Chest – Page 3 – Something Beats Nothing Every Time

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 29 – Phase 2. Bring the Pain!

So here I go, all soft and fuzzy after my week of rest only to be thrown to the lions. I still have to install my chinup bar in the basement but since today is Chest, Shoulders and Triceps hopefully I won’t need it yet. However, I should put it up before I am too sore to lift my arms to brush my teeth tomorrow.

The only thing more difficult than the airborne clapping pushup… and I am not THAT crazy!

Nicole decided to join me today, I am guessing she is on the P9X program where you can work out once every 9 days and still look amazing. Not that I am bitter or anything… Anyway, the workout was a real treat. It was difficult enough to have me sweating bullets again, simple enough that you didn’t have to skip back on the DVD to understand the movements and best of all there were no repeat movements. Even though it is good to have repeats so you can really push yourself, the time flies by if you do a list of completely new exercises instead. The program consisted of 24 movements, some compound shoulder/arm/chest motion, some isolation exercises. I knew it would be hard given that I had taken an easy week but even so during the workout I was amazed that I was able to push myself harder and make it through most of the workout doing max reps. I also made full 25 reps on at least 1/2 of the Ab Crippler exercises which shocked me. My hip flexors must have thought that last week was just brilliant with no AR… So much for that.

I did find that my wrists started getting sore at one point, I suppose I should really be using push up bars to protect my wrists knowing that I have carpal tunnel in both wrists as it is. The history on that is I woke one morning last year with a sore rhomboid muscle and a weird tingling in my arm. After a few hours I found that I had lost the feeling in half of my right hand (and of course I am right handed!). I was not able to feel anything in my 4th and pinkie fingers or down that side of my hand. What was far more distressing than that was the fact that I had barely any grip strength in my hand. I had trouble holding on to a 45lb plate with my hand in the coming days which really scared me. I went to see a neurologist (nerve guy ) who told me a couple of things. First, the fact that I have no feeling in my right shin and zero reflex in my right knee since my back surgery is permanent. Second, the nerve test on my hand said that PROBABLY I would get the feeling and the strength back. Enter the ridiculous medical community and their inadequate testing equipment. “Grip this” he said, giving me a handheld grip strength monitor. I crushed it. My grip strength in my right pathetic hand was still off the chart regardless of the fact that it was about 50% of my left hand. It was actually so bad that I could no longer do chinups at the gym because I couldn’t hang on to the bar with my right hand. Anyway, long story short he said that it was radial nueropathy known as Saturday Night Palsy because it usually happens when people get drunk, pass out and trap their arm underneath them, pinching the nerve. Either that or (and he was disturbingly casual about this next part) I had degenerative disc disease in my neck and my vertebrae were crushing my spinal cord. Nice! This was disturbing because I was at one time diagnosed with DDD in my spine as part of my MRI’s for my back. Taking a look at my massive head (orange on a toothpick!) you would think that he would be more inclined towards the spinal-neck-vertebrae-crushing thing, but apparently not.

So, that is the history behind my wrist/arm/hand/neck problems and it is the reason why, after his diagnosis of carpal tunnel in BOTH wrists, that I have some wrist pain when doing pushups. Nicole said it was due to me doing not only clapping pushups but AIRBORNE pushups with Tony, but I don’t think so *wink*.

Day 15 – Honeymoon pants

Today is the start of week 3. This is identical to 1 and 2 but this is the last of that specific rotation. This means this is my last week to try to perfect this sequence of moves. This in itself is a big motivator for me. I know the workout, I know the kind of intensity and the length and I can really push myself to try and perfect the total exhaustion point to be at the very end of the workout. I have not moved Ab Pooper X yet, however I think that I may do that for the next phase. I just think my abs are too tired at the end of the regular workout to get a really solid flex that will provide a good failure point.

L.L.Bean - Great store in the North East US. Dropped by an outlet during our honeymoon and just loved their stuff. You can order online too! — L.L.Bean - Great men's outdoor stuff.

