P90X Adventures: Week 6 Round 2 and a look back at one hell of a 2012...

This year has been pretty crazy.  It's been pretty cruel to me, but yet, it's been really good to me.  I guess I've become the physical manifestation of what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.  Looking back through the year feels completely surreal.  I've always felt like one night, I went to sleep looking like this:

 

Then woke up looking like this:

It was completely unlike any other change I've ever experienced in my life.  Hell, I thought my transformation during my initial 60 day juice fast was astonishing because I'd lost the most amount of weight I'd ever seen myself lose.  People noticed the difference, but at least in pictures, I just kinda looked the same.  

Now, for those of you just tuning in...  2012 was the year that I was putting Michael T. Jones Jr. , as everyone knew him, to rest.  I had no real idea of how or even if I was going to be successful in this.  Most people (including myself) didn't think I'd even be able to follow through with the plan I'd set forth.  It was pretty damned ambitious.  I'd seen what my 60 day juice fast in 2011 did.  I lost 47lbs.  I'd only heard about someone doing a 120 day juice fast and that got my little hamster upstairs running.  I started thinking about what would happen if I did that.  By the time the new year hit, I felt like I saw myself almost completely revert back to the person I was before the fast.  I was back to eating terribly, and the weight was climbing back up again.  The holidays... they're goddamn dangerous!  I set out in January to juice fast for 120 days.   I was then going to follow that up with another 2 months of basically eating vegan and hope that at the end of all that, the desire to revert back will have passed.

My mom was having hip replacement surgery in February and I hadn't found work yet, so I took off to Cincinnati to take care of her for 2 months.  That was tough... Unbelievably tough...  The second night of getting home set the tone for how difficult it was going to be when she sent me out to pick her up some White Castles.  If it's one thing that actually makes a fast of any sort become the toughest thing to face in life, it's when you have to deal with food.  I had to cook for my mom, and not touch any of it for 2 months. 

Well... it worked.  I just remember waking up one morning and everything just felt different. I actually felt way lighter.  I felt like my stomach had sort of half disappeared overnight.  I went to the bathroom and Holy Shit... I barely even recognized the face I saw in the mirror.   That's when I took the above picture.  Shit, I couldn't stop staring at myself.  That 2nd picture was only 27 days after the first one.  I kept on the fast and the pounds melted off.  In another 23 days, I was down 85lbs.  

I'd made the commitment to attempting the Seattle to Portland Classic this year.  That's a 204 mile bike ride literally from Seattle, WA, to Portland, OR.  Being in Cincy and taking care of my mom made it hard to really get any serious training happening, but I took all the opportunities I could and anyway I could.  There was a crazy unseasonal change in weather, so it was like 70° in February and March.  I found a park with a path and rented bikes in Miamitown. 

This was totally what I needed.  It was calm, serene and let me get out on a bike.  It felt so awesome.  It was only about a 7 mile trail, so I just started increasing the number of loops.  Much of the time, I was just riding a fixie and the fact that it had some hills made it pretty great.

I got back home in April and still had about a month left on my juice fast which had now become a 122 day event.  One day Zu came to me and told me that she figured out that 122 days was basically 1/3rd of a year.  I figured what's two more days right?  When I got back, I seriously stepped up my training and started riding at least 25 miles every day and at least 50 miles once a week.   I signed up for a Metric Century (100km) ride sort of as a practice lead up to the Seattle to Portland thing in a few months.  My whole plan was to do this ride using my hybrid cruiser.  That was pretty awesome and I got a lot of props from the people participating in the ride.   Some people started out confused because they thought maybe I was on one of the shorter circuits of the ride.  They hadn't expected that I'd attempt this 65 mile ride on a cruiser.  Let alone my first ever riding event.

I kept riding and training and finally the day came for STP!!  I was so nervous wondering at what point was it actually going to be ridiculously difficult.  Well, thanks to all that training, it was a cinch.  It was a total blast and I can't really say it was ever really difficult.  Being on the road with 10,000 other bicyclist changes the game completely.  I'd only heard that you can kinda get pumped by being around so many people.  It's totally true.  I was maintaining an average speed of about 19-22mph the entire time.  On a friggin' cruiser.  I can't describe how awesome it felt passing up dudes on carbon fiber bikes that probably cost thousands of dollars on my big bulky hybrid cruiser.  I kept every accessory on it.  I think I only finally decided to take my bike lock off at the last minute.  I also recorded a time lapse of that entire ride...

2 weeks after STP, I went with Zu for her first ever biking event.  We did the Oregon Tour De Cure!  She did the 43 mile ride, and I did the Century.  I got the start time mixed up and I started an hour later than I was supposed to, so by the time I finally finshed, they were basically tearing down everything.  Thanks to Zu though, they kept the finish line up just for me and as I got in, they had like 4-5 people and Zu all cheering me on to the finish.   That made me happy.  I was so proud of her for finishing.  She called me a couple times wanting to quit.  It was a hell of a ride.  Way tougher with hills than STP was by far.  I kept telling her to stick with it and she did.  I think she surprised herself, but I know she was definitely proud of her achievement. 

After all this, I finally decided to give P90X a try.  I figured after doing all that, maybe I'd be ready to do this.  I'm so glad I got on it.  It's been pretty damned awesome so far.  

