Something Beats Nothing Every Time – Page 80 – Extreme Home Fitness From P90X to Crossfit to Russian Kettlebells – Proof that at any age you can still give it the beans and be your own hero!

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.

Day 39 – The 4 Days Ahead

Kenpo

So I have a lot of extra days in hand for vacation time at work. I decided to take tomorrow off to give me a 4 day weekend. This way I can get some yard work done, get some garage work done, take care of a lot of outstanding DIY stuff and get my P90X workouts done during the day when I actually have some energy.

Today I did Kenpo, still my favourite and still a workout that I am guaranteed will give me a real challenge. My coordination continues to improve every time I do this workout and I find that the harder I work, the more focused I become and the better I do. I think that is a bit weird but there you go.

Day 38 – 1 Week To The Top

Back, Biceps

I always imagine the half way point of any venture as the top of the mountain, once you are past half way, things always seem to go more quickly towards the finish line. One week from today I will be half way through the P90X program and although my “transformation” is not significant, that was not my goal. In fact, as I stated at the outset my goal for doing this was only for the challenge and the variety. The fact that I have lost a few pounds and made some significant fitness gains is a bonus.

It has been really weird not going to the gym every day and still getting the quality of workout that I have been. I have always been of the opinion that you need to be in the gym to get the quality of workout that you need to succeed in fitness. This stems from the arrogance of my initial certification as an ACE Personal Trainer. When I got certified, the culture was that the gym was the law not the guideline and the notion of working out without weights was almost non existent. Since then a lot has changed, the improvisation of the fitness industry and their desire for money has generated a whole industry around working out at home. From the very early days of at home aerobics to Billy Blanks and his Tae Bo all the way up to P90X and beyond, the fitness industry now accepts the notion that you can get a great workout anywhere you want to. Ask any Personal Trainer worth their salt and they will now be able to give you a dozen alternatives to replace your gym exercises no matter if you are at home, at a hotel or even at the beach. My experience with P90X has taught me that not only is it possible to get a top class workout at home, but also that the workout that I impose on my kids at gym every year is a reflection of my own insight into that area. Without even knowing it I had developed a workout regime that could very easily have served as an at home workout for anyone willing to put in the time and effort.

Speaking of gym, I am going to start (hopefully) to develop the conditioning for the year before we start, that way I will have lists defined, workout schedules made and a well balanced approach to their fitness ready to go. Much as I enjoy making stuff up as we go, it does make me stressed and can occasionally lead to unbalanced workouts. So this year I hope to incorporate some of the Plyo and other P90X stuff into the conditioning and to have a set of workouts of various lengths I can pick from.

Day 37 – The Wobblies

Plyometrics.

I decided today that I would workout as soon as I got back from work instead of eating, resting and working out at arounnd 6pm. My legs were weak and wobbly, and I am not sure if it was due to lack of food or just that I was tired after the weekend cardio. Either way, the workout was hard today, my quads were burning for a lot of the time but since I am very familiar with the Plyometrics program now it was easy to focus on the finish line and power through the pain. I have to be careful doing this due to my back issues, once my legs get weak, my back has to take an additional load which can lead to my nerves pinching again. However, I seem to be pretty good at pushing just far enough these days that I got an amazing workout and didn’t cripple myself.

It has been raining here the last few days, but the humidity that Toronto is known and despised for has returned. Today I was drenched in sweat since I work out in the gym in the basement with the patio doors open. There was a warm, sticky breeze and the air was difficult to get any refreshment from. Luckily I had my freezing cold water to help but the relief was agonizingly temporary. I felt at times like I was inside an oven staring through the glass door trying to get out… Not a comfortable feeling at all.

Day 36 – Week 6 Begins – The Grind.

I feel like I am in that no-man’s land between the start and the finish. It’s that part of the race where you are too far from the start to be beginning but too far from the end to be excited about finishing. This is the grind. I expect that phase 2 will be like this the whole way through although I will be excited once I finish week 7 and get to have an easy week until the final push into Phase 3. It’s a good job that I am enjoying the new workouts because that is what will keep me going into Phase 3. I am a little concerned that Phase 2 doesn’t do much tricep work in comparison and tends to concentrate on back but then again I was always a chest guy so I am probably over sensitive to the imbalance.

