Round 4: Day 6: Super Cardio

Ow, ow, ow, OW! This is the feeling I used to get when I did Kenpo X the day after Legs and Back. Yesterday's Legs and Back workout left my butt in serious pain this morning. The cardio exercises in the first two rounds of today's workout contain a number of exercises which directly involve the glutes, the hamstrings and the quads, all of which were at some level of discomfort. Jumping and squatting was just plain nasty. Legs and Back, followed by Super Cardio is looking like a nasty combination.

I have never done this workout first thing in the morning, and it was a much tougher workout than I recall from when I did it a week ago near the end of the day. In some ways, it's more intensive than Plyometrics because of the jumping and twisting exercises which are foisted upon the unsuspecting participant from the start of the workout. At least Plyometrics starts easy, and works towards greater intensity. Not so with this series of exercises. I was really pleased to have survived the first two rounds of exercises, to reach the final round, consisting of Kenpo moves, which allowed my heart rate to drop a bit and to give my screaming legs a break. This workout looks like a keeper to me.

One thing I don't particularly like is the speedy yoga moves employed during the warmup period. I don't enjoy racing through yoga moves, but prefer to do them in a more relaxed, fluid manner. Also, I don't like doing yoga with my shoes on, which Tony acknowledges on the video as being more difficult. At least he understands that.

I do appreciate the extended warm-up and cool-down times; approximately 10 minutes for each. I'll take the warm-up more seriously next time, to better prepare for the lower body massacre which will ensue.

End of Week 1; looking forward to Week 2.

Round 4: Day 5: Legs and Back; Ab Ripper X

Legs and Back

Ouch. It's the first time I've done Legs and Back in quite some time, and I'm feeling it. Thanks to the cardio workouts in P90X+, my legs haven't been totally neglected; however, this is a workout which definitely has its place in any exercise program.

I didn't experience any specific difficulties during the workout; it's just that this workout is pretty intense. As usual, I found the standard and single-leg wall squats the most challenging, followed closely by toe-roll-iso-lunges and Groucho walk. The seemingly innocuous Groucho walk is deceiving; the lower you go, the more difficult it becomes. Staying low for the 45 second duration of the exercise is quite a challenge.

I did notice that I struggled a bit during calf raises. I haven't done any specific calf exercises for the last few months, other than the benefits that the cardio routines would bring. As a result, I found my calves burning. That's a sensation I didn't have when I was doing this workout on a weekly basis during the first two rounds of P90X. Again, it just points to the need for including leg exercises in a workout program on a consistent basis. I've tried to accommodate that requirement as part of Round 4. If I feel that legs are being neglected, I'll modify the program accordingly. It's still a work in progress.

Ab Ripper X

As usual, I jumped into ARX immediately upon my arrival home from the office. I really like doing this workout at this time; I'm usually energized, ready to blow off the extra stress and steam accumulated during the work day, and fully recovered from the morning workout. All good things.

The workout was definitely an improvement over Tuesday's workout. I was no longer sore in the abdominal area, as my body is becoming used to the exercises again, so it was basically an issue of mind over matter. I experienced some difficulties and discomfort during the first four moves (actually making me look forward to Fifer Scissors), and the last 10 Mason Twists found me starting to lose my balance a bit, but overall, I'm improving. I'll likely be back in form towards the end of next week, when I'll have had the opportunity to complete a few more ab workouts.

Round 4: Day 4: Yoga

Before getting into Yoga, a brief word about yesterday's afternoon ARX:

Upon returning home from the office, I jumped into my shorts and did a round of ARX. My abdomen was still rather sore from Sunday's Killer Ab routine, and I probably should have done some preliminary stretching before playing the DVD, but didn't bother, thinking that within a short period of time, my abs would stretch out and be just fine. I did experience some pain during the routine. I expect this to dissipate over time, as my body becomes accustomed to the workout regimen.

The workout went reasonably well. I struggled a bit on crunchy frog, as my hip flexors were feeling rather worked over by that time, and had some form issues during oblique V-ups when laying on my left side, as well as a small stamina problem during Mason Twists, struggling to complete the final 10 twists during the bonus round. All of these issues are minor and will disappear.

This morning, I was up bright and early for Yoga X. I haven't done this workout since I discovered Fountain of Youth from Tony's One on One series some months ago (about 4 months ago, I believe) and I discarded Yoga X in favour of the shorter FOY disc. I decided to bring back Yoga X into Round 4 on a regular basis, because there are moves in Yoga X which have been expunged from FOY: right-angle pose with hand grab, balance postures, bridge, plough to shoulder stand, and an extended Yoga belly 7. All these moves are, no doubt, good for me and I felt that I would benefit from the 90 minute Yoga X workout occasionally, to complement the more convenient but necessarily less complete 48 minute FOY.