I'm currently on Day 41 (day 131) of my round 2 of P90X.  I didn't let the holiday get too much in the way of my workouts this week.  I did take Christmas day as a rest day and I've just worked out the other days around it.  Everything has been on the same steady path to improvement.  I'm so stoked that for the last two weeks, I'm able to perform every move from yoga x except one.  I'm still struggling to get into the crane balance pose.  At least I can get into it, but I fall out of it pretty fast. 

Zu and I are starting the new year off with a bang. We're doing a midnight 5k on new year's eve.  I've never done any running before so this ought to be interesting...   I'm also doing another juice fast for January.  I'm not sure how long I'm going this time.  Definitely not 4 months, but at the least 31, possibly 60 days.  So, while everything wasn't perfect in my 2012, it was still pretty damn awesome and hopefully a great beginning to a triumphant rise that I hope will come in 2013.  2012 is still one of the best years I've ever had... Ever!

P90X Adventures: Week 5 round 2... you still alive?

I know my posts have become less and less frequent.  By outward appearances, it would seem as if my workout is likely falling through the same cracks.  Well, it's not (thank god) but it's definitely seeming harder and harder to shoehorn these guys into my day.  I've had many times this week where I was just battling my own desire to be lazy and just say "fuck it, I can miss one day right?".  The problem with that, as I observed the week after thanksgiving is that it's all too easy for that "one day" to widen into two, then basically a week.

It's a lot easier to just not write things though.  I get so wrapped up in daily distractions and maybe it's just the holidays, but this time of the year is always so stressful.  Maybe it's also due to the fact that there's so much less sun this time of year.  I dunno, it just seems like difficulty being productive becomes magnified.  Anyway, I'm here now, and that's what counts.  On to the workout report!

This week was actually pretty awesome!  This was the start of "phase 2" and I was hoping these things would get a lot easier to perform... I'm also used to being wrong a lot when it comes to P90X.  That's not necessarily a bad thing though.  It's probably a bad thing if things do become a lot easier to do, because that likely means it's not being very effective.  I finally bit the bullet and started my way toward upgrading my weights.  Once I learned that not all resistance bands are created equal and the ones I bought I'd essentially outgrown by the time I started using them, I knew it was time to just fix what really works.  I didn't get to grab exactly what I wanted, as it was too expensive to do, but I'm making small moves and that's definitely working for me because this week turned out a lot tougher than I was first expecting.

Chest, Shoulders & Triceps kinda wore me the hell out. It's funny because I was expecting to just shine through some of the routines that appear in other routines.  For instance the side-tri-rises.  They appear in Shoulders & Arms and when I do them, I blast through like 26 of them on each side.  It's pretty impressive.  However, the way the moves are stuctured on Chest, Shoulders & Triceps... oh god...  I felt like such a chump because I could only do 8 on my right side and 12 on my left.  Throughout the week, I kept feeling like I was under-performing myself from previous versions of this workout, but upon looking at the notes, I'm pretty much on par. On routines where I do have lower numbers currently to what was written previously, I know that I'm basically trying to accomplish every move unmodified (except pull-ups).  I still did myself proud with my 25 chair dips though.  That made me happy.  My pike pressers were also full of win.

When it came time for Plyo, I was really just not feeling it on tues.  I was just dragging all day and once I finally got to that point of needing to do it before it was "too late" Zu happened to come home early.  Thanks to her, she kinda gave me that final kick in the ass to get on it, and man did I feel so much better after finishing it.  I guess that's what I love about doing these workouts now.  In years past, I'd just feel like crap and then stop doing the workout because I didn't wanna feel bad.  When you make it a habit or routine, you get past all of the really tough garbage and you always end the workout feeling like a million bucks at the end.  Some days are better than others, and I think it mostly has to do with nutrition and energy levels when I try to attempt doing the workouts.

Back & Biceps was awesome.  I felt like a friggin beast after that one was done.  Arms all swole.  Upping the weight is doing it's thing and I'm glad I did it.  It would be pretty lame if I just kept with the plateu.  Where I really impressed myself this week was with Yoga X.

I was actually able to attempt and hit every single pose this week.  The biggest of all was Plow.  Now, I wasn't all like toes on the floor or anything, that would be ridiculous, but there's a section in yoga x where you're essentially shoulder standing the entire time.  I was doing that shit.  I'd been able to get the straight up and down shoulder stand move but anything else like doing the leg splits or scissoring the legs, I was always just like... nuh uh.. eff that.  Well, this week, I gave it a serious shot and holy shit.  Zu was home and here I was looking like this:

So I yelled out "Zu! Come quick!!  Check this out!"  I was so excited and sort of in disbelief.

Zu walks in and goes "WTF!! are you trying to give yourself a blowjob?!"

Let me tell you, that's not the position you wanna be in when somebody says something like that.  I probably almost broke my damn spine trying not to laugh.  Then she walks over  and starts inspecting closer, leaning in like she's about to "help" me and says "well, you're almost there... just a few more.."

"Goddamnit don't touch me!"

Yeah, nothing would be worse than having paramedics show up to find me stuck like that and end up paralyzed because of it.

I finished the rest of the week pretty strong. I ended up taking my rest day Friday and did Legs & Back yesterday.  Now all that's left is a little kicking and punching today, then bring on next week!!

I'm going to be starting an actual juice fast again in January.  I think I'll start by just juicing only that month and see if I wanna keep going from there.  At which point, I'll probably be blogging about juices and about how shitty the first week is.  It's really tough, and that never changes, but the feeling at the other end is pretty damn awesome I have to admit.  I know I have the muscles now, and now I kinda want to see them.  So here's to uncovering a little more awesome!

