedule for now along with speed and agility (especially since my rope jumping is improving). I am hoping Game Day will prove to be the same way and if it does, then I at least have 4 valuable cardio workouts that are complex multiple muscle group movements, work my whole body in a way that is functional and challenging and are fun to complete.

So I took on Game Day with the same vigor that I have attacked everything else so far, only to find that was a mistake. My tips would be to make sure you have eaten 2 hours before and have fluids on hand. Not only that, but try to take it a little easy the first few rounds because if you don’t you may find that like me you bonk around the 50 minute mark. It was a substantial bonk too… It’s too bad because I was really starting to enjoy the workout. It is a little manic on the different sport aspect but I found it challenging and interesting which always makes the time fly.

I had done some extra warmups doing my jump rope practice and maybe that was my downfall. Whatever it was, when we got off the floor after swimming (yes, I didn’t mis-spell that, we were swimming) I suddenly cooled off. It was a bizarre feeling too, it’s like my body suddenly said “that’s enough for today” and pushed me into relax and cool down mode. Maybe it was because I hadn’t eaten for about 5 hours too but in all honesty, that shouldn’t have mattered. I think next time I do it I will find out if it was just me, the bonk or the workout.

All things considered though, the workout was good. I think after a few rounds I may get tired of the seemingly random and bizarre choices of sports but that said, any time you do something that seems too “busy” it usually means you won’t get sick of it for a while. Colour me hopeful. I was a little disappointed in myself for not finishing but then again since it was supposed to be Relief day anyway I won’t complain. I think today due to short time constraints that I will do relief, go to coaching and then tomorrow pick up with Strength since I have vetoed Back To Core.

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.9 – VP, RKC and Nursing Week

The end of last week was a good time for working out, the weather is getting better, the sun is shining and I did my two current favourite workouts: RKC and IA Vertical Plyo. In stark contrast to the pain I suffered having to do Back To Core again, the RKC immediately took me back to those days when I was working hard at the Kettlebell Challenge. I chose to do 5 ladders, in a 34543 configuration again using the 45lb KB however once I had done the 3 and 4 I decided I would switch to the 70lb KB and try a whole 3 rung ladder. It was tough, especially since I am not doing KB work every day but I was happy to be able to make it through without dropping the thing on myself! I continued with my 4 and 5 to finish which, after doing the 70 pounder felt like I was using a little pink 15lb KB. I finished off with some single arm and doubel arm swings and called that a day. My body really felt like I had worked out, something that you sometimes don’t get when learning a new workout system. I spend far too much time studying the movements before doing them that the workout does tend to suffer a little.

Next day was Vertical Plyo. I am getting more used to this workout, I have to be careful not to smash my head against the ceiling in the basement where the low duct runs but apart from that I think this workout is what I was expecting from IA. It is fast paced, very mobile and extremely challenging. It is also completely adjustable for your ability, no matter how good or crappy you feel you can adjust each movement to match. You feel agile, fast and challenged during the workout, in essence it gives you the feeling that most people want from doing programs like this, the feeling of doing something athletic. Now, I wouldn’t go so far as to call someone who does this an “athlete” since I don’t think (if we are all honest for a second) that a work out at home program has the ability to make that happen but it is close!

It’s Nurses Week here in Canada and the US and it appears that below the border, the fast food giants are once again peddling to the masses and picking on the weak willed and sleep deprived. For my part, I applaud Nurses and their commitment to their patients and not only that, but their dedication to their profession. Yes, some may come across as a little crazy, or forcefully gregarious but as they whooped and hollered in the cafeteria this morning I was reminded of my early years at University and the crazy strong bonds we forged with each other to face the adversity of what was to come. These wonderful people face this kind of adversity as their profession, day in and day out and for that I think we should thank them. However, I think getting over $100K a year is thanks enough… That said, seeing the wonderful nurse that cared for my wife and child while we were here after the birth made me all soft and nostalgic so for today I will forgo my rant about overpaid nurses being in professions where they don’t belong while their own kin cry out for help and just say thanks, you guys are OK with me.

(II also found that doing a search for nurses on google images comes up with some rather interesting results…)

 

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.9 (Maybe) or RKC. The Mental Focus Trick.

Since I am only counting the IA days, if I choose to jump rope and do RKC today it would not count as day 9. I have been making progress with my rope jumping skills. I am not on to double unders yet but I am up to a full minute of jumping without a break. That took me 20 minutes to achieve by the way. Not only that, it brought home a point that I will share with my girls today at gym about focusing on the wrong thing.