So today I learned that one more rep is not always a good thing. I was doing these butt raised shoulder press things where you have your feet on a bench, your butt up in the air so that there is a straight line between your hands on the floor and your butt all the way through the shoulders. As you press you are actually using your shoulders almost like a handstand pushup but with your legs resting on a bench. However, the higher you put your feet, the closer it is to an actual handstand pushup and as I struggled to do one last rep with my ass in the air my arms very slowly gave way landing the top of my head on the padded floor with a resounding “thump”. I was not amused, especially since my instinct was to stand up but because my arms weren’t working I couldnt stand up either. So I lay on the floor for a minute or two staring at the unpainted ceiling and wondering if I should try that again.

Day 35 – Couch Surfing

It’s Sunday. Rest Day. Cardio day not stretch X.

Nicole worked floor hours this morning and I stayed on the couch attempting not to sleep through the Hungarian Grand Prix. With Lewis Hamilton finally getting the success he deserves it should have been easy but even with the excitement of wheels falling off the cars I was unable to see the whole thing in once sitting. What is really weird is that no matter how far I rewound the DVR to watch it again, I always woke up with 4 laps to go.

I finally managed to finish the race and squeeze in a 40 minute jog on the treadmill. I then set about trying to get motivated to get back in the garage to finish some of the outstanding issues however with the rain and the thunder and so on I decided I would have a leftover steak from the BBQ yesterday and power nap my way through the afternoon.

One thing I can say about P90X is that I don’t feel at all guilty taking a day off like I used to. I know I am working hard enough to earn that rest time and even more importantly I know that I am working so hard that my body REQUIRES that rest time. Me, the couch and the cat, like the Three Musketeers were inseparable.

Did I feel guilty about not stretching? Not really, I actually stretched before and after my run this morning so I really didn’t feel like I was missing out. I spent the rest of the day in front of the computer sorting and reviewing photos and making sure the backups were done and so on. I was astonished at how many pictures we have at home but compared to people with kids I am sure we are still pretty much bush league. I have 10,000 pictures in my TO SORT folders, imagine going through all that!

Day 34 – Tricking myself.

I find myself in the routine, able to predict how sore or tired I will be and looking forward to the Sunday rest day when I can do a little cardio on the treadmill or outside and take a day off from beating myself up. This is not a bad thing, it is not a rut, it’s a routine. I have been trying to imagine in my mind what the basement would look like if I knocked out a wall down there and created an entire room for the gym instead of having the small desk and the couch against the wall. Other than the aesthetic appeal, I don’t think it would give me much more functional room. Having spent lots of time thinking about moving stuff about in the house I spent the majority of the day, while Nicole was out at a Trainers course, cleaning up the garage and rearranging all the shelving etc. It was a monumental job to do and I was really proud once I finally got round to starting it. It still requires some finishing touches but for now the garage is almost done. Once it is finished I can get to work building and fixing all the stuff on my list including the TV shelf, the stereo in the Jeep and maybe even getting started on taking the wall down in the main living room.

The reason that I mention all this is because I was astonished at my energy levels and mobility. Usually I overcome the shortcomings in my flexibility or range of motion with brute strength. This time however I found myself bending and twisting into corners without a problem, preferring to inch myself into tight spaces to get the job done instead of my past solution of getting a bigger hammer. What is even more weird is the fact that as I was contorting myself around the shelving units I caught myself thinking of the name of the yoga pose I was in. Tres bizarre.

Even after a day of work in the garage I was still able to get the Kenpo workout done. As usual, I was not sure I would be able to do it however a long, long time ago I made a deal with myself regarding my workouts. The deal was that when I didn’t feel like going to the gym I would go anyway and if I still didn’t feel like it after the first 10 minutes then I was allowed to leave. I wasn’t allowed to quit up front without trying but I was allowed to throw in the towel if I had at least tried. Up to this day I have never caved after that first 10 minutes even though there have been countless days where I have made the deal with myself. Today was one of those days. I though I would do the warm-up and see how I felt. Doing that is kind of like giving a dog a bone, once I have it, I won’t give up. Around 10 minutes in I found myself pushing harder, trying to improve on my last session and I laughed a little at my ability to trick my own lazy subconscious. I felt good enough that after I was done I took some day 34 pictures to show my 1/3 distance progress. I still haven’t decided if I will publish those photos…