P90X Adventures: Week 4 Round 2 Recovery

This week has definitely been a bit of a recovery in many ways.  Trying to come back from what was supposed to be my actual recovery week was pretty damn difficult.  All the routines just seemed extra tough. I was feeling down.  It was just a mess.  Despite my wanting to finish the week strong with Legs & Back and Kenpo X, I really didn't do anything.

Monday came, and things turned around.  It started with a check...  Over the weekend, I finally got payment from one of the projects I'd been contributing to.  Now, what was so uplifting wasn't so much the money itself, though I'm not gonna lie, I was really fretting for a bit.  What had me so stoked was what this represented.  For at least 11 years, I'd been talking about making my own company to work in the game industry.  Of course, back in those days it was going to be more like a giant game dev studio/ omni-corp of awesome.  Back then, I was only like 19 so whatever.  My company's acronym was always DSGS which, at the time, stood for "Dat's Some Good Shit".   You can probably see why I decided to make a slight change (on paper anyway ;-P).  So, what this check represents is the actualization of a dream.  Yeah, sure, it's not a giant game dev studio.  Hell, I'm not even sure if I'll even be able to do enough business to live off of at the moment, but it's a start.  It's the start I needed to show me that I'm still in this and despite all the career and financial hardship, 2012 has basically been the best year of my life.  I spent all day Monday trying to open a bank account for my business and as a result, ran out of time to do a routine.  I took Monday as the rest day and started in on Tues with Yoga X.

Yoga X this week was amazing.  I can't remember a time where I was able to roll through all of the moving asanas so smoothly and actually hit every pose.  I get that I was essentially recovered since I hadn't done anything in like 5 days, but it felt great.  It also proved that these changes are real.  I'm also getting really close to being able to do the crane balance pose.  I think I just need to overcome whatever fear must be gripping me for some reason.  I had it held for a split second a couple times.

Core Synergistics was a different story.  One of my problems was that I decided to go out and have dinner before doing the routine I think.  It actually took me 2 hours to complete it, and it's only an hour long routine.  That was not a smart move on my part, but when you get cooped up in your room all day every day like I do, you kinda gotta jump at the chance to get out sometimes.  I did 6 prison pushups unmodified!  I was impressed.  Every move is improving. All the superman, banana, boat, and bow poses I can see and feel myself with my limbs raised higher, with those muscles engaging.  It's incredible.

Then yesterday, I blasted through Kenpo X without pausing.  I was on fire or something.  I've never been able to go through that routine without having to stop and take some sort of 1-2min breather or something more than once.  I know it was working because I'm starting to feel the soreness now in my back and shoulders.  I'm so looking forward to X Stretch today.  I haven't done a progress pic in a couple weeks so I snapped a couple today.

I've gotten back into powering up with juices specifically in the mornings.  Just trying to keep my immune system up and get as much fresh fruits and veggies in to start the day and set the way for a good day.  This week, I've been in an orange color phase.  It's always good to take in as many different colored fruits and veggies as you can each day.  Each color grouping carries specific beneficial properties. Even if they're technically the same plant, different colored versions of that plant will help you sometimes in completely different ways.  So bear that in mind, and try to eat the rainbow.  Here's what I had this morning:

Golden Paradise:
1 Small Sugar Pumpkin
1 Head of  Green Leaf Lettuce
2 Granny Smith Apples
1 Golden Beet
4-5 Carrots
1 Lime
1/2" piece of ginger
1 Orange (not pictured)

P90X Adventures: Week 3 Derailment...

The last couple weeks have been difficult to handle.  I've been in too dark of a space to really write anything, but I need to push forward and try to climb out of this hole.  This is probably going to be long and I am gonna vent a bit, so just warning ya.

What happened?

Well, The week of Thanksgiving was going pretty well.  Things were pretty rocky since I began my financial "free-fall" since I hadn't found any solid work yet and my unemployment ran out. However, things felt fairly hopeful as it seemed prospects were coming.

We'd been planning on going down to Stockton the day after Thanksgiving to spend time with my Uncle and his family.  We rarely get to see family and we're actually not all that far apart from each other (about 8 hours).  I also figured this would be a good opportunity to drive a little further to San Fransisco and check out a few of my friends who'd recently moved down for new game gigs and do a bit of "networking" and see if maybe I can dig up an opportunity or two.  Things almost got cancelled when the whole unemployment thing ended, but I decided to press on because I didn't wanna let my Uncle down.  He was really looking forward to seeing us and Zu and I really needed to get away, even if for just a brief weekend.

We rolled out and I tried to handle Thanksgiving the best I could.  Sure, I didn't eat the best Thanksgiving day, but I sure as hell did a lot better than last year.  I was kinda halfway caught between being proud of myself for doing only 1 trip through with no real seconds, but still a little down on myself for going for some of the old bad comfort foods.  I guess all in all, it wasn't all that bad.  That could've been the end of the story...

We headed down to Cali, and it was a pretty beautiful drive.  We were worried about show in the passes, but it turned out clear and awesome on the way down.

This is where things started to get "tough".   Now if it's one thing my family loves to do... well any family for that matter... it's eat.  My uncle and his wife are so awesome and they're amazing hosts, but for a guy that's basically a recovering "food-a-holic", it was like lighting a book of matches in a powder keg.  I tried to keep things under control for the weekend.  I definitely upheld my P90X routines while I was there.  I guess in the end, it wasn't all that horrible.