This morning, although my weight does not seem to be moving much, I put on my pants that I bought 2 years ago during our honeymoon. We went to the L.L.Bean outlet in Portland Maine as part of one of our excursions from the cruise. They had the greatest outdoorsy type stuff for men. I would say it is like Roots a little, just more rugged and a little less poserish. I was also very happy to find that you can actually buy online and they will ship to Canada, something they only started last year! The point of buying them was as a reward for losing the 45lbs I lost for the wedding. They fit pretty well and they were the smallest pants I had bought in years. Since then they haven’t seen much action. I gained about 20lbs in the couple of months after the wedding while basically not caring what I ate. As time progressed I was out of the gym basically being a lazy ass and not eating well and of course, as you would have predicted, gained most of the weight back. Not to be too hard on myself at my highest weight which was very, and I mean VERY close to 295lbs I was not working out at all so I was just pudding. After I gained some of the weight back I was 15lbs less and I was working out 5 days a week so the body composition was significantly different. I am currently sitting around 255-260 at about 22% fat according to the scale at home.

Chest and Back.

The only flaw I can find with the back routines here is that there is no work up to the pullups. Since I don’t use a support, a chair or whatever, I find that going straight in to full bodyweight pullups is difficult and is causing me some elbow pain. I think the resolution is to have some kind of support for the first sets and then work up to the full weight. It’s a little frustrating but as my bodyweight reduces I suppose I will get better. I can’t imagine trying to do chin ups with a 45lb plate around my waist, or even a 25 for that matter. So being 20 lbs lighter will no doubt help.

The pushups are cake, all except the diamond pushups which I find hard on my wrists. It is a good tricep workout but I think since I have a bench with weights in the basement that maybe I will substitute some heavy close grip bench presses for the diamond pushups. I am still really struggling with doing Abs after the main workout and I don’t seem to be improving in that area as much as others. What to do…

Day 8 – Week 2 already!!!

Chest and Back.

Week 2 here we go! Only 82 more days to go!

I awoke this morning feeling like someone had thrown up in my mouth for me. It was a truly disgusting feeling that I could easily have predicted had I thought about it. I was too busy bidding on Versace and David Beckham cologne to realize that in just a short few hours all the garbage food I put into my body would literally revolt on me. It was my own fault, nobody forced me to eat those wings or the meatballs. I need to work on my foresight because I dreaded the idea of having to work out this afternoon. Part 1 of my recovery was to do a quick couple of miles on the treadmill after which I really did feel better. Drank some juice, had a salad for lunch and the memories of spinach dip and nacho chips was fading fast. We went to Costco in the early afternoon and got rained on in the parking lot and then watched some TV until it was time to work out. Nicole requires naps during the day, so once she was napped out it was time to go.

Week 2 – Just do week 1 again apparently. I have included in my files a copy of the schedule for you to check out for yourselves. It’s over to the right in the links section.Â As you can see, weeks 1-3 are the same then you take a week off but I may do some short strength training in that week it depends on how I feel my progress is coming along.

Today was tough. After the workout was over I have to admit I felt like a bit of a failure. My strength seemed to leave me so soon, I felt like my Ab Rubber X workout was not up to par and I was not as tired as I was last week. However, once I looked at the sheets, I realized I had done more this time around. My chinups were better, my abs were almost 50% of the total workout which blew me away considering how crappy I felt. Speaking of Ab Ripper, I find that I am just too tired to do it at the end of the workout effectively. I may try to work it in at the start afterÂ warm upÂ Â instead. I am also finding that my affection for Crunchy Frog is diminishing. It is starting to hurt my back doing what are basically horizontal V-Snaps. Besides, I haven’ t ever really noticed frog abs so I am confused as to why we would be doing these! I find that the Fifer Scissors are fine, but doing the bicycles only 2 moves in to the sessionÂ really taxes my hip flexors and I am at failure very quickly. There are 11 moves, all of which I cannot name off the top of my head and I can do at least a handful of most of them (that sounds like I really suck at abs doesn’t it?). I cannot, for the life of me, do any leg climbers. I am not sure who invented this ridiculous movement or what they were thinking, but I substitute V-Snaps instead since I hold the movement in the highest of contempt and refuse to even attempt to become proficient at it.

