Day 31 - Back & Biceps Workout

First day doing Back & Biceps. It's been over a week since I'd done a pull-up and it was tough. I'm still having to rely on having my foot on a chair to do them...one of these days I'll be able to do workout routines without the chair.

This is a really fun, although really tough, workout. The back exercises are basically doing a pull-up variation followed by a bent-over dumbbell raise variation. Working biceps are always a fun workout, and this routine has tons of variations of bicep curls. You don't have to be too far into the routine before you start really feeling the burn and having a crazy-tough time doing exercises that you know wouldn't normally be too hard if you hadn't been pounding those muscles so much already.

Day 30 - Neighbor issues...

So today I was 5 minutes into my plyometrics workout and I get a call from apartment management asking me to - as a courtesy to my downstairs neighbors - keep it down with whatever I'm doing up here.

Now I know that my working-out isn't silent down there (inspite of the mats I bought to try to dampen the sound), but with most of my exercises there only 5-10 minutes of warming up where I'm doing things like jogging in place or jumping jacks that they'd hear down there. And when they called it was about noon...not really a time when I'd be disturbing people sleeping. Ugh...I just really annoyed me.

I'm going to try to do my plyometrics workouts somewhere else (probably at my parent's house) from now on, since it's the only workout I do that is constant jumping around. As far the rest, I don't know...Maybe do the warming up bare-footed would help? Or I could step outside into the stairwell for the warming up jogging in place & jumping jacks? I dunno...

Day 29 - Chest, Shoulders, & Tricep Workout

Today was the first day of Round 2 and my first time with this workout. It was a tough, good workout! By the last few exercises I could hardly do them because my muscles were just so stinkin' tired.

The whole workout consists of 8 exercises for each of the 3 target muscle groups, so you end up doing 24 exercise, first a chest one, then a shoulders, then a tricep, then another chest, etc...

The last chest exercise is a 1-armed push-up...oh my goodness. Not only are they BRUTAL, but at the point in the workout I hardly had a prayer. I ended up only doing 3 on each side, and that was with being on my knees instead of my toes. Yikes...This is tough stuff.

Afterwards, though, I felt great! Seriously! I went to the mirror right after, with my muscles all full of blood like they are right after a workout, and I looked huge! lol. This may be my favorite workout.

Day 28 - Last Day of 1st Recovery Week

Well this week has been my first "Recovery Week"...and it's been really, really nice. lol. My life's become somewhat crazy recently, so this week I really needed to do all of my workouts in the morning before work (meaning I had to be done by 7:00am), and this was the perfect week for it.

This week I got to do Core Synergistics, Yoga X, and X Stretch twice each. Plus one day of Kenpo X in there. It's really been a nice change. I'm excited to go back to hitting the weights, but the more relaxed workouts have been really nice.

I really think this week was a GREAT thing for my working out. I kindof expected to feel a little weaker, somehow, but I don't. I feel really good, actually. The only thing that didn't happen this week that I REALLY hoped would was my neck/back injury healing from when I hurt it a couple of weeks ago...it feels much better generally, but it still starts aching from time to time.

I guess we'll see how the new workout goes tomorrow.

Day 23 - Core Synergistics

What a CRAZY workout Core Synergistics is!! It's not hard in the same way plyometrics or weight training is...it's something more along the lines of yoga, but not yoga. I've never done pilates, but I guess it's something like that.

Lots of endurance and core exercises. One exercise I had done in a gym class a long time ago was the Superman/Banana where you get on your belly but keep your arms and legs off the ground and outstreched like superman, then flip over onto your back still keeping your legs and arms off the ground in a superman position, then flipping back and forth between the two over and over....it's rough on the abs and back. Also things things like holding yourself in a push-up position for 10 seconds, then lowering yourself for the push-up and holding at the bottom for 10 seconds, then repeating.

I felt good afterwards. I was somewhat sore, but not at all exhausted at the end. I think I'm really going to like Core Synergistics days.

Day 19 - Pains...

Man, I don't know what's up. The whole time I've been doing P90X (in fact, starting a few days before) I've had some pain on the right side of my neck, but I was able to stretch sufficiently to make it not an issue during workouts. But then on Sunday I somehow tweaked the left side of my neck/upper back, and it's MUCH more annoying than the other pain. ALSO tonight while doing the Legs & Back workout my lower back (like, right behind my kidneys) has been super achy....SO obnoxious. I'm hoping the lower back achiness is just residual from my Yoga workout yesterday, and it's not my kidneys on the verge of blowing up or something.

I was SO exhausted by the end of my workout tonight. When it was finally done I didn't move straight into Ab Ripper X. Instead I took a break for about an hour & had my Recovery Drink (which I've grown to LOVE). Then after I felt good and rested I did the Ab workout...now I feel destroyed again.

Day 14 - The X Stretch

So I did the X Stretch workout today. It was nice. I'm serious. Calling it a "workout" is probably a misnomer...you never work up a sweat or anything, it's literally just a lot of stretching. You stretch your shoulders, arms, back, legs...pretty much you got it, you stretch it. I thought it was going to be weird and boring, but it actually felt really good to just really stretch out these muscles that I've been working out the last few weeks.

I can't guarantee that on all of my "rest days" that I'll do the X Stretch, but I don't see a reason not to do it.

Day 12 - A Tough Groundhog Day!

Happy Groundhog Day!!!

Today was VERY tough. I don't know what it was, but only about half way through the Legs & Back workout, I already started having thoughts about quitting. I'm not quite sure what brought it on...It's felt like the last few works has been becoming slowly easier, but today's seemed VERY tough. I made it through it, though!

I'm still not to the point where I can do even 1 pull-up without the assistance of my foot on a chair, but I can feel it coming! Seriously, if I could do just 1 or 2 all by myself, I'd feel great.

I did Ab Ripper X today, too! It's still BRUTAL, and I'm having to take lots of little breaks while the people on the DVDs continue to do reps, but I'm doing every exercise, which is a big step forward!!

Day 11 - Yoga!

Okay, I got to do the Yoga-X today. You may recall that last week I couldn't continue beyond 15 minutes into it...

So...the Yoga workout is long. But I have to admit that I felt really good afterwards. The first half is "Moving" poses, while the second half is "Balance" poses. I didn't think of Yoga as a sweat-enducing activity, but during the "Moving" poses section of this workout, I was sweating more than I have during any other workout I've done...I'm serious. It's tough. I ended up fast-forwarding through the last 10 minutes or so of the "Moving" section, 'cuz I was just so exhausted from doing them. The "balance" half is a much more relaxed series of poses, much more focused on stretching and flexibility rather than strength (although there definitely are some strength - especially that work the abs - poses in there).

When all was said and done I felt good about having done it and will definitely be doing it again next week. The biggest thing I learned is that my Yoga Matt is WAY too slippery! I found that when I moved to just the carpet that although I wasn't as comfortable, several of the poses (ESPECIALLY the downward-dog) became much easier. I guess when my hands were sweating that trying to hold some of those poses on the slippery surface of my Gold's Gym Yoga Matt (in spite of the little ridges in to), I was spending a lot of energy in keeping my hands stationary, whereas when I moved them to the floor my hands just stayed and I couldn't focus on the rest of the pose.