Things fell apart when I got back.  See, the following week was supposed to be my Week 3.  I spent Monday and Tues driving all over San Fransisco and the surrounding towns catching friends and doing things and we didn't get back home until super late tuesday night.  I figured I'd already offset my schedule for P90X that week too much so I'd just make it a free-for-all week and just mix it up with random routines while I resume my schedule the following week...

...yeah... that never happened.

I can't particularly say what had me stuck, but I just couldn't bring myself to start or follow through with a workout that week.  It took it's toll on my body.  I could feel what the inaction was doing to me.  Allowing myself to basically backslide like that.  It was pretty terrible.  It came to a head Monday morning when I got on the scale and it read 249.8lbs...  Thanksgiving morning it had read 235.  Yeah, I was not feeling happy.  To exacerbate this issue, one of the companies I've been doing a bunch of sound work for has yet to pay me a single cent and it's been months.  Also, I'd just been turned down for the one job prospect I really thought I had nearly in the bag.  I was low...  Hell, I am low...  Last week was like a crippling punch in the gut, and this week started with a secondary kick while I was still down.

I have to say, this was one of the hardest P90X weeks I've had.  I couldn't make it all the way through Chest and Back on Monday.  It was so tough.  I'm actually still sore from Tuesday's Plyo  but I at least pushed through the entirety of the other routines.  I'm recovering and I'm starting to get back on track, but this feeling I've got right now.  Just down in the dumps.  It's taking it's toll.

One of the worst combinations is food and emotions.  One of the lines that stuck with me the most from watching the documentary Hungry for Change, came from Dr. Christiane Northrup and it was simply "If you're upset, don't eat".  The body senses all manner of stress, and it's typical reaction to stress is to gain weight and store fat.  I was pretty damned stressed these last couple weeks so I get the near 15lb gain.  I've come down  some and I'm working my way back, but as long as I'm feeling like this, it's just a harder, uphill battle.

Today hit me pretty hard since I went to go have lunch and hang with friends and everybody's got new jobs. Many of them just got hooked up at this place I was really hoping to be so that certainly knocked me down some more.  Oh well, I'm glad they're all doing better though.  Things will have to turn around for me eventually right?  Not sure how much more "falling" I can endure heh.

Well, I can't control a lot of what's going on that's getting me down, but I do know what I can control.  That's P90X!  I just gotta keep pressing play.  Cool thing about working out, is at least it helps elevate the mood some.  I'm taking my rest day today.  I'm gonna finish my weekend up strong with Legs & Back and Kenpo X.  Maybe I can kick and punch some of my troubles away and elevate my mood for the first recovery week of round 2!!

okay... done whining for the moment.  Catch you next time!!

P90X Adventures: Week 2 Chest, Plyo, Shoulders recap

So, today was day 100 of what I guess now is my P180X Adventure... :-P

Day 1

Day 99

This week, so far, has been pretty awesome with the workouts.  On this week's Chest & Back, I blasted out 30 standard pushups like it was nothing.  It's the goal everybody in the video mentions when Tony goes around room before starting...

Wow, I'm really catching up to these people now.  In today's Shoulder's & Arms, I think I beat them all in chair dips and side tri rises.  I think next week I might try raising a leg with the chair dips.

I suppose I am writing this pretty late... (3:30am)  so I'll probably keep this relatively short.  Tomorrow well, later today, is Thanksgiving.  I'm definitely thankful for a lot this year.  I have a whole new life and never felt this good that's for sure.  Last year, I was thankful for juicing, biking, and losing 47lbs.  This year, however, I'm really thankful for the discipline.  I've never been able to stick with things like this.  It's all too easy to just start something.  I think honestly giving myself back my mobility and ability to even attempt this stuff gave me the appreciation and the drive to not ever want to lose it again.  I think that's what keeps me going.  Well, that and Muscles :-D

So, since it's thanksgiving and I've really been digging on it myself.  Here's a smoothie I got from the Reboot Your Life site.  The Pumkin Pie Smoothie

1 cup almond milk
1/4 cup rolled whole oats
1 Tbsp. chia seeds
1/4 cup organic pureed canned pumpkin OR *homemade pureed sugar pumpkin
1/2 – 1 Tbsp. maple syrup
1/2 frozen ripe banana
1-2 tsp cinnamon
1 medjool date, pitted
3 ice cubes
1/2 Tsp nutmeg (My own addition)









Okay, I should probably get some sleep.  Later folks!

P90X Adventures: Round 2, week 1 recap

It's been getting harder and harder to keep up with the blog.  It's been a struggle enough just trying to keep up with P90X.  I figure between the two, the blog can slide here and there.  Not so much on the P90X front though.

I'm nearing the end of my first week in my 2nd round of P90X.  This time around, I'm determined to get to the point where I'm not really modifying anything.  I can say that I'm certainly on my way.  I'm not expecting that I'll be able to pull off pull-ups without a chair, but I'm certainly gonna push for it toward the end of these 3 months.

One remarkable improvement in Round 2's week 1 vs Round 1's week 1 is, simply put, FINISHING...  I don't think I made it through a single routine my first week doing P90X.  Thankfully, I stuck with it.  I worked through the pain and it's paid off a lot.  The other big thing this time around is the addition of Ab Ripper X.  Now, I was supposed to be doing Ab Ripper X during every resistance day which is at least 3 times a week during each phase.  I think I can count on one hand maybe the number of times I did Ab Ripper X during round 1.  It's just as well, I was in no way really prepared for it mentally.

