P90X

I decided to spend a little time this afternoon looking through a couple of the routines I'm trying to build the strength to actually finish. I didn't look through the first one because I can actually finish it. Don't be too impressed, though, because I'm doing girl push-ups and using a chair for my pull-ups, lol! It's the best I can do right now. This is what I learned by watching the full videos:

02 Plyometrics:
There are 6 groups. All of them repeat once. There is so much jumping in this routine that I should probably wear better shoes (I workout barefoot :)

So far I've regularly completed 2 complete groups and have been working on my 3rd. I believe this workout will take me a while to master before I even gain enough strength to go deeper and jump higher.

03 Shoulders and Arms:
There are 5 groups that repeat once. This one drives me crazy as there are so many bicep curls. I've regularly completed 2 complete groups and have tried to start and 3rd quite a few times. I'm just so tired of MORE bicep curls that I quit. So, I've determined to reduce my weight on the bicep curls in order to allow me to complete the workout. I've only been using 8 lbs! This has been enough weight to make me struggle toward the end of my sets. But, going again and again and again with these bicep moves is too much. For the sake of actually continuing with the workout, I will reduce my weight.

05 Legs and Back:
This one is a killer. By the time I have mastered this workout I should be looking really good. Then, to actually give it deeper squats, increased weight, etc, I should have buns of steel. This workout is crazy! Anyway, there are a total of 23 exercises. The pattern is to do two types of lower body moves and then give the legs a break by doing a type of pull-up. However, because I'm not following the P90X program as recommended, I choose to pass over the pull-ups because if I follow my own plan I would be doing them the next day in the next workout.

So, there are 8 types of pull-ups. This leaves 15 lower body exercises, of which I have only regularly completed 5! I've made it through two more a couple of times, for a total of 7. I have a long way to go. There isn't much I can do to alleviate the difficulty of this workout. Some of the moves call for weights and most of them call for my own body weight. All I can do is resist going too deep so that I may have the strength to complete the workout.

The Goal
Much of my goal is to finish these workouts for the endurance while building strength and muscle through the exercises. The question is raised whether the goal should be to finish the workout by reducing weights, not going so deep, or jumping so high and so on, or rather to give each move my absolute everything and stop the entire workout when I've reached my max. I'm not sure which solution is ideal. Until I have different information convincing me otherwise, I will make it a goal to finish the workout. Then, as I build strength I will increase my weights, go deeper, and jump higher as my strength allows.

Actually, I do have information that contradicts this plan in one of the articles I reference in this blog, No Pink Dumbells. They argue that in order to build muscle I must be using weights that allow me to barely finish the last two reps, and to do less reps vs more in order to afford me heaver weights to build the muscle necessary to burn the fat. At first I thought that wouldn't be a good idea as I don't want to become bulky; however, they pointed out that saying that I didn't want to lift weights because I don't want to become bulky is like saying I don't want to run around the block because I'm not interested in running a marathon. In order to become bulky I would have to follow this method for a lot longer than necessary to loose the weight. The reason I have decided that my first goal should be endurance is because I don't have any. I can do something for a short period of time, but I need to build up my lungs and.... my endurance. So, that has become a first goal. I feel that I will meet that goal by actually finishing each video. Then, after that goal has been met I will work on increasing the difficulty. What I've caught myself doing as I build strength, especially with the Plyomectrics, is going a little deeper and jumping a little higher. I allow myself a little latitude, but try to hold back a little bit because it will prevent me from being able to continue further into the workout.

Sunday Weight-In

Why do I even bother!? I feel I'm back to where I started a few weeks ago. Of course, I've not eaten really good all week and I only worked out twice. On Monday, I did P90X's Arms and Shoulder's and Tuesday, I did P90X's Lower Body Workout. Then, by Wednesday my poisen ivy on my arm was so bad I couldn't think of doing much, let alone something that would make me sweaty and likely scrap my breakout. Also, I was struggling with sleeping and wasn't getting up early enough to dedicate time to exercising. All week I found myself not eating all morning and not eating really well at night. Now I have to find the motivation to begin, AGAIN! :(

This week's weight-in: 1(?)3.6

Tomorrow morning I don't plan to workout because we will be working in the garden as a family. That will wear me out. I can't do both. :(

Sunday Weigh-In

I almost forgot to weight myself this morning and did so after I showered, with wet hair. I wonder how much that made a difference? I really didn't make any progress this week, but then again I worked out only three times, went out to eat at an all you can eat restaurant on Saturday night, and then went to DQ on the way home and had a small vanilla cone dipped in chocolate. I also didn't eat perfectly all week. I didn't eat junk; Saturday's exception. I just didn't eat and then was desperate toward the evening. In reality, I'm glad I didn't go UP!

My new weight is 1(?)3.4. That's two ounces more from last week. It must've been the wet hair, lol!

I've decided to start with the upper body workout this week. Basically, I will be reversing the order of the video's I've been doing because I'm getting strong with the first two, but not the last two.

