Week 2, DONE!!!!

I must say that I have yet to fix the issues I'm having with staying up late.  It is really hard.  What makes it worse is that it is a spiral.  Once you start there is no easy way to just wake up early without loosing sleep.  In case you haven't pick up on my delemma, I still stay up til 2 in the morning.  I just have so much energy now in the evening that I don't get tired til then.  Maybe I need to be more active than I am being.

Anyway, the second week went by so much faster than the first did.  My body is no longer sore all the time.  My back is still giving me issues, but there has been a developement.  The second saturday ( or the last day of your second week) you start doing cardio abs.  After doing these excersizes my back felt incredible.  And they felt great for the rest of the weekend.  I think the mix of stretching and ab work in that area great helps the lower back.  With this in mind I have decided that for my back health I am going to change the INSANITY program slightly in that I am going to start doing the Cardio Abs workout every day.  Yeah it will suck, but I have to do it for my back.

Being the first day of week three today I had a fit test.  I did so much better on this test.  It is amazing how much I have gotten better.  Even though you can't see it in the pics, apparently I am much stronger now.  I should have guessed this anyway because I didn't barf after the workout like I did on the first week.

Here are my numbers so you can see the improvement.

Switch Kicks: week 1: 61; week 2: 65.
Power Jacks: ---------37; -------- 47.
Power Knees: --------60; --------100.
Power Jumps: --------10; ---------24.
Globe Jumps: ----------1; ----------6.
Suicide Jumps: ---------4; ----------9.
Push-Up Jacks: -------10; ---------20.
Low Plank Oblique: ---10; --------22.

Most of the numbers I was able to double.  Most of this has to do with the fact that I wasn't trying to hold back the vomit this time, but still, thats definately an improvement.  I was starting to get a bit frustrated with this program as I haven't been seeing the results in my body yet, but after seeing this and noticing how much better my body feels compared to the first time, I'm so amped right now.

Anyway here is this last weeks pic.

The pics might look better if i take them after I work out, but I figure you are more yourself when you wake up than at any other time so I take it then, when my guard is down and I'm too tired to fake it.

whew....

I am tired.  I've learned that staying up til 2 in the morning is horrible for working out so don't do it.

My lower back still hurts me.  I think it has a lot to do with my lifestyle.  Have of the day I'm sitting in front of my computer, so my posture isnt the best, as well I wear slippers (flip flops) everywhere. which have 0 foot support.  I think I am going to start wearing my tennis shoes around for back support.  I did that yesterday and my back felt pretty good by the end of the day.  Also I think that surfing helps it a lot as well.

Anyway for the time being I've replaced all the jump exercises with power squats, it's not as effective but it saves my back.

I'VE DONE A WEEK....

... now only 8 more to go...

So I'm not one to complain, but I've had issues with my lower back for a very long time.  I think it may have been something that happened in gymnastics when I was about 8 that has permanently damaged me.  Im not sure what it is but for some reason I have a bad lower back.  Hopefully its just because I am weak sauce and need to have more ab strength, however it might not be and could be something relatively dangerous if I dont take proper care of it.

My lower back started hurting on friday and got much worse after my workout on saturday.  Sunday is my off day so i had a rest and it seemed to get a bit better, hopefully that means that its a muscle thing and I just need to take extra care of it.  As well I've started wearing shoes, although my shoes are starting to fall apart.  They can't handle the INSANITY. (Take that Nike)  So we'll see what happens.  For now I have forgone most of the jumping exercises.  I do what I can keeping proper posture but once I feel the pain, I stop and replace the exercise with a squat that is as close to the exercise as possible.  I know I will not get the same effect as if I was doing the full exercise, but for some reason I find that my back is a little more important.

I dont know if I can handle another week of this.  The diet is killing me.  I think I need to change it up.  I've all but eliminated my sugar intake, except for the recovery drink and the protein shake, which is great because now I get hungry every 2 hours, my metabolism has sky rocketed, however now my food bill has gone through the roof.  All for health.  Maybe health is a corporate conspiracy to sell more vegetables. Who knows?

Anyway here are my week 1 photos:  I dont see much of a difference, other than there is a smirk on my face.

p.s. happy valentines... maybe next year I'll have one ( I said that last year too)

I still hurt....

It's not that I'm a whiner or anything... but I'm still sore.  I do all the necessary stretching and so forth, but it doesn't take much time for the muscles to tighten up again.  I find that I have to stretch every couple of hours if I want to remain limber enough to walk.

Anyway I did post yesterday because the internet was down.  But as I have yet to give an account of my last 5 days since starting INSANITY I guess I will give you a day by day rundown.

First day: Monday Feb 7.

I did the fit test on Monday.  I woke up at 9am, which is 3 hours before I usually wake up, and ate a healthy breakfast of eggwhite muchrooms and onions. (according to the INSANITY meal guide), then I waited about an hour and a half to start the video.  The time passed so I got started.

 It turns out that your not supposed to be able to keep up with the people on the video, as I am persistent in trying to give 100% within 15 minutes of the video I was loosing most of what I had eaten for breakfast.  If your not understanding that means I threw up everywhere. I dicided then that I better take it slow, or I would literally die.

Turns out I will not be eating breakfast before working out.  I will eat a late night meal instead to give me the energy for the morning.  (PS it works just dont eat any fat or sugar in this meal.  I find that oatmeal with a bit of protien powder and half a banana work great, just a little though maybe your fist size portion, while this will not fill you up, it wont keep you from getting a good rest either.)