I just finished my 3rd Ab Ripper X this week.  It's 4am.  I went clubbing tonight and I'm supposed to be up at 5:30 to help Zu volunteer at this Running event.  I figure I'll just stay up and since I hadn't yet done the abs, I'd go ahead and take care of them while I'm killing time.

My schedule got shifted over because I have to help yet another friend move out of their house and get it prepped for sale.  That took up the portion of my Tues that I should've been doing Plyometrics so I went ahead and marked it as my "rest" day and I've made up the rest of this week a day late.  Yesterday, I was doing Yoga X.  I felt super sapped and had to quit out halfway through.  I was a bit bummed but I couldn't understand why I was feeling so crappy.  I decided to check my blood sugar and it was down to 76. I was literally on E so I just decided to call it there.  No sense in killing myself right?  Aside from that, things have been pretty rock solid.

I've come to the determination that the resistance bands I picked up are kinda useless to me at the moment.  They don't equal the tension I need to be working on.  They're all essentially less resistance than the weights I'd been using but out grown.  This basically means, I need to go out and buy new weights.  We'll see if I can get them in the near future.

I think that's all I have for now.  Until next time...

P90X Adventures: We fall... We pick ourselves back up... Week 1 Day 1 Chest & Back

Well... let me tell you about what happened to that "Victory lap"...

...it didn't happen...

Tuesday I got done with Core Synergistics and I was feeling pretty good, but also kinda not so good.  As it turned out, a cold was coming on.  Wednesday came and I was done.  I was stuck doing recording all day and had to come back and frantically work on editing a radio show the rest of the afternoon.  Add to it, I my body was wrecked from this cold.  I was pissed.  Thursday came and went, then friday and the weekend.  Before I really knew it, It was late Sunday and I hadn't really done anything else from my recovery week.  I felt pretty sad about it, but then again I was fairly sick and it was a better idea to let it rest and not go crazy on P90X.

The one thing that really helped out was juicing.  I made versions of my immunity juice each morning and I could feel the cold lifting a little more each day as it progressed.  By the time friday rolled around, I was nearly cleared up.

I tried not to feel so down about not finishing strong since I'm really not finishing yet.  I've got no plans on letting this be the only time through the program.  I definitely want to get to the point where I'm performing as good or better than the guys on screen that's for sure.

So I started again.  It felt so great going into standard pushups and just blasting out 25 like it was nothing.  They're all perfect form.  It's just insane how much difference 90 days can make.  I'm so grateful for starting this program and I'm glad that I've been able to stick with it like I have.  Minor setbacks like these aren't even really setbacks for me anymore because I know where I want to be with this thing.  This time around, I'm vowing to not miss a single Ab Ripper X routine either.  I'm still struggling through it.  My little 17 minutes of hell, but man if Tony didn't hit the nail on the head with his words... "I Hate it... but I Love it."

P90X Adventures: Week 13 Day 1 Yoga X

So today marks the start of my final recovery week for P90X. It kinda feels like a victory lap. This is now the 2nd time I've gone all the way through Yoga X non-stop.  It's incredible.  It's just so astonishing how much more flexible I've become in 3 months.  I'm still not able to do a number of the moves with great form, but I can at least get into all of them which is crazy.

At this point, the toughest still are the Yoga Belly Seven moves.  They're crazy.  They're essentially like longer held versions of some of the Ab Ripper X moves.  They're murderous, but at this point, I'm feeling the burn and all I can think of is how awesome it's gonna be to see the eventual payoff from this stuff.  It's basically taken me about 70-80 of the 90 days to finally get to the point where I can start working on my abs  and as I figured, I'm gaining muscle but that's just kinda pushing the belly fat out.  This definitely presents a bit of a discouraging feeling because it looks as if my gut is expanding rather than contracting, but I have to remind myself that there's friggin' muscles under those layers.  It's still the typical head games we all face and when I really look at things, my waist is still moving down.

I've been thinking for the last week or so about what I plan to do once I'm actually finished with my 90 days.  ..

Do I take a couple weeks off?

Do I move on to my new Rev Abs workout?  

I've definitely come too far to go back on my momentum that's for sure.  Also, since I've gotten to where I can perform P90X fairly well, I'm still not as awesome with every routine.  So I plan on just continuing straight into another round of P90X next week.  There's really no point in taking a break.  I know that keeping on this path will get me to where I wanna be.  It's still hardcore but it's getting easier to perform well and if I keep it going my shit is gonna get ripped son!

That said, I'm excited to see how I do on Core Synergistics tomorrow!

P90X Adventures: Week 12 Days 2,3 &4 Plyometrics, Final Back & Biceps, and Yoga X

A lot was happening this week so far which lead to me not being able to actually write about much of it until today.  This week is essentially wrapping up my last week of main resistance training P90X exercises and so far, they've all been awesome.  It's been amazing to see how far I've come on these in particular in 7 weeks.

I'll start with Tuesday's Plyometrics...   I blasted through it and I had quite a bit of energy for a good portion of it.  The sweat was just pouring.  I'd say this is probably literally the most I've sweat the entire time doing P90X, and I'd had some pretty damn crazy sweats between Plyo and Kenpo X...

I look like someone dropped me in the damn river!

I actually wrung out what maybe amounted to about 12-16oz of sweat from that shirt into the sink...  it was not pretty >_<. 