For ages I was focused on the jump, how high, which foot, together, one by one etc. and was having little success. It took me 20 minutes of constant work just to get 15 seconds and I must have restarted about 80 times.  Then I decided that I would concentrate on the “SLAP” sound that the rope makes when it hits the ground in front of me and try to make it as loud as possible. As soon as I tried that, I made 45 seconds, then a minute within 2 attempts.

The point is that as much as you may think you are mentally in the game, it may be in fact that you are defeating yourself. All the belief in the world would not have made the difference to the degree that changing my focus made. To that end, when the girls are learning new skills it is important to not only bolster their confidence but also to try and have them focus on different pieces of the puzzle to find out what works for them. When it comes to physical activities, there are as many ways to do things as their are people, not because the physical move is any different but because what we choose to focus on makes our experience completely unique.

If you want to play a fun trick to see just how critical of a difference this makes and how it affects your brain grab a friend. Tell them to take a look around the room at everything that is green, what kind of green, what it is, how big etc. For 60 seconds let them study to room. Then, tell them to close their eyes and describe in detail everything in the room that is red.

It’s fun, and educational too! Just remember, what you focus on becomes your reality, so changing your perspective can often change your whole experience.

 

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.8 – Back To Core (sucks). Chihuahua of Donkeys

So my wife is not impressed with my admission that I want to reclaim my handstand ability. I told her it was more like donkey kicks and realizing that she may not know about the Shetland Pony I was reduced to comparing myself to a very small donkey, the Chihuahua of donkeys if you will. It was a mute point for today because it was time for Back to Core which is now my least favourite workout on IA and in fact may be the worst workout video in the entire series of P90X, Insanity and IA. I would go so far as to say it is worse than P90X Kenpo and that is really saying something. It is a weird, disjointed attempt to work the back without pull ups, something that is just not going to cut it at this level. The fact that there are pull up bar exercises in the other DVDs reveals that you should have a pull up bar and if you do, use the damn thing. Doing lat work with bands is something I would expect from P90 or one of the other female oriented videos since they seem to shy away from the art of the pull up. This video is almost like a prequel to IA, it is a gentle, pedantic stroll through exercises that either don’t have the range or breadth to be of much use or would be more at home during a yoga session. Half way through the workout I realized I was angry. This was not what I signed up for by any measure. So this will have been my last foray into the Back To Core DVD. I think instead I will do deadlifts, chin ups and ARX, at least then I won’t end up frustrated and angry at Shaun T for what I can only surmise is a sell out filler DVD of the set.

Tomorrow is Vertical Plyo, that should cheer me up!

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.7 – Strength Part 2 and A Big Enough Why

Strength is a good workout for me. It is something I can do without much mobility difficulty and I can scale up and down to make it more challenging. There is one move I like in particular and that is the hip flys which I didn’t believe would do anything for me but once I got my shoulders down a little I was surprised at the lat work I got. The other thing is the progression on the pull up bar from jumping pullups to all out hanging hand position changes. For me, since I am still indoors and the doorway is a little narrow I have to improvise a bit and so I do regular pullups but then in addition to the pushups, I also do handstands since they are a definite weakness for me and something that I admit I am jealous of when I see the guys at gymnastics doing them. So I am setting a goal for a 10 second handstand by the summer. Not only that but anyone who reads Fitbomb regularly will know how much he complains about his double under proficiency. Well, you can put me in that boat too. Although I am up to 100 regular jumps pretty regularly now, and I can almost make a full minute if I concentrate the art of the double under is something that I fear will elude me on a more long term basis. Being in a basement doesn’t help really but then again, at least nobody can see me there. I am hoping to have some degree of skip rope skill before I start working out on the lower deck again this year. Otherwise I may draw a crowd and end up on youtube as “the guy across the way who can’t skip to save his life”. Don’t think it doesn’t happen people!

So I am feeling a sense of responsibility for the Biggest Loser at work. The results are not stellar and so today I sent out the following as an attempt at motivation. I know it is a contest, but in the spirit of helping and encouraging not beating down and humiliating. So my conscience got the best of me and I am trying to help…

So here are my 3 simple suggestions.

