Second verse, same as the first

I'm working out again. p90X again. Remember that, from 2010? Yeah. I actually kind of like the workouts now, though. It's still a bit of a struggle to get myself in the mindset to work out, but I'm actually surprised to admit that when the videos are on, I'm pushing myself and not totally hating what I'm doing. I think I've come to the conclusion that I prefer strength training to straight cardio, which is completely counter to the mantra that women always hear that if we want to lose fat, we need to do cardio. The more research I do, the more I find that this isn't really entirely true, so that's encouraging, if only that it helps me feel that I'm on an exercise path that isn't a waste of time.

An abrupt change of plans

I decided that I'm going to start over on P90x. Basically this means that when I am better prepared, I am going to act as if that week was Week 1 again.

I was reading a little bit online about P90x yesterday. Previously, the research that I had done was basically to see if it really worked. Once I established that it did, I just kind of jumped right in, not knowing what to expect. Yesterday, I looked to read up on tips and advice that people had, and I wanted to get answers to some of my questions (I'm going to have to skip a day every now and then inevitably - what are the major consequences? After a skip, should I do the workout I should have done the previous day, or should I move on to the next day? What's the deal with the nutrition guide - is it really necessary?)

While I was finding answers to those questions, I also confirmed a couple of other things that I had suspicions about in my mind. One was that several people mentioned beginning the workouts and just doing them to get a feel for them before they actually started the program regimen. That way, their benefits wouldn't be compromised by being so out of shape that they wouldn't be able to do the full workouts, like I've been experiencing. Those people said that by doing a casual week or two of the workouts to just get their bodies adjusted to the idea of working out, they experienced much better results from Phase 1 of the program. I myself had been wondering how beneficial it would really be to have two throwaway weeks out of four in Phase 1.

Additionally, I'd mentioned before I have a couple of other problems. One is that I didn't have a pull-up bar, which is crucial for one of the workouts in Phase 1, and for two of the workouts in Phases 2 and 3. Another is that I just don't have the motivation (yet) to get up 40 minutes earlier every day that I have to do the Yoga workout.

So my plan is this: for the remainder of this week, I'm going to do some low-impact pilates stuff. I'm realizing that my weaknesses at the moment aren't in cardio, because I get through that stuff okay. Don't get me wrong - I'm tired after - but where I really fail is in the stuff that requires strength. So I'm going to do some pilates stuff to jut work on muscle control. In the meantime, I'm ordering the P90x chin-up bar online. When that gets here, I'll think about starting up the program again, but - I'm pushing back "Day 1" such that Yoga X day falls on a weekend. I'm potentially going to have to make adjustments during the recovery week and subsequent phases, when yoga will fall on days other than 4 like it currently does, but I'm hoping that by the time I get there I'll also be more mentally prepared for the routine and I'll be able to motivate myself to get up earlier.

I always knew getting on an exercise routine was as much of a mental challenge as a physical one, and I'm really learning that the hard way now. I've never liked "working out," so training my mind as well as my body is doubly difficult at this point in time.

One week down!

As of yesterday, I completed the first week of P90x, as best I could. For those wondering, the daily workouts for the first three weeks are:

Day 1 (for me, I started on Monday): Core Synergistics. As the title implies, this workout does focus on the core. It's not quite cardio, but with me being not in great shape this one definitely gets my heart rate up. The workout is all about engaging, so even if it seems like the particular movements aren't directly targeted at the core (like say, Ab Ripper X is), the power center of each movement is still meant to be the core. I'll definitely wake up tomorrow (Tuesday) with a sore butt and probably sore abs as well - at least, this is what happened last week.

Day 2: Cardio X. This workout incorporated some cardio-kickboxing type maneuvers, as well as other assorted aerobic motions/exercises that are meant to get the heart rate into your target zone as well as strengthen muscles.

Day 3: Shoulders & Arms + Ab Ripper X: This is a muscle-targeting day. It's weights-intensive for the shoulders and arms (whoda thunk it), so I definitely felt soreness in those areas the next day. This and parts of Core Synergistics are very tough for me because I've always been very weak on the upper body, so it's really difficult for me to get through the push-ups. I'm hoping that it won't take me *too* long before I'm actually able to complete the suggested repetitions. And Ab Ripper X is, well, basically what it sounds like. By far the hardest abdominal workout I've ever done, and I was unable to do full reps of this as well. By the time I get to the last exercise, my abs are jello and I'm pretty sure that I would look truly pathetic to anyone observing me try to do it. Again, it will be interesting to track not only the way my body changes visually, but how well I actually am able to complete the workouts themselves.

Day 4: Yoga X. This is the one I skipped last week, so I'll have to report back with how it goes. From flipping through the video, it looks like I can expect the usual P90x treatment, which is to say: yoga on steroids. It will in all likelihood be great for muscle strength and control.

Day 5: Legs & Back + Ab Ripper X. This day didn't go so well either, because nearly all of the exercises intended to target the back were pull-ups related. 1) I can't do pull-ups; 2) I actually don't have a pull-up bar. I'm headed to Sports Chalet (or equivalent) to get something like that to put in a doorway because I only really got the legs parts of this done last week. The routines were tough, but for me, very do-able compared to some of the other movements throughout the week - perhaps I still have a bit of residual leg fitness from years of dance and soccer? One can hope.