Then Halloween was my final Back & Biceps.  What I found particularly remarkable about my sheet for this was that my numbers all stayed relatively tight.  The big changes between way back in week 5 to now was that I was using less and less of the chair for pullups.  That definitely made a sigificant change in my numbers for pull-ups but that's great because I'm lifting more and more of myself with less and less assistance.  I also started hitting a plateau with the weights so switching to bands made the last couple versions of this really sing for me.  

Then there was Halloween night.  Now, I felt especially happy to try out Left 4 Dead characters.  The years past, the only character I could've really portrayed from L4D was Coach.  I probably would've made a pretty good coach all things considered.  Coach loved to talk about eating... I loved to talk about eating.  I guess we were more kindred spirits for sure, but I know I probably wasn't going to survive the zombie apocalypse because I was just too slow to keep up.  

Now, however I got to try out Louis from the first Left 4 Dead game!  It definitely felt good.  Now I actually feel like I could survive in the zombie apocalypse.

Grabbin' Peelz!!

Then yesterday came Yoga X.  This was literally the first time this entire 81 days so far that I've gone through the ENTIRE Yoga X routine!!!  Hoooly Shit man!!  I did it, and I'm so damn proud of myself.  I'm so amazed at how far I've come with some of this flexibility.  I'm still not very flexible by a long shot but I decided to do a time-lapse of the routine this week and a couple of the shots really amazed me.  Of course, I'm not showing the ones where I was like falling over haha :-P  

This makes me look like I know what I'm doing!! :D

For the last couple days for breakfast, I'd been making various juices and smoothies.  I'd intended on sharing each but kept running out of time each day to actually write a friggin post so I guess I'll just share a couple now!   Tues I made a video featuring a juice since I hadn't done a juice in a while.  So here's that:

This is my "Immunity Boost" juice which came as a request from a good friend of mine.  She wanted to know what types of juice would be good to help fend off colds and flu and all sorts of nasty bugs that start going around about now.

Then yesterday, I made a pretty awesome green smoothie.  This guy was pretty cool.  It basically followed my green smoothie formula of a bunch of kale and some fruit and other boosters to make it tasty.  This time it's a bit more hardcore with Lacinato Kale which is basically the darkest leafy green I've ever really seen aside from maybe purple kale.  Really, Really good stuff.

 Super Green Smoothie:
1/2 bunch of Lacinato Kale (5-6 leaves)
1 cup of strawberries
1 cup of blackberries
1 cup of blueberries
1 carrot
1 banana
1-2 tbsp of Chia Seeds

Yumm!!

So that's what we got.  Today I made another juice which I'll hopefully be sharing either later today or tomorrow when I go over my final Legs & Back which I'm probably about to jump into here pretty soon.

Laters!

P90X Adventures: Week 12 Day 1 Final Chest, Shoulders & Triceps

Well, it's drawing to a close...  I'm running out of main routines.  Soon I'll be on my last recovery week and then, I'll have completely my first round of P90X.     I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do after this first run.  I've been giving it a little bit of thought but not much.  The main focus is... well... keeping focussed. It's been getting harder and harder to keep up with and to muster the drive to complete because there's that growing feeling in the back of my mind that I'm almost finished.

Almost finished?!  If anything I'm only just beginning.  That's the struggle.  Being done only implies that I can just stop and if I stop then I'll go back.  I can't go back.  I've come so far and I sure do have a ways to go.


I've been lately finding myself with a weird feeling.  This late in the routines, I was thinking that maybe they would be getting easier.  They're not.  Instead, what I've been finding is that I'm getting better and stronger, which in turn, makes the routines harder and more intense.  It's like some crazy mad science.  It's kinda been changing me emotionally too during the workouts.  It's been opening a more primal side I'd say.  I'm kinda starting to sound like a juice head bodybuilder sometimes.   I'll be going on a move like today's chair dips for instance, and then I find my self starting to count loudly...  Like barking it out as my triceps feel like they're about to rip and snap back into my armpits or something.

"22, 23! 24! 25! FUCK YEAH!!!"

...did I just yell that out loud...?

Yeah, it happened.  More and more often.  I also feel like I'm getting a little routine "stir-crazy".  I'm finding myself quoting all of Tony's jokes and the quirky ways he might say stuff differently during each routine.  I'm like talking to my tv.  Maybe that's a combination of spending ALL my time at home and then doing P90X on top of it.

Looking at my worksheet for Chest, Shoulders & Triceps is like whoah...  I started this routine 5 weeks into the program so I had already come a long way.  Here's the stats comparing week 5 to now:

                                                       Week 5              Week 12

Slow Motion 3-in-1 Push-ups	9	22
In & Out Shoulder Flys	17reps 15lbs	16reps Red bands
ChairDips	11	25
Plange Pushups	8	10
Pike Presses	5	8
Side Tri-Rise	15 left 12 right	8 left, 13 right
Floor Flys (pushup)	8	17
Scarecrows	15reps 15lbs	10reps Red bands
Overhead Tricep Extensions	15reps 15lbs	11reps Red bands
Two-twitch Speed Push-ups	7	21
Y-Presses	9 reps 20lbs	9 reps Blue bands
Lying Tricep Extensions	12 reps 20lbs	12reps Red bands
Side-to-side Pushups	-	11
Pour Flys	-	10 Red bands
Side-leaning Tricep Extensions	-	8reps Red bands
One-arm Push-ups	-	9
Weighted Circles	-	35reps 10lbs
Throw the Bomb (tri ext)	-	12reps Red bands
Clap Push-ups	-	7 full  10knees
Slo-mo Throws	-	8reps Green bands
Front-to-back Tricep Extensions	-	10reps Red bands
One-arm Balance Push-ups	-	4
Fly-row Presses	-	8reps 20lbs
Dumbell Cross-body Blows	-	35reps Green bands