It's nice to get back to a workout with which one is intimately familiar. I rarely had to look at the screen to perform a move; everything came back from memory. I was anticipating that some of the moves would prove difficult, because I had not assumed some poses for a long time, but surprisingly, moves which had given me fits (right angle pose with hand grab) were really easy. I'm really pleased that my body is still so flexible, in spite of the fact that I've been skimping on Yoga time. Perhaps I'll look into Tony's new One on One disc, Patience, Hummingbird.

Namaste.

Round 4: Day 3: Shoulders and Arms

Resistance is not futile. That's what's been missing from the P90X+ workouts. There's certainly some resistance training in both Upper Plus and Total Body Plus, but not like the pounding your shoulders, triceps and biceps get from the 1-hour long Shoulders and Arms P90X workout. Similar to Sunday, when this workout was over, I could barely lift my arms to wash my face.

When I work up this morning, I was still sore from Sunday's workout. My shoulders and arms were still stiff and pained, and I was still experiencing abdominal pain (muscular, not food or disease related) from the appropriately-named Killer Abs routine.

I liked returning to this workout and enjoyed the good, old-fashioned, push and pull exercises. Nothing too fancy, everything is pretty basic. I noticed some areas of improvement, using my final Round 2 numbers as benchmarks. Upper Plus has improved some of my shoulder strength, as straight arm flies were no problem. I increased the intensity of the curls by standing on the resistance bands with two feet (instead of one, as demonstrated by Daniel Haas). I used the blue band for the curls instead of the black band, as the black band handles are starting to chip and deteriorate, and, using 2 feet on the band, I slowed down the exercises, focussed on form, maintained my elbows in a static position, and tried to achieve an isometric hold at the top of the movement when the band is at its point of greatest resistance. This approach led to a nice burn, especially during the repeat round. Now, I just have to work out some of the kinks in my neck.

Later: Abs

Round 4: Day 2: Cardio Intervals

Day 1

The day started with 30/15 (One on One with Tony Horton), a routine which involves doing 30 pushups of various types, followed by 15 pullups of various types. 30/15 is a suggestion; following those numbers depends upon you level of strength and willpower, both of which diminish towards the end of the workout. I was able to maintain the 30 pushups until the last two exercises; then, chataranga pushups hit me, and my numbers dropped precipitously to 20 pushups. These pushups seem straightforward enough: 2 on the PowerStands, 2 on the floor, and repeat. The moving back and forth from the stands to the floor, combined with the slightly different type of stress the different pushup positions put on the body seemed to drain the energy from my arms, shoulders, chest and willpower. I found that at 20, I just couldn't get my arms to lift my body any more. Pullups were a different story. Using the black resistance band for each type of pullup, I decided to try for 20 on each round. Those were successful, so I know that I can increase that number, perhaps to 24 each, next time. I really liked this workout. It was somewhat different from Chest and Back (P90X) because it omitted Decline and Divebomber pushups, but it was still really challenging and really rewarding. I think that I've never done so many pushups and pullups in one workout ever. Love it.

Later in the day, I did Killer Abs from the One on One series. This is a combination of the Abs moves from Power 90 and Ab Ripper X from P90X. I've never done the Power 90 abs exercises, and found them to be challenging, especially the move where you twist your torso and do crunches which isolate the obliques. Huffing and puffing. The ARX moves were all familiar, of course, and I found them to be fairly easy, as Tony inadvertently omitted Wide Leg/Cross Leg situps, and only did 20 repetitions of each move. Still, the combination of both ab workouts made for an intensive workout. I really felt it in my obliques when I woke up this morning.

I also felt the 30/15 workout when I awoke this morning. My upper body was experiencing some pain which I haven't felt in quite some time. It feels good knowing that I'm once again confusing my body and challenging myself. I'm optimistic for this new workout regimen.

Day 2

The morning started with Cardio Intervals (One on One), which I had briefly previewed on fast-forward, but had not yet tried. I was a bit disappointed with the warmup sequence, which went a bit too fast for my liking; it also didn't really target the legs as much as I would have liked. I'll likely extend this warmup regimen in the future to ensure that I target the muscle groups I think need work. By now, I have enough experience to know that there are a variety of exercises available to warm up those parts of the body, and I know what my body needs.

It usually takes some time to become accustomed to exercise moves, and this disc is no different. The workout consists of 20 moves, each executed for 30 seconds, and repeated over two rounds, with a short break between rounds. Not surprisingly, when 20 moves are involved, some are going to be more intense and more enjoyable than others. It took me some time to work up a sweat, and, during the Kenpo moves, I felt my heart rate drop somewhat. It's a somewhat uneven workout, but I'll give it a chance. By the end of the workout, I was sweating, but nothing like Interval X Plus, or Plyometrics. I even felt that Super Cardio was more exerting than this; however, it deserves another chance. About 45 minutes after the workout, I did feel fatigued. On the plus side, there are a lot of moves which involve twisting the upper body, and that helped work out the kinks and soreness in my arms and shoulders, providing some much-needed relief from yesterday's 30/15 workout.

Tomorrow, back to P90X, with Shoulders and Arms.