I will have a challenge tomorrow. I'll share that on Tuesday :)

This Week...

This week I did....

Monday: P90X 01
Tuesday: P90X 02
Wednesday: P90x Shoulders and Triceps
Thursday: I didn't work out - I had a lot of cleaning to do and was worried about exhausting myself and not being able to finish it. It was a good thing, too, because the cleaning exhausted me.
Friday: I didn't work out using a video, but I did in what I tried to accomplish outside. I moved only 6 bricks. They are over a foot squared and about 2 inches thick. I could barely lift one and three of them over-taxed my wheelbarrow. Then, I dug up some huge plants and transplanted them to where the bricks had been. I had planned to complete a huge area, but only finished about 3 square feet. Uhhhggg! I worked harder than I had I done the Plyometrics and Shoulders and Triceps workout together! Hubby asked me what I wanted from DQ and I told him, "nothing". Although, later that night I wish I had said, "yes!"
Saturday: No workout. Have finished cleaning house and have a young teenage boy here who will hopefully help me finish the bricks! :)

Starting Again!

Well, It's been about a month since I started working out again. When my tops began to feel tight and my "fat" dresses that I've worn for the past 5 years during my weight gain are no longer fitting, I feel that I've reached the point of deciding in which direction I am heading. It's time to get serious. I'm going to post to the right of this blog my weight loss record, without disclosing the actual pounds (because I'm too embarrassed, yet). I really don't like to weight myself because if I'm not loosing, then I've always become discouraged and stopped and if I'm loosing sufficiently, then I over-reward myself with sabotaging snacks and slothfulness. Still, I've decided to weight myself on Sunday mornings to be able to track my progress and patterns.

I say I've started a month ago, but in reality I started a few months ago. I would lift a few weights here and there throughout the week, but nothing much more than more than doing nothing. (If that even makes sense). When the weather became warmer I would walk about 45 minutes. I had tried walking to my parents for my very first walk of the season and that turned out to be a big mistake. They live just over 3 miles away and it was too much for breaking me in for the season. I spent the next week treating a hurt ankle caused by walking on the side of a country road for over an hour. My dad had to drive me home, lol! He helped me measure the road that circles in my neighborhood and it turned out I would need to walk around it 5 times to equal the distance to their house. So, for the next two weeks I built up my strength to walk 5 times around the neighborhood. Then, the Sunday I determined enough was enough, my "fat" dresses were no longer fitting, I walked to my parents home AND back! I walked every day in the evening and did the P90X in the morning. I stayed away from ALL junk food and ate moderate and correct portions for each of my meals. I lost 4 pounds that week. It was exciting, but I didn't believe it, either. Really! I didn't believe it because I knew in the past I would loose some, gain some, loose some, gain some and so on. I really never lost anything because it would come back on again. Down 3, up 2, down 1, up 3, etc. I waited until the next week and found that I had put 2 more pounds on. No surprise. The next week I lost some more. That was 3 total weeks. Then, I lost control of my sleeping schedule, was stressed out about a deadline, and was given a huge box of cheese popcorn for Mother's Day that I took a week off. I put a little back on. Today, I started again.

That first week of walking AND P90X was the last week of walking. The gnats came out and I would have eaten a bunch in order to walk. My schedule has been like this:

Mondays: P90X, 01 Chest and Back. This is a tough workout for me because I cannot do a full pushup and cannot even do a pull-up. So, I do girl push ups and use a chair to allow me to do a pull-up. My goal was to make it through the entire video, which I've achieved. For most of the push-ups and pull-ups I'm doing 5 each, with the exception of regular ones which I did 8. Because I'm feeling stronger I increased my push-up count to 8 for each and 12 for the regular. I'm only feeling slightly stronger for the pull-ups. It's going to take time, for sure. I just don't have the strength. The only exersize in the video I do not do are the dive-bomber push-ups. Since I cannot even do a full push-up, then those are impossible for me at this time.

Tuesdays: P90X, 02 Plyometrics. My goal was to complete the video. I'm still working on it. I've made it through the third routine. Today, I was about to start the fourth and realized I'm just not ready. It's MORE jumping and I just finished a bunch of jumping and can barely keep myself going. I need a few more weeks of going through the 3 and then I'll add number 4.

Wednesdays: P90X, Shoulders and Biceps. I will have to make note of how far I go in this one. There are so many bicep moves that my elbow areas begin to hurt before I really feel I've maxed out my muscles.

Thursdays: P90X, Legs and Back. I skip the back in this because I return to first workout for Friday's. The legs I work on until the wall squats. Last time I was able to make it a few more moves before I was finished.

Fridays and Saturdays I return to the first two workouts. At least that's the plan. I don't like the other two workouts he has for those days and I need to build my strength for the first two, so I return to them. However, only one of the weeks did I even remotely do this. To be quite honest, it seems every single week I find a day, or two, that somehow I don't workout. So, I make sure I get through these four workouts once.

Well, that's a quick rundown of my month and plan. Wish me luck.... I need it!