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Workout
OK, this is interesting to note… Today was supposed to be yoga day, but I forgot! I got through the warmup and stretch for the aerobic workout, because I figured yesterday was resistance, so today is aerobic again, right? Then I remembered that on the schedule, Friday is yoga day! Well, I wasn’t ready for that mentally, so I just went on and did the aerobic one.
That’s been my relationship with yoga ever since I started P90X. At first, I skipped it entirely and ran on the treadmill (which is not at all the same). After the first month or so, I gave it a try, and enjoyed it I guess, but I think it’s a common complaint that the P90X yoga workout (90 minutes of exercises and stretches) is pretty long for a weekday morning workout. A lot of weeks I would shorten it, or skip it and head back to the treadmill. Anyway, all that to say it’s not my first time skipping yoga. It’s only supposed to be 45 minutes, but I don’t know how easy it will be to follow along with the book.
Nutrition
The day started out pretty well, with butternut squash soup and brown rice for breakfast. I added vanilla whey powder to it, because I thought it would keep me from feeling hungry again too soon. I had nuts mid-morning, and then things started to go wrong…
Fridays at work we usually bring in Chinese food for lunch. Before I started this program, I had fallen into a rut of ordering General Tso’s chicken (battered and deep-fried, then covered in a sweet/spicy brown sauce). This time, I didn’t have the healthiest choice, which would have been steamed chicken and vegetables, but maybe it was the middle ground: Chicken with a brown garlic sauce, but not deep fried, vegetables, and brown rice. Added to that was hot and sour soup, a thick broth (probably some sort of starch thrown in) with mushrooms and tofu.
I had chocolate espresso beans for dessert, which have some sugar in them, and then, because I wasn’t really feeling the “kick” of the caffeine, I had a cup of coffee later in the afternoon anyway. Maybe I need that caffeine cleanse more than I thought? Honestly, I think I would do better with more sleep.
Adding insult to injury, my wife called to tell me she wanted to put aside our plans for bean burritos at dinner, and instead have some pizza. Ugh. So I had a couple of slices, and chased it down with plain yogurt and whey powder for dessert. Believe it or not, pizza is mostly fat and carbs without much protein.
In the end, I was over my recommended sugar intake by 23% (20 grams, about 4 teaspoons), but still low on protein, which leads to cravings. I had a calorie surplus of over 600. Not the best way to trim the fat.
Health and well-being
I took a peek at the scale and tape measure today, and there was no change since the beginning of the week. So far, I’ve had three days of (slight) calorie deficits, and two days where I was over by an average of 500 calories. I need to work on that next week for sure.
Workout
Today I returned to the Striver’s Resistance Workout, Phase 1. Once again, I was running late, so I ran through the two “circuits” once rather than twice. It took me 45 minutes to do whatever I did manage to accomplish, so I think some streamlining is required to complete this workout in under an hour. The weights I have require me to add and remove disks if I want to change weights, so that slows me down, too. For example, I need a lighter weight for the P90X bicep-building classic “21s” (as in 3 times 7 reps). For plain old bicep curls, I use a heavier weight and do 8-10 reps.
I took a first attempt at making a worksheet for tracking my weights and reps for these exercises. I also asked on Tony’s Facebook page if there are any worksheets available.
My next resistance workout is Saturday, so I should have plenty of time and energy to complete both circuits of this workout, right? I did a “bonus round” today, though. My son had his pull-up bar on the door, so I did a set of eight close-grip pullups, then came back a little while later and did eight more. Just for fun. Pull-ups are not included in this phase of the resistance workouts, but they will be back, with a vengeance.
Nutrition
No Zone Perfect bar today, and I did OK with nuts as a mid-morning snack. Of course, I didn’t complete my workout, either. I do find there’s a correlation between the difficulty of my resistance workouts and my cravings for protein. The week 1 P90X workouts made that very clear.
I’m starting to run out of the meals I prepared over the weekend, so it’s time to plan for the next batch. There is a tempeh and yam stew that looks interesting, since I have had tempeh in other meals before, and a “kitchen sink” vegetable soup (which means “lots of different vegetables”), similar to the soups I have made for myself.
Health and well-being
I was really tired this morning, after a mediocre night’s sleep. That is probably my number one health concern right now, just blocking out enough time for 7 to 8 hours sleep on a consistent basis. If my evening activities end too late, it’s difficult to get in that early morning workout.
I don’t think I have mentioned yet that the book includes a dietary “cleanse” over the course of several weeks. It is adjusted slightly for every fitness level. This week, Strivers are asked to give up alcohol, next week caffeine, and over the course of a month, no more dairy, gluten, packaged foods, or animal products. The goal is to find out how your body improves by eliminating sources of food allergies or other negative health effects. So far, alcohol is not a problem, because I don’t drink it anyway. Actually, I am a little ahead of myself by almost completely eliminating refined sugar as well. My whey powder has a little bit of sugar, and we already talked about those Zone Perfect bars. Skipping dessert is a little tough, but I am willing to do it as an experiment. Anyway, so far I am not seeing a dramatic improvement due to my healthier diet, but we’ll see how it goes. A little wrinkle is that my birthday is coming at the middle of the month. Stay tuned!