Day 6: Kenpo X. This was cardio, and fun! But hard, obviously. It was a lot of martial arts maneuvers: punching, kicking, etc. Toward the end of the rep sets, the video instructor suggested doubling the pace and making vocal fighting sounds (think hieeeeya!) to keep intensity up. At the beginning, I did double my pace but I refused to do the sounds. I was all, "I'm by myself, what difference does it make?" But by the end of the video, I was making sounds throughout the whole workout and wishing I had done so earlier. It really did make it more fun and easier to keep going! Sometimes people's crazy tricks actually do work.

Day 7: rest, or X stretch. Out of time constraints, I just opted to rest and not do the X stretch video. It was a nice day off!

I was back on Core Synergistics today. I had forgotten how much it sucked. Like I mentioned above, there were surprisingly a lot of push-ups. I had traditionally thought of push-ups as all upper-body, but the truth is that to really maintain good form and get maximum benefit, you really do need to control the core muscles to keep your body straight. Which makes it a great addition to Core Synergistics, but really tough for me because of the obvious upper-body element. I'm doing everything on my knees right now, which the video says is okay for beginners, but hopefully it won't be long before I can firm up and try the real deal.

First workout fail (kind of)

It's too soon to start blowing it, but I already missed the P90x scheduled workout today, which was "Yoga X." It went like this - I got up at my usual (new) early time, turned on the video, and found that it's nearly 40 minutes longer than all of the other workouts, presumably because yoga is less cardio and more sustained series of movements.

I did, however, turn on a Denise Austen pilates video I also have on my computer and did her core, hips, and thighs workout. I got a good little burn going and am proud of myself that I still pulled together a workout rather than just going back to sleep (so tempting), but paranoid and disappointed about skipping a day of the P90x regimen. Note to self: on yoga days, wake up even earlier. Ew.

A Mid-Winter Resolution

I am two days in (not many I know, but two days is better than zero) after starting the P90x workout, which is proclaimed far and wide across the Internets as being one of the most intense workout plans out there. I've seen results photos of real people not affiliated with program marketing that seem to indicate that yes, this program does deliver on its promise of whipping your body into shape in 90 days. This is something that appealed to me when I heard about it, because I've been thinking to myself for awhile about getting back into shape. I haven't gained a significant amount of weight in pounds, but I can see changes in my body that indicate that I've lost a lot of my muscle and gained back the volume it used to occupy in fat.

I've used other workout tapes periodically (8 minute abs, Winsor pilates, Slim in 6) but never for an extended period of time. P90x appealed to me because it first and foremost relies on a strict schedule of 12 different hour-long workouts that rotate every day, and the workouts really must be done daily in order for the program to be effective. I realized that I needed that kind of disciplined schedule to really motivate me to keep up with the program, because otherwise when left to my own devices it would be too easy to skip workouts.

And good lord would I have loved to skip today. I began yesterday doing the first workout to start off the plan, "Core Synergistics." It was really tough. Even though I know I've been out of shape, there was this small part of me that still thought in the back of my mind that I could probably handle it, having been pretty fit before. I was so wrong. It is so easy to lose your fitness and so hard to get it back. I could barely complete most of the reps in each set of exercises, and even worse, my form was (probably) terrible. I found myself staring longingly at the count-down clock in the bottom corner of the screen, begging for the hour to just end already. I did the workout in the early afternoon, and by dinnertime I was already feeling sore.

This morning, I woke up early (this is another terrible part of starting to work out - finding time in the day to do it. As it happens, the only truly plausible time occurs when I would usually prefer to sleep.) and felt the burn all over my body. The Core workout was a pretty telling lead-in to the program by helping me to realize that even though each workout targets one specific muscle group, the program is effective primarily because while targeting that group, everything else is engaged. My core is sore, sure, but so are my upper back, pectoral area, biceps, and triceps.

Somehow I got myself out to the family room to do workout #2: Cardio X. This workout had a nice, long yoga warmup, which I appreciated. Even though holding the warrior poses while my already sore thighs were trembling with despair was difficult, to say the least, the warmup got in some nice therapeutic stretching, which always feels amazing when your muscles are sore. It stopped being nice shortly thereafter. There was a cardio kickboxing twist to several of the moves, which was kind of fun, but again I was hit over the head by the fact that I am just not in good enough shape to do 25 minutes of sustained tough cardio without wanting to die. There were repetitions of movements, some of which seemed really stupid (a variation on jumping jacks called "Wacky Jacks" would have made me burst out laughing if I weren't more inclined to cry out of non-fit frustration), and even worse - some of my (least) favorite moves from Core Synergistics re-appeared in Cardio X in the last 5 minutes, when I would have hoped that the workout was going to wind down.

At the end of the day though - or at least in the middle of the day where I am now - I am kind of feeling like even though my body hates me at the moment, I'm still motivated to continue this workout. Partly it's because I feel like this kind of pain would only come out of something that's bound to make me stronger, and partly because I feel like this kind of pain would be all for nothing if I didn't keep going. It's a good hurt.