The Insanity is over.... Kind of

My time with Insanity is officially over 60 days and lots of sweat later I feel great and my conditioning had definitely improved from where I had started.

Would I do it again? I don’t know. I’m a big proponent of staying true to your goals and right now Insanity doesn’t line up with what I want to achieve with my workouts. It was great to do something else for a bit and Shaun T is a great motivator and I always felt he was directly motivating me, a hard thing to accomplish over a DVD and I’m glad I did it. I like pushing myself to new levels and doing workouts that are truly intense and that I know will take me to a new level of what I can accomplish.

Working out is a fantastic tool for personal growth. You can’t cheat your way to being ripped or pulling a 500 lbs dead lift you have to put in the work if you want it. Success in your fitness goals spills over into other areas of your life. The skills learned in the gym (where ever your gym is) are so valuable to the rest of your life.

I am so grateful that I found my way into this lifestyle and I can honestly say if it weren’t for the lessons learned in the middle of working out I wouldn’t be where I am today, pushing myself to be better in every area of my life and to be so passionate about helping others that have that burning inside them to change their lives for the better.  

Intermittent Fasting and Insanity.

My weekend was a food-for-all. On Friday we celebrated my son’s7th birthday with way too much pizza and too many cupcakes. Saturday was homemade chili which again I had way too much of. With the weekend culminating Sunday night with yet another party with too much food and good company. All told I woke up this morning to 191lbs on the scale. I started the weekend at 183lbs. I don’t regret the weekend one bit I enjoyed good food and being surrounded by family and friends celebrating milestones. Had I been following a strict calorie restriction diet I’d be kicking myself in the butt for not having the willpower to resist all the food and deserts that were available to me this weekend. Enter Intermittent Fasting, last night after my slice of cake around 8pm I took a break from eating until 7pm tonight when I sat down to dinner with Jen. I did all my normal activities except eat any food. I had a cup of coffee this morning black, and a diet Coke later in the day around 4pm other than that the only thing I drank was water. My Insanity workout was great I had tons of energy to get through the entire workout in fact I had more energy today than on regular days even though I worked out later in the day than normal. I was 18 hours into my fast. Most days because of my schedule and how I normally eat I have a 14 hour window that I do not eat during. It goes from 10pm until noon the next day which is my usual workout time so I don’t eat till around 2-3 pm for my first meal.

I’ve been following IF since the fall of 2008 when I found Brad Pilon’s Eat stop Eat. It has been the cornerstone of my diet plan that has helped me loose 60+ pounds and to stop obsessive compulsive eating. The information Brad puts out is well thought out and backed by tons of research. I highly recommend his blog if you have any questions about IF that I can’t answer I’m sure Brad can. After all he did do his graduate work on fasting and its effects on the human body.

If you have questions about how you can use IF with your current workout program or how it might tie into one of the many Beachbody workout programs let me know how I can help.

Cold weather Insanity

I usually look forward to every one of my workouts, today was different. My gym sits in an unheated part of my house. It’s really a patio that has been turned into a “sun-room”.  The outside temperature when I started my workout was 47 degrees it felt a lot colder out there than that must have been the slight drizzle coming from the sky. I dressed for the occasion by wearing a beanie and a tee shirt, neither which I normally wear. The warm up was brutal my body just couldn’t get warm I hadn’t even broken a sweat till the 3^rd and last time through it. After the first circuit I stripped off the shirt because the sweat was finally starting to roll and I was starting to cool down from it. But I was finally starting to enjoy the workout and really had a good time with it. By the end for the 55 minutes all the window were covered and I had managed to warm up my little gym. I think it’s time to find a space heater for out there so I can at least have a little bit of comfort for when I start P90X2 in January.

Insanity the half way mark

So today I was day 36 of Insanity. I did my fit test along with the Max Cardio circuit workout. Man it kicked my butt. At the end I was totally gassed. I was very happy with the results of the fit test every number went up and I’m feeling better every day. Here are my results after 36 days. My day one fit test .

Switch Kicks: 50/120    +70

Power Jacks: 45/54    +9

Power Knees: 81/92    +11

Power Jumps: 30/47   +17

Globe Jumps: 8/10    +2

Suicide Jumps: 17/21   +4

Push-up Jacks: 26/33    +7

Low Plank Oblique: 30/50    +20

This is a huge improvement from where I started. Plus I was in good shape to begin with.

I had a few thoughts today about conditioning that I don’t know the answers to that I want to explore. Is there a maximum genetic expression for human conditioning? Or will your body keep adapting to the stresses of conditioning work? Will you ever reach a point of being over-conditioned? I don’t mean over trained. I know first hand that not only is it possible but it sucks too. Is there such a thing as optimum conditioning? I’ll be exploring this concept as I work through my training protocol from now through the next several months. Over the next year I’ll be doing P90X, P90X2, and a weight lifting protocol As well as a hybrid P90X/ Insanity program. Stick around its gunna be a good year.

Insanity Month 1 Review

I’ve been trying to come up with a post for this week. It’s been hard to get my thoughts in order though. So I’m going to tell you my experiences during my first month of Insanity.

I started my Insanity journey rather cocky. I’ve done several rounds of P90X as well as being relativity active outside of my workouts many days I’d do double workouts just because I had time to do an extra workout.

Day 1 of Insanity in the fit test which I thought I’d be able to handle quite well after all I’ve been working out 5-6 days a week for over 4 years. While I think my numbers were pretty good I thought they’d be better than where I landed.

Switch Kicks: 50

Power Jacks: 45

Power Knees: 81

Power Jumps: 30

Globe Jumps: 8

Suicide Jumps: 17

Push-up Jacks: 26

Low Plank Oblique: 30

This workout is no joke when it comes to conditioning it is by far the best workout I’ve done. Every day I was in a flop-sweat half way through the program by the end I was standing in a lake of my own DNA. The workout times are perfect just when I was thinking “Why the hell am I doing this? I can’t do anymore.” The workout would be over and it would be time to cool down. . One word of caution however make sure you have good shoes and are not slipping in your own sweat you could seriously blow a knee. For me I’ve done all but 2 workouts in my vibrim Five fingers The only problems I’ve had is some swelling in my left knee and my ankle from slipping in a puddle of sweat. A second warning do not do this work out on carpet! The amount of sweat produced will have your house smelling funky in no time at all. If you have no choice but to work out on carpet get a good mat to put down so you won’t upset your significant other because the place smells like a locker room.

Beachbody has done an incredible job putting together the best At-Home workouts on the market.