Tuesday Feb 8th, Plyometric Cardio Circuit

Most the day on Monday I was sore.  So when I woke up on tuesday I was ready for a good stretching.  I started the stretches and gave 100%.  Its funny though, when your not fit, even strecthing is hard.  I couldnt do most of the stretches because I wasnt flexible enough.  And it turns out that I ended up using a lot of strength just to hold myself up and balanced.

Anyway the warmup comes before the stretching.  And just a warning, this warmup is much more intense than the fit test warm up, it lasts twice as long.  Literally there were balls of sweat falling down my ripply body as I was warming up.

The rest of the workout is just as bad.  This is probably the worst time I've ever had working out.  I hate it, and I don't want to keep it up.  But what I hate even more than that is the fact that I can't do it, so I won't stop.

Wednesdays Feb 9th Cardio Power and Resistance

So I thought that I was sore after the first day... When I tried to get out of bed, i crumbled in a hurt heep onto the ground.  My legs most of all were dead.  It hurt to even flex enough to walk.  Not the striking broken bone pain, just the soreness out my body pain.  I looked like a penguin most of the day tuesday as my body was jsut as sore, but it just got worse.  I had work on tuesday night, and had to run up about 25 stairs multiple times during the night, I thought I was going to die.

The wednesday workout isnt as bad cardio wise, Its more about mixing the strength in with cardio.  Don;t get me wrong it still kicks butt, and if i could even do it to half the caliber that the people on the videos do it, that would be amazing. 

On gauging myself, I would say that I run the program at about 25% of the video intensity.  I am still trying as hard as I can.  But %25 percent is all I can give.  I figure thats as good a starting point as any.  Anyway the Cardio power and resistance focus more on muscles.  There are a lot of squat style exercises along with some shoulder work.  Yes It was difficult.  Today is the day that I started the blog as well.  As I was introducing myself I had no time to write in that days stuffs.

Thursday Feb 10th Cardio Recovery

By far my favorite day.  You take it easy, at least compared to the other days.  It is still hard but there isnt really any cardio involved, its all strength and balance exercises which are my favorite, once again I could only do about 25% of what they were doing.


Friday, Feb 11th Pure Cardio, today,


Pure Cardio is by far the shortest workout after the warm up its only about 25 minutes, but it hard as.....  I just finished it before writing this entry, I didnt push myself as hard as I had hoped to but my lower back is starting to hurt.  I think the fact that I am doing this without shoes is catching up to me.  I'm pretty sure I should get some.  Appearantly a lot of back pain comes from poor work out shoes.  I was hoping that I could do it all barefoot as I am one of those people who think that less is more, and i would be better off doing it without shoes, as nature intended.  But then again, nature didn't invent the linoleum tiles that I am working out on.  I'll check it out, but I'm pretty sure I'll be told to get shoes.  Plus shoes provide great traction and leverage for the workouts.

Tip #2 buy good shoes

(Tip#1 was dont eat breakfast before working out)

What the duece is this?....

So, I've decided that I am going to work out, regularly.  Its turns out that while surfing is good and dandy, it doesn't really help you stay fit.  Yeah surfing is hard as hell... i won't be surprised if hell is learning how to surf, except in hot flowing magma instead on nice salty cool Hawaii water... mmmmmm. Oh sorry... Yeah surfing is definitely hard.  But there is much more to health than just being active. (appearantly)
I discovered this when I visited my parents this last holiday season.  While in Spewta (or Utah, whatever you prefer to call it), I litterally did nothing.  Yeah I did a few pushups and such everyday to "maintain" however when I returned to Hawaii, i went and played softball with some friends.  Next thing I know I had thrown my shoulder out and my legs hurt like the dickens the next day from running around some bases.  It became clear to me that I was not as fit as I thought I was, or was at one time.

I knew I had to change.  Awhile back I pickup up a copy of both Beachbody Insanity and Beachbody P90X.  When I say awhile ago I mean almost a year ago.  At the time I really didnt think I had the time to work out, with school, graduation, and all the other b.s. you have to deal with at that time.  So I just forgot about it.  Now I've been graduated for about 9 months, most of the day I sit and do nothing, besides the time that I am out surfing or working at the movie theater.  I also have my online business.  Emblemart.com. ( tell your friends) So I really have no excuse to not work out. Now that I've started (day 3) I realize that there always was always plenty of time to do it. It's an hour or less a day.  The same amount of time that you spent watching TV or less.

Even when I played football (that one hellish year) cardio has always been the hardest for me.  For this reason I have decided that I will start with INSANITY.  Also because INSANITY doesnt require any free weights or any of that other stuff that I dont have access to here on the north shore.  INSANITY is a cardio based program with a mix of isometric workout.  It is freaking hard, and it hurts.. but it hurts so good.  Hence the title of the blog.. OUCH,... MY BODY.  After INSANITY I will move onto P90X.

Anyway the moment you have all been waiting for: Weighing in at 195lb, at 5'11". (36 waist) is TRAVIS... (rocky theme playing in the back ground)
 
While I am not ashamed of my body ( It took me a long time to get where I'm at.. hahaha) I want a better one. And I'm willing to work for it.

I'll post photos every week or so, right after I wake up. That way I'm too tired to act like I look better than I do.  And chances are none of you will see this until I'm done with the program, because I'm not going to tell anyone... so I could really care less.

PEACE