  1. Keep a food diary for a week… I know, you have all heard this before but it really helps to narrow down what is causing the issue. For those of you who choose nuts and seeds as your snack of choice please be aware that a serving of nuts (around 22 almonds) is between 150 and 200 calories and let`s be honest, who eats only 22 almonds? A cup of trail mix can be between 600 and 1000 calories which, when your intake should be 1500-2500 a day is enormously significant. Try to snack on fruit instead, nuts and seeds are often a downfall for weight loss as they were for me a few months ago.
  2. Write down and post your goals for the next 3 months. 90 days is a short enough time to stick to something and long enough to make a significant difference. Include in your goals not only your weight, but also your activity on a weekly basis, your proposed sleep schedule, your foods that you would like to temporarily forsake and your REASONS for having these goals. Make sure your goals are big and small, small goals are easy to achieve and give you a great confidence boost. Every day you achieve something, check it off on your list so you can see that you are moving in the right direction.
  3. Write down 1 thing that you can do every day to move towards your goal. If you need to get out and walk then write down that you will go for 10 minutes every day the first week and LIMIT yourself to that. By the time week 2 comes, commit to 15 or 20 minutes a day and once you have created that habit you will find it easier to keep going.

My last piece of this rant is regarding “reasons”. As you probably know I am a gymnastics coach and I have trained many many teenage athletes over the years. The biggest obstacle to their performance in the gym is their ability to create “reasons” for not being able to do something. This is a habit that will stick with them and something I try my hardest to prevent them from reinforcing. Your reasons are not reasons, they are excuses. I know it’s hard to hear but it is the simple truth. If you have a big enough WHY you can endure almost any HOW but if you allow fear, discomfort or laziness to dictate your life then your reasons will only prevent you from reaching your goal. Instead of using your “reasons” for failing, transform them into opportunities to succeed. Set them up as obstacles that you are determined to challenge and realize that they are only in your way because you allow them to be there.

Take control.

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.6 – Confused and Tired

Mixing this schedule right off the bat may not be the best idea so I am going to only count the IA days and not the RKC days so I don’t get lost. As it happens I am on day 6 which is a return to Speed and Agility. This was a weird week, I have had family in from out of the country, I had a gymnastics competition to do for 3 days and I have been trying to keep up with the workout. No need to tell you that things have not gone well. For one day I did a hybrid of RKC with some rope practice which was a good 40 minute workout. The next day I was able to do the warmup but a fridge emergency cancelled that workout short leaving me frustrated. So I managed to muddle through the speed and agility in pieces and the next workout will be back to strength. That will have to be tomorrow and hopefully I will be back on track. 2 weeks until the next competition so I have a good window of opportunity here to get to work. I keep meaning to do a walkthrough of the workouts to give an idea of what you are required to do but knowing that this will all be redundant and useless in short order as others with more time will get it done I don’t think I will bother.

My parents being here has been great but it does tend to curb my own enthusiasm for working out, not that I am not committed but when you only get to see your parents  a few weeks a year you tend to make a meal of it! It’s now tuesday and I am going to do strength today and then hopefully tomorrow something before gym. The ‘rents go home tomorrow evening so I hope to be able to squeeze something in if I have time. If not, I am keeping my unnecessarily obsessive beast at bay and not going to worry about it. That is another benefit of the Paleo lifestyle, if I skip a day or two of workouts I don’t end up several pounds heavier and feeling like garbage.

 

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.3 – 1.5 – RKC, Back To Core and Vertical Plyo

Back to core is a weird little workout. I did RKC the day before (5 ladders, 34543 on the rungs) and that seemed to fit in well. Day 4 was back to core and I had expected a core workout similar to core synergistics but was surprised by a workout that attempted to work the back and the core. It was a little bit like stretch X meets Yoga X, it really didn’t know where it was coming from and for an extreme workout for the back and core not to use the chin up bar was, well, bizarre.  There were some effective and inventive moves involving bands that no matter how effective they may be only manage to make you feel like a home gym failure who can’t use dumbbells or chin up bars. It was not a difficult workout and I think I would find it a little short on the challenging scale after a few rounds. Vertical Plyo however was a rude awakening. It was like P90X plyo meets Insanity on steroids. The workout was fierce, varied, challenging and interesting. I was toasted by the rope jumps again but all in all this was an enjoyable workout. I have been critical of PlyoX in the past and admit that I was far more fond of Insanity Plyo Cardio and this was a fitting evolution of the concept. There is plenty to challenge even the most determined grasshopper out there and for me, there is much to be achieved.

