My P90X Experience: Days 5-7

Whew! It’s been a busy couple days so I haven’t been able to keep up with my posts. But don’t worry–I was still able to keep up with my P90X workouts. )

Friday was Legs and Back. I’m not even close to being able to do a pull-up, so I’ve been using a resistance band to do the pull-up exercises. My husband liked using the chair when he was building up to doing pull-ups but I just can’t figure out the feel for how that works yet. For the pull-ups I doing 15-20 reps with the red resistance band so I think next time I need to kick it up to the green band or figure out how to use the chair.

One exercise I had problems with was the 3-way lunge with 2-kick option. In this exercise you need to lunge in three different directions and then raise or kick your leg after the lunge. For some reason I just didn’t get it. Maybe next time.

My favorite exercise were the calf raises–probably because my calves are most likely the strongest muscles in my body. Thanks to years of playing soccer in my youth and four years in the marching band in high school carrying around a ~20 pound set of drums on my back. Everyday during our warm-up exercises we were required to do a bunch of calf raises. Apparently adding weight really does make a difference. I used 5 pound weights which didn’t really intensify the “burn” so I think I’ll use the 10 pound weights next time.

Saturday was my first experience with Kenpo X. Interesting! It was a good workout but I felt like I was concentrating too much on learning the different moves rather than getting a good workout. I think it would have been helpful if Tony had taken just a few seconds to explain the difference between a jab, cross, hook, and uppercut. And forget being able to do the star block exercise. Right!

And that reminds, one thing about these P90X videos–I really love them but I think one thing that would make them even more interesting is to have someone in the group that is totally new to P90X just to see them struggle with the exercises just as much as you are. Granted, Tony is pretty good about pointing things out that other people are doing and instructing them to do it the “wrong way” so you can see the difference. Also, many times I hear him say, “Now at home you might only be able to . . . and that’s fine.” 9 times out of 10 I’m doing exactly the thing that he says.

Today I did X Stretch. I guess this “workout” is optional but I really want to improve on my flexibility. The X Stretch exercises remind me of a lot of what we do during the second half of Yoga X. It was strange though, the ballistic hamstring stretch reminded me a lot of the fifer scissor exercise from Ab Ripper X. It didn’t feel like stretching at all–unless I was doing it wrong! It was nice though–I’m definitely going to keep doing X Stretch for the rest of the 90 days.

So, tomorrow starts Week 2. I’m looking forward to going through Chest and Back for the second time because we got a nice new cushy workout mat for our room. I think it will help a lot with the push-ups. We have a laminate wood floor (laid over concrete) which can be really slippery and hard on your hands for push-ups. Onward and upward!