HTML Tables


This morning, I didn't really have much to make a smoothie or juice with.  I almost forgot that I'd tried making some chia seed pudding the day before so it was perfect for breakfast.  Pretty simple.  You basically soak chia seeds for at least 4 hours and they'll expand and can make a sort of pudding-like texture. I took 2 tablespoons of chia seeds, added water until it just covered them, added a tablespoon of raw cacao powder and about 1 tablespoon of raw coconut nectar.   I had some strawberries so I just cut some up and added them.  It was great! Chia seeds are pretty awesome and full of Omega-3's.  When paired with water and soaked, they're great for hydration and also as an appetite suppressant.  They're pretty good for lowering cholestrol and also regulating blood sugar by slowing down how fast the body converts carbs into sugar.  So go forth and get some chia!  add it to a smoothie, juice or make a pudding!

Until next time peeps!

P90X Adventures: Week 11 Day 5 Legs & Back

So yesterday, I did my Yoga.  It was tough... really tough.  The energy just wasn't there.  I don't know what it was.  I did some things with improvements, but on the whole, I was just not hitting it with the moves at all.  I was sort of barely going through the motions and I'm not quite sure how effective I was even being at that point.  I pushed through though and tried really hard to reach the end.  I can't feel too bad about that.

Today though... Today I went to work.  Now, since at least 2008, I've been carrying over 299lbs on these two legs.  They're strong legs.  The one advantage to losing the weight the way I did, powering through juice and biking nearly every day is that I didn't really lose any strength or muscle growth in my legs.  Despite all that, it's P90X Legs & Back that friggin takes me to the damn brink every time.  Holy shit man it is no joke.  I can maybe recognize that I didn't have a very strong core or lower back, but when I do some of these leg moves, it's like my body just turns into a friggin' faucet.  I'm constantly pausing and trying to catch my breath.  Trying to get my heart rate back to normal.  Trying not to trigger a damn migraine with the forced blood rush through my body.  Trying not to friggin' puke!!  >_<  I've only more recently been able to push through the routines all the way.  I think Week 6 was the first week I actually did it all the way through.  The following weeks had seen some sort of weird distraction where I either couldn't finish or skipped it.  There might have even been one week where I just didn't write anything down but did it.  This was the first time I did every last damn move though and I feel like a goddamn boss!

As I was wrapping up, Connor called wanting to come over.  I needed to get some VO work done and asked if he'd volunteer and try being the voice I needed on a project.  I'd intended on giving Ab Ripper X the good college try this time around since I'd chickened out twice already this week, but it was easy to give up after doing the heavy resistance routine like Legs & Back, plus I just didn't really have the time.  We did the recording session and we'd already had plans to set out and go see Iron Sky later.  Oh man, that movie was way better than I was initially expecting.  It was hilarious.

After the movie, I got back home and decided what the hell, and I threw on Ab Ripper X.  I gave it another try.  Now, I think last week I might have done it again.  Usually when I give it a shot I only last a couple moves in.  the last time, I think I made it until there was about 6 min left in the routine.  Well, tonight I only realized it was 17 minutes from start to finish.  I'd always been thinking it was a 30 min routine or something. I gave it a serious try this time and holy shit, I was able to blast through a lot of the moves.  It sure burned like hell, but even the little bit I'd been attempting showed as those moves were the ones I was able to actually pull off a full 25 reps on.  So the triumph of the day was when I made it 100% through the routine doing every single move.  What the hell was I so afraid of this whole time?  Well, I'm glad I've managed to finally clear this hurdle.  Hopefully now there won't be anything more standing in the way of me finally being rid of the rest of this belly!

...You hear that belly?  You're goin' down!  Mikey's burnin' down the house son!!

So for pretty much all week this week, I'd been rocking variations of a smoothie I created the other morning which I called Berry, berry, berry Kakow!!  I made a video the day I came up with it, but my computer was not playing nice and I was having major troubles rendering it out.  Well, I finally got it to render and got it uploaded and here it is for you guys to try and enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/my_videos_edit?ns=1&feature=vm&video_id=M2QCuM2Z-w4

Blogger's being a pain and not allowing me to embed it so just hit the link above.

Alrighty... Until next time...

P90X Adventures: Week 11 Day 3 Shoulders & Arms final

Yesterday, Plyometrics was pretty much the same as always.  I went through it without any real problems, but this time I had a lot more energy.  That said, I think I ended up going harder on each move than I've done in a while so I actually had to take a lot of frequent breaks between just to calm my heart down some.

Shoulders & Arms was the first routine that I powered all the way through the first time.  Even made it through the bonus round that first time, though I skipped the side tri rises the first time through because I didn't realize how easy they were for me.  This last time was interesting as I did the routine for only the 2nd time almost exclusively using resistance bands.  The weeks prior, I'd been using 15lb and 20lb dumbells.  The last time I did S&A before week 9, I had to do almost 20+ reps of everything in order to really feel the burn.

The bands have been a bit weird to get used to.  I've managed to find the burn a lot easier this time around but it was tricky on week 9.  I guess I just sort of figured the guys on screen using bands were all hardcore and I should at the very most, match their bands and not try going with heavier bands than them.  That was my mistake week 9.  A lot of the time, I was just not really feeling it.  Some of the tricks they employ though, really do help create more tension from a lighter band without having to jump up to the next tension, so that's been helpful.  Basically, creating a "loop" with the bands and standing on that will give you a lot more tension without having to step it up.

