The Fitness Ninja

One of the key reasons I hate missing or skipping workouts is that, miss enough of them, and I find myself completely lost in whatever schedule it is I’m trying to follow.  So… just to review day 64 and 65 (Saturday and Sunday) were a write-off as I was just too beat up by my cough / cold to do anything.  To add insult to injury, the healthy meal of portabella mushroom sandwich and salad I thought was doing me good at the Cheesecake Factory was, in fact, slowly killing me with its delicious goodness as it clocked in at over 1,000 calories for basically one sandwich.  How can a vegetarian sandwich be so heavy?

It’s probably due to that tasty house balsamic vinegar type sauce they slather it with.

At least when we got home yesterday after the six hour drive back from Rochester, I followed through on my goal of finishing Chest, Triceps & Shoulders along with ARX.  I know it should have been Cardio Abs but as I didn’t have the dvds on hand in the basement on the time, I decided to sub ARX in its place.  I’ll do the two Cardio Abs session tomorrow and Friday.  Everything about the workout was sluggish as hell (as expected when you consider the factors) and I was a couple reps short on a bunch of the sets.

Damn it.  I know what my goals are, where I want to be and how I want to feel come summer but instead I am so lethargic despite working out.  I have some real reservations about where I’ll be at the end of this phase as I still feel ‘paunchy’ if you know what I mean.

As for today’s workout, I did Core Cardio & Balance.  I’m still feeling a bit under the weather and still have a few problems breathing so I decided not to opt for what was originally on tap: the killer Max Plyo.  Don’t think there’s any way I would have survived that.  I’ll tack that on at a later day to some other workout.  Or maybe I’ll just do it after the third recovery week.  Who knows? It just has to get done.  Speaking of which, I tacked on the last 15 minutes of Yoga Belly 7 that I didn’t get around to doing last week.

K… enough of my excuses.  I’ll be sure to ‘bring it’ tomorrow for Back & Biceps.

Today was a bit of a whirlwind day.  Went to downtown Toronto to take in some of the holiday spirit and crazy buzz of the city during Christmas.  The Eaton Town Center was swarming with last minute shoppers.  Treated myself to lunch down there: 6 inch roast beef Subway sub with baked lays chips (130) and a bottle of water.  Then as a dessert I bought a small non-fat raspberry frozen yogurt for myself.  These things are awesome! So filling and only 110 calories per serving.  Man, I wish I could make these at home.

In any case, the trip home from the city was brutal! What was supposed to take 50 minutes spanned into 2 hours.  Miscommunication between the train’s head office and the station we got stuck at resulted in transit buses being screwed up and at another station.  Apparently, the reason the trains were delayed (then later cancelled) was due to an accidental death at one of the stations.  What a horrible thing for a family to endure at any time of the year, but especially during the holidays.

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When I finally got back to my hometown there was an awesome dinner waiting for me at my sister-in-law’s place (my wife was there for a visit): roast beef with potatoes, carrots, corn and some Yorkshire pudding.  For dessert I had 2 small cubes of chocolate fudge and 2 cookies.  When I got home, I rested for a  half an hour then decided to tackle Chest, Shoulders and Triceps.

Thoughts on Chest, Shoulders and Triceps:   I really like this routine.  The common theme through all the exercises is “push” as there are almost no pulling motions (one of the sets near the end adds a row during a sequence but that’s it).  I guess what really stands out in my mind with this dvd is that Tony asks you to do some pretty crazy things which may seem impossible when you first view it.  For instance, halfway through the routine Tony asks you to do one-handed pushups.  Prior to doing P90x, I had never even attempted these.  And today, I was able to do 4 of them on each arm when it came time to execute.  When I first attempted them weeks ago, I could do a grand total of O as I was so burned down by that point in the routine.  It’s this kind of concrete measurable progress that really helps motivate one to stick to P90x in the long term (and do multiple rounds). Currently, I’m still trying to get totally airborn on the plyo pushups (I can do the clap but have problems getting the feet off the air).  There also seem to be a million variations on pushups to work both the chest and triceps during the routine (my favourite probably being the pike presses).

Anything else to add? Oh, this routine also has my favourite P90x personality in Phil the Attorney.  Not only is the guy built like a truck and aa complete monster when doing all the sets, he also has the cahones to tell Tony off when he gets in his personal space.

Interesting note: I actually threw up a little from pushing myself so hard during the routine.  Regurgitated roast beef doesn’t taste so good especially during side-to-side push-ups.  At one point I freaked myself out during a tricep extension as I thought I popped my shoulder.  The bone shifted in the socket and the weight almost came crashing down on me.  Needless to say, I decreased the weight immediately after that.

Food for today: In addition to what was noted above, I had PB&J whole wheat toast with a cup of juice for breakfast.

…how tough ab ripper X was.  Having just gotten off of my first recovery week, I was pretty stoked to get back to weight training.  Well, let’s just say that the Tricep, Shoulders and Chest routine handed my ass to me.  I had watched this video once before (on my iPod touch as I took my lunch breaks at work) and so I kinda knew what to expect.  Well, knowing what to expect and executing are two very different things.  I had to keep most of my loads pretty light switching between 10, 15, and 20 pound weights.  Really, the only time I could use 20s was when a press was called for and I had to actually dip to 5s during the weighted arm circles.  Geez those things make your shoulders burn.

Also, I knew that one handed pushups were in this routine and was really looking forward to trying them… I thought I would at least be able to do a few. NOPE!  By the time I got to them in the routine, I was kind burned down already and I had to settle for doing them on my knees (if I remember correctly, I think I was able to do 6 per hand).  Then returned the horror that is ab ripper X after all this… If there is one exercise that totally gets me in ab ripper which I still cannot do with any consistency after like 6 reps it is Fifer scissors.  I just cannot hold my legs up straight now matter how hard I try.  They shake and shiver then tumble down like a house of cards… which I just then promptly try and rebuild again for the next rep.  Ah well, it’s a journey after all… just gotta keep doing my best.

Food: oatmeal, cup of juice, 2 granola bars, string cheese snack, mix of shreddies, raisins, almonds, 4 mini chocolate bars (approx. 240 cal. for all of them / 60 each) DAMN HALLOWEEN and weak WILL!, pork and beans for dinner, 2 slices of pizza (chicken and tomato).

Here’s another great P90x results video…