Workout
Today’s aerobic workout (the same as two days ago) took 40 minutes start to finish. My warmup might be longer than the suggested “March in place (30 steps),” then jog, then run. For some reason I think I would be more comfortable having a DVD (or audio) lead me through the warmup and stretch.
As for the workout itself, I had a better calorie burn this time, and made better transitions from one exercise to the next. I lost count during the knee/front kick, which was supposed to be 15 reps per leg, so I did some extra ones. There is a plyometric exercise called the line jump, which is really just hopping forwards and backwards across an imaginary line. I find that one pretty challenging. Another exercise not found in P90X, called the Briggs Ram, involves standing with wide feet and moving side to side as if you are pushing and pulling a battering ram. It can be pretty tough if I put some effort into it.
I found myself remembering some of the pointers Tony made in P90X about using my core muscles, landing on my toes, and so on. I would need to check the exercise descriptions to see if that level of detail is available to the people who are doing these exercises for the first time.
Most important of all, I was tired and sweaty at the end, which means my 30 minutes of actual exercise time was well spent.
Nutrition
First thing this morning, I was a little hungry, so I had a Zone Perfect Peanut Butter Cookie Dough bar. A clear violation of the nutrition guidelines in the book! This is another one of those “leftovers” which I could do without for a month, I suppose. If I am going to consume a packaged food with sugar in it, I suppose it’s best to do it as close to my workout as possible, right?
Other than that, I did well with my food choices. Of course, it takes about 20 minutes to pack up all my food for work, which is sort of a hassle. Even assembling a salad using packaged mixed greens takes some work. I was a little nervous today because I ran out of protein bars (my usual mid-morning snack, especially on resistance training days). I did fine with a serving of unsalted mixed nuts. We’ll see how I do tomorrow after some pushups.
I had my cup of coffee mid-afternoon, with some cocoa and stevia (actually, Truvia). I am not technically supposed to “cleanse” from that until next week. 🙂
My snack was hummus on a rice cracker. Rice crackers have such a “diet” stigma, but why not have one, if it has something tasty on top? I also had my apple left over from lunch. No dessert again. Maybe the cocoa helped.
In the nutrition section of the book, Tony says he doesn’t count calories, and he doesn’t worry about formulas for various food groups, and yet, his list of recommended foods is accompanied by portion sizes and servings per day (or per week for certain foods). For a detail-oriented person such as myself, that translated into “How many proteins, healthy fats, whole grains, etc. am I eating today?” At first, I started a spreadsheet to track this, in addition to my Calorie Count food journal. That lasted about a day. I am sticking to the food list and portion sizes as much as possible, following the suggestions I have read elsewhere for a calorie breakdown of 30% protein, 50% or less carbs, and the rest from healthy fats. It’s hard to hit that 30% protein without whey powder or bars. Well, I guess I could eat lots of chicken, or egg whites.
Health and well-being
I went to bed at a reasonable hour, then woke up earlier than expected. The coffee helped me through the afternoon, and I got tired and grumpy as the evening progressed. My family was milling around until 10 PM, which meant it was going to be another short night for me.
My impression so far is that I am not losing any fitness since P90X, but I am having trouble making any improvements.
Workout
Today was my first try at the Striver’s Resistance Workout, Phase 1 (estimate time 30-35 minutes). The stretches are the familiar P90X head and shoulder rolls, huggers, etc. The workout is a combination of moves from the arm, shoulder, and biceps DVDs, with some lower body and abdominal exercises thrown in for a well-rounded session. Sorry, P90X fans, but there are only two kinds of pushups in this one (standard, wide and/or modified).
Life interrupted my workout schedule, on day 2! My plan was to get through this from start to finish, as I did yesterday. Unfortunately, due to some distractions around me, my exercise time was shortened. Also, pretty quickly I realized something was missing: Those sheets for tracking your workout! I stopped, scrawled down the exercise list on a piece of paper, and started up again. After all that (and some confusion when I did some exercises in the wrong order), I only did one half of the workout. At least I ran through everything once, and even without the repeat circuit it was pretty challenging. I’m glad to see that I did pick the right level of difficulty.
Nutrition
I’m still on track (two days in a row!). There is a chapter in the book called “Nourish” which describes Tony’s “flexitarian” diet of primarily plant-based foods, lean protein, and complex carbohydrates (from veggies and whole grains). My calorie count is a little higher than I would like, but I am eating healthy food that is mostly on Tony’s recommended list. No desserts (just an apple), and I skipped the coffee today because I was stuck at home due to the weather (no coffee maker). I did feel like some dessert after dinner, so I mixed up some plain yogurt, cocoa, and chocolate whey powder (with stevia and a little sugar). I think it was a good compromise. My goal is still to have more of a calorie deficit rather than breaking even, as I am doing right now.
Health and well-being
I set my alarm a little later today, because I knew the bad weather would keep me home from work. I think once I get into the rhythm of these shorter workouts, I will be able to manage my morning schedule better and maybe even add a little treadmill (TV watching) time.