I had the same pain in my elbow doing pullups, mostly during bicep involved close grip motion. It doesn’t really hurt doing front grip like we do at gymnastics or doing hammer grip so I can’t really say it is hindering me. It is also in my left arm only which is not the bicep that I tore so it’s a bit of a mystery to me why so painful. As far as numbers of reps go I am almost able to keep up with Tony in the video except of course on the 25 chinups per set. Part of it is because I am using the door hanging chinup bar that I fell off the first time I put it up so I am a little nervous. I do weigh significantly less than I did back when I did that and I have fixed the door frame myself so it should be OK. It just looks a little flimsy. Maybe I should install a solid metal bar instead. However I am past 12 reps on the chinups for some sets, mostly even the second round I am doing 10 per set. That equates to a minimum of 60 unassisted chinups per session. Not bad considering I have never been able to do chinups until this year (until I really tried). They were never a part of my workout routine, mostly because being a young, egomaniacal gym rat you just don’t do bodyweight exercises, they are for girls and the kind of guy who shops at Lululemon,Â works out in spandex shorts and a cycling topÂ and has a wardrobe full of Abercrombie and Aeropostal shirts. Anyhoo… after the workout I was conmpletely wiped. I lay on the floor of the gym for a good 10 minutes listening to the DVD intro music and wishing I was on the couch. I finally managed to get enough strength back into my arms to get up and head upstairs. Week 2 – Just like week 1 but more painful…

Here I go. Day 1, time to “Bring It”.

June 19th, 2009. D-Day.

So this is an off the cuff decision for me, deciding to jump into P90X without much pre-thought. It’s probably better this way, no trepidation or anxiety leading up to the kickoff. Just a day to think “will I regret this?”. I know Tony, and by ‘know’ I mean we spent some time together last year in my basement while I took on the original P90 program.

From what I can recall, I hate Tony. He represents so many failed attempts and a goal that seems simply unachievable. Simply put, I hate him because at this point, I hate myself for what I have become.

Maybe this will be better, but I think it is what he represents more than him as an individual. I am sure my charity won’t extend past this afternoon so that is all I am going to say for now.

Lunch was a bit of a disaster, I haven’t actually read the nutritional guide yet so blissful in my ignorance I had BBQ for lunch with the work gang. Needless to say I am sitting here in a meat coma thinking of how I am possibly going to “bring it” without “bringing it up” later in the basement. Also, I have not actually set the floor in the basement yet with the extended floor mats. We currently have half the basement as the gym, I will need to extend that to the full room if I am going to have the space to do this P90X thing. So when I get home I have to fix the floor, find a workout book, towel, mat and arrange the dumbells ready for the program. Big day, I can feel it!

Let me just say that I consider myself to be in decent shape. I can do a hundred pushups, a couple hundred crunches and a handful of full extension chinups without much effort. However, I am a static athlete. Most of what I do is with free weights and my strength is very limited to the range of motion. So even though I can bench close to 400lbs and shoulder press over 275lbs I am not necessarily “fit”. I know my cardio can use a little work since I do not run since my back surgery but I consider myself pretty strong. What I really want is what our kids at gymnastics have, all around flexibility and strength. I am at the age now where carrying such a large amount of muscle around is getting to be too much like hard work and I think it may be time to tone it down a bit.

11:10PM

Chest and Back

I sit here having achieved most of my goals for the day. Basement floor, check. Arrange workout stuff, check. Go to Supperworks and make a week of meals even though I forgot we were going, check. Bring it, check and check!

Tony warned us to take our time and pace ourselves and even though Nicole had a miserable attempt at day 1 yesterday I think today we brought what we could. The push ups were easy, I easily matched what the guys in the video were doing. Even the pull ups which I have spent the last year working on at the gym were fine. It was the Ab Ripper X (which I forgot we had to do for day 1) that killed me. I have an ab, just one, but a few minutes in it had admitted defeat and shamelessly abandoned it’s post. By the conclusion, I was unable to achieve a standing position, much less hold the upwards facing dog (which for me resembled a tranquilized chihuahua).

Given the adrenaline of it being day 1 and our unbridled enthusiasm I am not surprised we made it through. I am, however, Â surprised that my heartrate monitor stayed above 140 for almost an hour straight and that even though it was 3 hours ago now I am still a little shaken and more than a touch nauseous.

Welcome to day 1, the only thing I can guarantee is that I will feel a whole lot worse before I start to feel any better. But that is why they call it X!