P90X Days 1-3: I Give Up

After Day 2, breathing what I was certain was my last breath.

Just kidding. I'm not giving up yet, but pretty much everything on me is sore. It hurts to straighten my arms. It hurts to bend my arms. It hurts to stand up. It hurts to sit down. It hurts to plop down into my little car. It hurts to gently roll myself out of it. It hurts to turn the (no power-steering) steering wheel in between. It hurts to squat down to pet a dog. It hurts to bend down to put the P90X DVD into the stupid DVD player that keeps working no matter how much I pray that it will not work one of these days. It hurts to pick up my laptop to tell all you fine people how much it hurts. In short, it hurts.

To be fair, I haven't really worked out in five or six months, so I'd probably be pretty sore three days into any workout routine worth a darn. Other people in decent shape would obviously not feel as bad as I do, but this is without a doubt the hardest I've ever worked out. And with the appropriate weights to challenge yourself on each exercise, it should prove painful to anyone trying to do this thing correctly. Most of the workouts are just under an hour long (50 to 60 minutes each) and for most of the 13 weeks, you add on the 16-minute ab workout three days a week.

For anyone not interested in the specifics of each day, I want to re-emphasize that this is not becoming strictly a P90X blog for the next 87 days. In fact, I suspect that once I've suffered through each of the 12 DVDs at least once, the P90X content will be scaled back significantly to include mostly pictures and measurement progress reports. We'll see. In any case, I promise to continue to deliver the same variety of content (that most people don't care to read) that I have always provided. Now, for a summary of each of the last three days...

Another Day 1 picture: My body was so angry at me after this workout that it was shaking. Holding the camera still was almost as tough as the workout.

Day 1: I know I already posted on Day 1, but all I did was explain why I'm doing this stupid thing. I didn't really say anything about Day 1's workout. It was the chest and back workout and the abs workout. Chest and back exercises were mostly various push-ups and pull-ups (12 different exercises, 2 sets each). I'll admit that after the first couple of sets, I was having to do the "easier" version of just about everything. The abs workout is a separate, short DVD (16 minutes) of non-stop ab exercises, most of which made me want to throw up. Thankfully, my fairly large gut would not allow me to complete the full range of motion on a number of these exercises. Without my trusty belly in the way, I would have almost certainly died. I'm gonna miss that protective layer when it's gone. );

Another Day 2 picture: As Miracle Max might put it, "Mostly dead."

Day 2: While Day 1 wore me out pretty well, Day 2 was significantly tougher. Plyometrics is what they called it. I've never heard of such a thing, but surely it's not any worse than all the push-ups and pull-ups that I failed to complete the day before, right? Wrong. They suggested the cardio DVD as an alternative for people not ready for plyometrics (which was probably me), but I wanted to give the real deal a shot. It seemed to serve much the same purpose as cardio, but it was much more jump-intensive. Not only did it bring further into focus just how out of shape I was, but it also made very obvious just how uncoordinated I've become. Not that I was ever a super athlete or anything, but I had decent hand-eye coordination and balance once upon a time. I could dribble and shoot a basketball half-way accurately sometimes. I could hit a baseball 16 or 18 years ago (a couple of times a season) or a softball 10 years ago. If nothing else, I could at least sort of keep my balance while running, jumping, turning, and squatting. Apparently, not so much anymore. All of this resulted in me lying on the floor wheezing and gasping for air at the end of this 58 minutes and 36 seconds of punishment. Can't wait for next time this workout shows up on the schedule (next Wednesday).

After Day 3: At least I could stand after this one.

Day 3: Shoulders and arms workout and the short little abs workout again. 15 different exercises, 2 sets each. Lots of curls, extensions, rows, dips, etc. While this definitely had its painful moments, I didn't hate it as much as the first two. It could be the fact that I need a wider selection of dumbbells (all of my sets seemed too heavy or too light after the first few sets) or it could be that this workout just isn't as bad as the first two. I'll definitely be buying another set or two of dumbbells in the next few days and I'll let you know if this one is as easy this time next week. I suspect it won't be. Abs was pretty miserable again, but the great thing is knowing that it doesn't last very long. I was pleasantly surprised to find myself getting the form down on some of these better. Like the plyometrics workout on Day 2, the abs workout requires some balance and coordination I haven't needed in a few years.

Up next: Yoga (something I thought I was less likely to do than spin class...oh well).