It makes the routine go a by nearly twice to three times slower because they hardly focus on the person with the bands until the move is already halfway over.  I look and see the form and then have to rewind the routine to make sure I'm getting it done with them.

My triumphs for this last time through Shoulders & Arms were definitely chair dips and side tri rises.  I managed to blast out 20 chair dips the second time through with straight legs.  I think the next time they show up, I might try raising a leg every 5 to step it up now.  On side tri rises, Tony expresses his disbelief at how Dreya's able to blast through like 22 side tri rises and says something like "25! Don't do any more than me! If you do 26, I'm coming to your house!!"

...well...
I totally did 26 and felt like a complete badass!   Of course, that was only with my left arm and not my right. I was only able to do about 17 with my right arm.  I guess I'm totally gonna have a tiny arm /big arm haha.

The soreness has kinda been building... tomorrow's yoga x is gonna hopefully be a welcome relief.  I'm certainly looking forward to it.

~mike

P90X Adventures: Week 11 Day 1 Chest & Back final...

Holy crap folks... I've been a bit too occupied this weekend to really blog about any of the routines.  I'll try to start quickly with Friday's Yoga X...   I think this was the first time I made it pretty much all the way through without stopping.  It was pretty awesome.

Getting my warrior 3 pose on in a drive through redwood ... doesn't get more badass than that!!

 I got to go see my good buddy and former co-worker off as he's moving on to work at a pretty kickass game studio down in San Fran.  I'm really glad that he's finally moving on.  Adam is actually the guy who gave me the initial inspirational spark and glimpse into this window that eventually lead to my transformative journey in the first place.  He's the one that told me about Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead, and indirectly, he's been a bit of a motivating force for me.  I'm a bit bummed that he never got a chance to go out on a bike with me and in turn, I never joined him on a morning run, but it sounds like he's going to return next year for the tough mudder.  I guess I'm planning on attending this time.  With all this P90X stuff going on, I think I'm ready to make running the final frontier.

Saturday, I had a bit of a cheat-routine with my Legs and Back.  I didn't actually get to the routine until about 7:30pm and I was heading out to another Arena Club Reunion party.  I realized about a quarter of the way through the routine that I was likely going to be spending the rest of the night dancing so I cut it short a little before halfway.  I kinda felt bad about it because I really wanted to finish the routine, but in the end, it was probably a good call.  I of course danced all night and now I'm so friggn sore!!!  It still trips me out that I've gained that much confidence and my back is that strong now.  Before, I'd have to be sitting and just "observing".

I skipped Kenpo X... Largely due to the fact that it was our 6 year wedding Anniversary!!!

...also, I was totally sore from dancing the night before :-P

So, I'm getting to the end of this P90X adventure.  Today, in fact, was the last Chest & Back routine for the rest of the thing.  I figure I'd take a look at the stats between my Day 1 and today...

Move                          Week 1  Day 1                                           Week 11 Day 1
Standard Pushups                     9                                                               21
Wide Front Pull-ups                 5 w/chair                                                   12 w/ far chair
Military Pushups                       1                                                                8  (still really freakin' hard)
Reverse Grip Chin-ups              3 w/chair                                                  12  w/ far chair
Wide Fly Pushups                     4                                                              15  bar slipped... too wide
Closed Grip Pull-ups                9 w/ chair                                                  10 w/o chair
Decline Pushups                       0                                                                10
Heavy Pants                             20 x 15lb dumbells                                     20 x Red resistance band
Diamond Pushups                     1                                                                10
Lawnmoweres                         stopped                                                      13 x Blue resistance band
Dive-bomber Pushups              stopped                                                      10
Back Flys                                 stopped                                                      10 x Red Resistance Band

                                                 
                                                 ROUND 2

Standard Pushups                            0                                                         19
Wide Front Pull-ups                         0                                                        11 w/ far chair
Military Pushups                               0                                                         8
Reverse Grip Chin-ups                    0                                                          10  w/ far chair
Wide Fly Pushups                            0                                                          19
Closed Grip Pull-ups                        0                                                          11 w/o chair
Decline Pushups                               0                                                          9
Heavy Pants                                     0                                                          12 x Blue resistance band
Diamond Pushups                             0                                                          10 on knees
Lawnmoweres                                  0                                                          11 x Blue resistance band
Dive-bomber Pushups                       0                                                          5
Back Flys                                         0                                                          12 x Red Resistance Band

So woah... I've definitely come a long way.  It's awesome seeing the progress.  I was starting to  get bummed on some of the pullups because I was finding myself getting tired and worn out way faster on them. Then it hit me that I wasn't really using the chair at that point.  Blew my mind.  Of course, once I came to that realization, I'd basically get sapped and would need the chair at that point to try and eek out at least 2 more. nuts... 

This morning, I powered up with another smoothie.  My phone was being stupid so I was barely able to get the resulting smoothie pic. 

                                                 Green Peach Berry:

3-4 Leaves of Kale
1 handful of Spinach
1 Peach
1/2 Cucumber
1 cup of Blackberries
1/4 cup of flax seed












This guy was pretty green so it wasn't very sweet, but still pretty tasty.  You could probably sub in some apple juice to sweeten it up.  I didn't have any bananas, otherwise that probably could've helped a bunch too.

That's it for today!

~Mike