Despite the lack of coffee, I was pretty alert. I did add some snow shoveling to my routine today. Someone calls that “snowdio”. I think that made up for the shortened workout, and I didn’t feel like I needed more (for example, when I skip a workout).
Back to cardio tomorrow. Maybe this time there will be no surprises?
Today I took a step away from P90X, for the first time in a year, but I did not go too far. I started the workout and nutrition plan in Tony Horton’s new book Bring It! I will try to highlight some points from the book along the way, but for now I want to concentrate on documenting my experience, since the book is new. In comparison, I felt like I was way too late in the game to be a cutting-edge P90X blogger.
The book begins with a motivation section, and a fitness test. This is not the same sort of “Can you handle it?” test which is recommended by some of the Beachbody programs. Instead, Tony is trying to identify your fitness level and work with it. The three levels are Beginner, Striver, and Warrior. After all that time spent with P90X, I am glad to report that I am just below Warrior level. In order to give myself a chance to get used to the book, and recover from the fatigue that has been plaguing me lately, I am starting at Striver level.
Workout
There are three workouts in this plan: Aerobic (twice a week), Resistance (three times a week), and Yoga (once a week). Each fitness level also includes a “Phase 1” and “Phase 2”. The first workout for me was Striver’s Level, Aerobic Phase 1.
Here is my first adjustment, after working with exercise videos for almost two years: There’s no video! I’m working from the book! I made photocopies of the workout pages, and added page numbers for the exercises (not listed with the workout, but there is an index at the end of the book). A lot of these exercises are familiar to P90X fans, but I did refer to the instructions a few times.
This workout seems short compared to P90X, and the calorie burn was about the same as the Kenpo workout for me. It was lower than Plyometrics, and a lot lower than a run on the treadmill. Maybe when I am more comfortable with the routine, I will be able to transition better from one exercise to the other, and feel the burn! (Yeah, I went there.)
Nutrition
I did a lot of food preparation over the weekend. Looking through the recipes in the book, I chose the black beans and yam chili (with ground turkey), and the butternut squash soup. I bought some rice cakes, hummus (I haven’t made my own yet), apples and bananas for snacks. I will be finishing off some leftovers this week, but they are healthy things like lean turkey and bean soup with a little ham. I already had salad-making supplies in the house.
I can’t promise a full rundown of my meals every day, and maybe it would be best if I don’t, but here’s how I started my program:
Today for breakfast, I had steel-cut oats with a banana and chocolate whey protein powder. My mid-morning snack was a Pure Protein Chocolate Deluxe protein bar (200 calories, very little sugar).
For lunch, I had a mixed greens salad, with tomato, cucumber, baby carrots and balsamic vinegar (no oil). I also sprinkled Costco’s no-salt seasoning mix on top. To the salad, I added some of that leftover turkey breast (Dietz and Watson Lite), and I had one serving of the homemade chili (about 360 calories, according to the recipe calculator at Calorie Count. I had an apple for dessert.
My hunger level today was low, maybe because I overindulged yesterday. Yes, I caved in to the excuse “I’ll do better starting tomorrow!” I wasn’t even sure I wanted my snack, which was a serving of the butternut squash soup plus a half cup of quinoa (about 300 calories total). I ate it anyway, because I figured it would be a while until dinner.
Dinner with the family is starting my new plan out pretty well, actually: Wild-caught salmon, broccoli and brown rice. Since I will be eating at home most nights, I will have to adapt to what is being served, and I’m OK with that. I think I will see the benefits of this program if I keep my dinners reasonable and skip the added sugar of my usual desserts. Tonight, dessert was a banana. I did have a snack of cheese and a sourdough pretzel after returning home from a meeting. Hey, not such a bad cheat, right?
Health and well-being
First, a little background: I was not a coffee drinker, or a tea drinker, until very recently. Last June, actually, while on a trip to London (think “jet lag”), I decided to give coffee a real try. Before that, I had tried the occasional mocha-flavored drink and decided I didn’t like the taste enough to make it what I considered a bad habit. I have learned over the past couple of years from Jillian Michaels and The Nutrition Diva that caffeine can actually provide some health and fitness benefits, as long as it doesn’t come packaged in a sugary drink. So these days, I don’t mind having a cup of coffee (sometimes two), or substitute some chocolate-covered espresso beans (half a serving) as a dessert. I still prefer my coffee flavored with chocolate, or I will get it down the hatch with milk and two sugars.
All that being said, mid-afternoon today, I had one cup of coffee with unsweetened cocoa and stevia. That has been my standard pick-me-up for a while. Pretty soon, if I follow Tony’s nutrition plan and cleanse, I will give that up for a while. I already skip the caffeine at least one day or more over the weekend, because we don’t make coffee at home. I don’t expect big withdrawal symptoms, but I will probably miss it. After all, I spent many years getting my caffeine from a moderate amount of cola (or diet cola), which I know doesn’t pack the same buzz, unless you drink a lot. (Here’s a comparison chart for various sources of caffeine.
One of my goals, besides making regular blog posts, will be to get a decent night’s sleep AND get up early enough to work out AND get to work on time. If I can manage that, I will be healthier and less stressed, right?
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