So week one of P90X is done. Let me assure you this is not a scam. From the way I feel after one week of this – I can understand how a person can have the advertised results. It’s a great workout, and it covers your whole body. I’ve summarized my first week here for your enjoyment.
Day 1 – Chest and Back + Ab Ripper X
Not to bad, the workout was Chest and Back + Ab ripper X. I had no problems with the chest/back. After 55 minutes of that though, the 15 minutes of Ab Ripper X resulted in me just flopping around on the floor in a pool of sweat. =)
Protein bars from Safeway are insanely expensive I might add. They taste wayyy better than they did ten years ago too.
Day 2 – Plyometrics
Back and shoulders are sore today =) Started off the day with a 
monster 8 egg white omelet, mushroom, green onion and tomato, the recipe called for three ounces of low fat cheese – but I stopped at 1.5 ounce! This is the most food I’ve eaten for breakfast on a work day ever. Its a bit rough throwing cooking into my morning routine. It was hard enough for me to add a bowl of cereal or something in every morning. Lot more tasty and filling than cereal though.
Today’s workout was Plyometrics. The video says if you can handle this one, you’re good to go for P90X. My years of work have paid off – I pretty much owned plyometrics. The only problem I had was a terribly cramp like pain in my feet – which I suspect might be from my shitty mat not absorbing as much of the shock.
Lunch was a protein shake with frozen raspberries.
For dinner I made the Lemon Garlic chicken, wild rice, and more asparagus. (I also managed to burn a pot while steaming this asparagus – my wife is not pleased)
By the end of the day my back, shoulders, boob muscles, and butt are mildly sore. =)
Day 3 – Shoulders and Arms + Ab Ripper X
Woke up a bit late today – started off with a chicken + 
egg mixture that was supposed to be a “scramble”. Today still sore – but not enough to stop me. After a couple of hours of work, it was time to get into the shoulders and arms workout with another Ab ripper. Ab ripper is still kicking my ass.
Tuna salad and salad/spinach for lunch. mmm.
Day 4 – Yoga
This was rough. I’ll never make fun of people doing yoga ever again =) Flexibility is not one of my strengths. This DVD was also really long 1.5 hours. I knew yoga was a lot harder than it looked, having done the little bit provided by the Wii Fit – but man… It was nice to see toward the end of the workout I was bending a little more, reaching a little further. The hard part about this is going to be making time for it in the middle of the day.
Day 5 – Legs and Back + Ab Ripper X
Protein shakes are fast and easy for breakfast! They also result in a 
huge drink. 1 cup skim milk, 1 cup fruit, half cup of ice, 1.5 scoops of protein powder and 1 whole banana (recipe calls for half a banana – but I don’t want to waste half! I try to use small bananas..) Combine and blend… this easily overfills my big ass 20oz cups.
The workout was pretty cool – back squat things burn real good. More Ab Ripper X – but at least this time I made some progress. I didn’t flounder nearly as much as the first couple of times.
Day 6 – Kenpo X
Saturday. My wife has a ton of work lined up for us today. The nastiest part is scrubbing our monstrous deck so we can re-stain it tomorrow. Started off the day with a shake and an extra ounce of almonds and fruit.
Kenpo was very cool. It got my heart rate up to a max of 165. It was a little tough to learn the moves. A lot of muscles memory is needed for some of the punch combos – especially when you start to speed up. It was a little hard to keep the pace the first time around because of my lack of familiarity with the workouts. I especially liked the 100+ punches at the end. This is a great way to get some cardio in – WAY more fun that running for an hour.
I’ll also add that scrubbing the deck in the hot afternoon sun was hellish.
Day 7 – Rest / Stretch
Ok – we got up super early to stain the deck before the sun came around the back. So much for rest hah! Another protein shake for breakfast. I’m sensing a reoccurring trend here..they’re just so quick and easy to make =)
After the deck was stained my back and butt were killing me. Went in to do the stretch DVD and it was actually quite helpful. A lot less sore afterwards. Now its time to rest.
Summarization
I was surprised how much food the “diet” portion of P90X is telling me to eat. It’s also crazy how much protein its telling me to eat. It makes sense though, and the way my muscles feel – it makes complete sense. My diet had been quite carbohydrate heavy – which meant I wasn’t getting to eat as much food to hit my caloric limits. It’s actually a nice change.
As far as equipment goes, I had a mat, heart rate monitor, and resistance bands lent to me by my parents-in-law. I definitely need to get the chin-up bar and some dumbbells. The bands just didn’t cut it. Replacing the bands with chin-ups is going to make the chest and back workouts significantly more challenging. My mat is the Nintendo Wii one and it really sucks =)
The hour long exercises really seemed to go by quickly (well except maybe yoga…) Most importantly – I feel surprisingly good (aside from the soreness) – energetic, even somewhat mentally focused. I’m looking forward to week two.
Finally, I now fully understand why they start with a fitness test. Yes, this was a relatively “easy” program for me to start with. I went into it able to easily run seven odd miles and having been doing plyometric circuits for the past six months. If you’re just starting to change the way you live, and choose P90X please know its not going to be easy to do. You will likely not be able to keep up with what you see. Don’t be disheartened, this is an advanced workout. Stick with it, and each week you will see improvements. Don’t push yourself too hard – you will probably end up hurting yourself. Again – I’m not a doctor. If you’re just starting off and choose P90X you should really talk to yours first.
I am very interested to hear about your experiences with P90X. Leave a comment, or contact me to tell me about how it went for you.
for the first few times =). Gently slip your spatula under the side of the omelet you didn’t add cheese too and wiggle it around to get everything unstuck. Flip that side of the omelet over onto the cheese! If your egg is cooked enough, this should make the perfect omelet shape! If not – it might break. No worries – it might not look as nice – but it will still be tasty. As you can see from the picture above – mine didn’t turn out so well this day =)