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.2 – Strength (Not My Problem)

Today was a welcome relief after yesterday kicked my ass and waking up this morning feeling like I slept in a garbage compactor. My back was sore all day, I presume that was the bear walking. However, today brought a day of strength, using dumbbells (and in my case kettlebells) and a pull up bar. Strength has never been my issue so strength endurance days are not usually that tough. Today was no different. The workout was enjoyable, went quickly and gave me a chance to repair my tattered self respect after yesterday’s fiasco. Although I could have used heavier weights, the workout allows you to work as hard as you need, not necessarily as hard as you can but still get the benefits you are training for. There is no use of the skip rope so my temper was in check, and the agility ladder was thankfully rested for the day. I am glad there are pull ups too however they are few and far between. It is a fun whole body workout, nothing too specific and still gives you a feeling that you actually did something instead of going through the motions to fill the time while your instructor comes up with another aerobic combo to bore you with. I certainly don’t feel as wiped out as yesterday but I feel that the next workout may be a return to humility for me.

Meanwhile, I will enjoy having kept up with the on screen crowd.

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.1 – Speed And Agility

What can I say, I feel a little humbled writing this. The fit test was fine, but today after Speed and Agility I feel like I did the first day I did insanity which is to say I am wondering how I am going to make it through if every day is like this.

Rather than try Shaun T at this time, I realized that I would have to be at least 20lbs lighter if I was going to try some of the stuff I had read about. However, the lure of the shiny box was too much and halfway through Kenpo (which I now no longer find fun, but rather boring) decided that I would put the Plyometric Insanity disc in and see what the big deal was. Ten minutes later my heart rate was at around 160 bpm and I thought my heart was going to explode. Shaun T’s warmup had reduced me to a quivering mess and as I lay on the floor soaking in my humility I realized that indeed I was looking at the future.

A large part of the success of Insanity and Insanity:Asylum I think is the warmup. It truly is a warning of what is to come and I am certain that for many, halfway through the warmup is the time they decided that Insanity isn’t for them. I remember feeling defeated because the warmup seemed too hard for me. As I finished the warmup for I:A I felt that same familiar feeling of defeat washing over me. However, I figured that I had conquered everything that BeachBody had thrown my way so far, there is no reason I couldn’t do this. I was (almost) right. The Speed and Agility workout is tough, it’s variety and speed and control and everything I was looking for. In fact, it was the content I was hoping for to vindicate my choice to spend the money. So the details, let me just say I didn’t do the full workout. I wasn’t able to keep up with everything and although I never pushed pause and I started every exercise I finished around 50% of them.

The bear crawls were the easiest part for me but also the part that I think caused me a very sore back for several hours after. The agility ladder agility moves are also pretty simple but the problem is that the compound movements require concentration, accuracy and patience to master. Speaking of patience, the warmup is in fact the part I had the most difficulty with. The problem is that I cannot, and have never been able to skip with a rope. I was quick to decide that the rope they included was garbage, turns out in fact that it was the user that was the problem. I bought a nylon rope to replace the one they shipped and as I  became slightly more proficient with the stupid thing I was quick to realize that the one they had sent was exactly what you need. Apologies, then, to the brains at BB.

The warmup then was the most frustrating and humbling exercise I have come up against since the first time I did Turkish Get Ups with the 45lb Kettlebell. That was a frightening evening, and day 1 of I:A was just as frightening as I came face to face with my own lack of competence! However, as I tell my girls at gym on a daily basis, it’s OK to be scared, but do it anyway!

R6 Insanity:Asylum 1.1 – Fit Test

The Athletic Performance Assessment was not too bad, I managed to keep up with the participants even though the in and out abs progressions really kicked my butt. Each move is done for 60 seconds, the count is by reps even though for some, one rep is all the way to the end of the ladder and back!
Here are my results:

Agility Heisman – 8
In and out progression – 25
Pull ups – 25
Mountain Climber Switch Kicks – 70
Shoulder Touch Pushup Walk – 7
X Jumps – 24
Moving Pushups – 5
Agility Ladder Shuffle – 12
Agility Ladder Bear Crawl – 5

I will probably be doing day 1 workout later today since I was supposed to do the fit test last night. My parents and sister are in from out of the country so time may be a premium but I am going to try and stay on track.

This is going to be fun!!