Falling on Your Face

As most of my lovely readers know, today was the first day of another journey I have chosen to take: the journey of P90X for the second time. This first day was absolutely fabulous!! Read more if you want to know why.

Well, I came home from Audit, wasn’t feeling so hot, so I decided to sleep for quite a while. I knew that once I woke up, I’d P90X it up and my first day would be completed. Well, I didn’t wake up until 3pm. I was partially tired and partially hesitant about going through another round of TH wise cracks (as previously mentioned in Day 62 of Insanity.) Anyway, once I got out of bed, I was ready.

It took me about ten minutes to get my workout gear on, haul the chair into the bedroom, get my 8lb weights set up (more about this later) and put the resistance bands on the back of the door.<<picture down below. Plus, I had to get my trusty 32-oz water cup, arrange my hair so that it wouldn’t come undone and of course, make the bed so that while I was working out, I wouldn’t have to stop in the middle of some Push-ups and do it. Lol. (The bed always has to be made if I do a workout in the bedroom. The room has to be clean too. J)

Anyway, I pushed play and it began. In all the P90X videos, you see TH in lighting that shows every detail of his muscles…he talks for a little bit about what’s to come and then it goes to the video. This first section seems kind of silly to me because he’s being serious when the rest of the video is TH making wise cracks. Again I say, this gets annoying after 90 days. I had to laugh.

The workout started with the warm up of course, which I had actually forgotten a lot about. The warm-up only lasts about 5-6 minutes (nothing compared to Insanity, let me tell you!!) But, you work up a “nice” sticky film and then proceed with about 7 minutes of stretching. In just the first portion alone (warm-up) I had noticed that I was able to do SO much more than when I first started. For one, I was able to go from exercise to exercise without stopping. I did jumping jacks for 50+ seconds and didn’t really feel exhausted, and I was able to do run lunges like they were nothing!! (I had a horrible time doing run lunges when I first started out.) This time, it was like I was a pro!! It put a warm fuzzy feeling in my heart to know that I had come that far in just a matter of months.

Ok, enough about warm fuzzies. The workout: Chest and Back. (and Ab Ripper X) I bet you can’t guess which muscle groups we worked on today. Lol. This workout was basically a 2-set deal. We did 2 sets of 12 different exercises. This workout includes a lot of push-ups, pull-ups, and a few exercises involving weights. I’ve come to like this workout simply because it works the flab off of my arms!!

About the weights. In the first round, I could only handle 5lbs neoprene dumbbells (neoprene simply means that it’s covered in a rough rubbery substance so that they are easier to grip.) Today, I started with 8lbs, and it really didn’t seem all that heavy. Boy, I thought I was just dying with the 5lb ones. Haha!! Even that made me all warm and fuzzy inside.

One of my favorite exercises is Reverse Grip Pull-Ups. They hurt like the dickens if you do a lot of reps, but looking at my muscles as I pull down makes me oh so happy. (I wasn’t able to see any kind of definition when starting the first time.)

Another move that I have to mention, simply because it’s the reason for the title today, is the good ole Divebomber Push-Ups. Seriously, the name alone makes me giggle inside even though the move itself almost gave me a rug burn!! Lol. This is how it went.

I can’t do push-ups yet. So, I modify. I do push-ups on my knees (which doesn’t do as much for your body as the old fashioned ones do, but if you can’t do em, you gotta modify. So, I do.) The same goes for these Divebomber thingamabobs. You kind of start out in an upward dog yoga pose except your hands and feet are spread out like a X. Then, you move your face down like you are trying to crawl underneath a fence without touching the floor with your knees. So, since I was doing this move on my knees, I only allowed my arms and back to go “under the fence.” It’s amazing how much pressure is applied to your arms when you’re actually putting practically all of your weight on them…just to go “under a fence,” I might add. So, I was going “under the fence” and I got way to low to push myself back up. And, BAM! Face hit the floor and I just had to laugh at myself. (Note: if you go down too far, you might not be able to get back up…) From that moment on, I paid more attention to how my arms were feeling and came back “under the fence” when I felt like I was about to headbutt the carpet again. That was probably the highlight of my day.

Ok, so that sums up a good portion of Chest and Back. Now, on to Ab Ripper X. (Excluding the “ab” part, this could be a name for a really vicious dog…at least that’s what I think about when I have to do this 15-minute ab killer!!) Not even four minutes in, I was lying on the floor feeling like I wanted to vomit on the newly made bed. But, like a trooper, I gritted my teeth through the rest of what I could do and that vomit feeling left me. Yay! In that workout, I got warm fuzzies because I was able to do about 50% more of what I could the first go round. Exciting and painful!! But, awesome!!

I guess that’s enough for this post. But, before I go, I weighed myself this morning and Simon said 173. I weighed myself before coming to work and Simon said 171.6. So, folks, I believe Sweet “16” is just around the corner!! We should celebrate once I get there…with like a really big cake…haha…no…how about a stalk of celery (yeah!!)

Signing Out,

It’s Possible!!

Below are some pictures that I hurriedly took on one of the water breaks (oh yeah, we get more water breaks in P90X!!) My cute green toesies that I shot while preparing for more pull-ups, the pull-up bar, and my neoprene dumbbells. :D