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.