258

Back at it after a couple of days of lethargy/laziness. It's a problem that's seeped into everything -- blogging, going out, doing the dishes. I just lost the edge for a few days there.

Burned a new part of P90X to DVD and tried it -- arms and back. Still a lot of pull-ups involved, which I still don't have any way to do, but it was a different sort of workout. I need to get the hang of it, but I kinda like it.

One thing though -- Arm Circles.

Every P90X warm up has arm circles in them. 4 sets, 2 varieties -- and they burn. I don't know if they do any good for any muscle set whatsoever, but they burn, and it sucks. They're just arm circles, right?

It's part of the reason I stick with P90X, despite the fact that the trainer is annoyingly smug and the workouts are largely built on equipment I don't have. Because despite all that -- it's pretty straightforward work. I feel like it might take me 3 years of sticking to this workout to get anywhere, but I will say that every time I do an hour of it, I feel it.

I'll probably do the arms and back thing again tonight. We'll see.

259

Something I was worried about came true last night. Thus far on my latest new push I've been doing exercises based off a mixture of two things -- P90X's chest and back workout video, and the Turbulence Training guys YouTube Channel. It gets my heart pumping, it works me hard -- it's a good thing.

But knowing I had to keep shifting it, I decided to dig deeper into the well and vary my workout a bit, focus on a different muscle group. The majority of the stuff I've done so far is upper body, and I was worried I'd overdo it or forget the rest. Last week I did a bunch of lower body stuff in the gym. I was rusty at it, but made it through.

Last night I moved on to the next P90X thing, which was called Ab Ripper X. 15 minutes of crunches and related moves.

I could barely do any of it.

Crunches always suck, but what surprised me when I tried it was how much the moves hurt my lower back. I couldn't focus on the crunch because it hurt just to sit or lie in the correct position.

I haven't figured out why this is - or what's wrong with my back (it doesn't hurt at other times), but I had to shift focus and decided instead do do a bunch of the Turbulence Training full body exercises instead.

The book should arrive soon. We'll see if it helps.

259

P90X again -- did the full hour this time, only skipped a few of the things I don't have the equipment to do (no pull up bar). Also discovered a 10-minute workout from the Turbulence Training guy that I can probably do in the mornings if I can get out of bed early enough.

259

P90X again -- chest and back exercises. The workout is an hour. I managed about 35 minutes.

262

Worked out lower body last night. Full hour in the gym.

No change.

262

Two nights ago I really pushed it. An hour straight with weights, pushups, the whole nine. Last night I was exhausted, possibly from staying up late and basking in Obamamania. So I took the night off. Half the things I read say a day off is a good thing.

The first time in three months that I've topped 260 argues otherwise.

260

Not surprised by the lack of change, I normally don't weigh in twice a day. However, felt I should post anyways.

Bad news is that my Turbulence Training book hasn't come in the mail yet.

Good news is it didn't deter me from getting back on the horse. I wanted to keep an eye on the election coverage, so I stayed home instead of going to the gym -- deciding to see if I could chase the P90X guy around instead.

The workout is an hour. It's like 15 exercises cycled twice. In other words, you warm up, do 15, rest, and then you go back through the 15 again. A bunch of the exercises required a pull-up bar, which I don't have -- so I substituted squats and stuff for those. I kinda kept up with it, probably doing about 65-70% of the workout. It's hard to keep up with the guy, and like I've said before, P90X is really for people who are sort of in shape already, not people like me who are trying to get back in shape.

Still, I went for it.

I haven't worked out in a while, and certainly not with that sort of intensity. Everything seemed twice as hard and hurt twice as much, but I made it through an hour of lower rep, modified, and substituted exercise. My heart rate is high, and I'm sweating hard.

I'm back, bitches.

260

Back in the gym tonight. Will be spending time today putting together a much more organized and directed workout. Lets hope it goes better this time.

258

Over the weekend I :

• Didn't work out
• Ate a bunch of Halloween candy
• Ordered some really good pizza
• Researched some exercises that I could do (while eating said pizza)
• bought two of these:

I probably paid too much for them (some of the bigger name fitness companies sell products similar to this that cost $400, which is just insane), but I'm banking that "new toy" syndrome might actually work in my favor here. I've also been investigating something called Turbulence Training, which sounds a lot like P90X, which means it's most likely bunk -- but the websites show detailed descriptions of exercises I can do.

The thought is to build a workout that I can do whether I go to the gym or not. I'm not sure if it will work, but just because I skip doesn't mean I shouldn't do anything.

I do like the way the guy behind the Turbulence Training thing talks, but that only counts for so much -- because when you're fat and looking for a shortcut every skinny dude with biceps seems like an expert.

This guy's spin is that cardio doesn't help -- especially if it's extended time and steady pace. What he's pushing is interval training (varying speeds/intensities) mixed with weightlifting and of course -- a food plan that I'll glance at hopefully yet surely never follow.

Tonight is boyscouts with my son, which means I'll get home too late to go to the gym -- but I should be able to do at least some of the things I've researched out with these weights and some of the interval training stuff I've seen online.

Compared to the nothing I've been doing lately, I'm hoping it is slightly more effective.