John Cleese Was A Plyo Superstar!

I mean he must have been! Doing our first plyometrics the morning after our first Legs and Back out of the gate was an... interesting idea. I still have trouble walking up and down stairs. And early on in the workout, when we reached the silly walk segment, I thought "Oh, this isn't going to be too tough!" Ha! I was a bit wrong.

Four silly strides into our silly walks and I was definitely feeling it. And that was quite early on in the workout, too. Nonetheless, it was a great workout. We both really enjoyed it, and felt we got a great full body workout, with perhaps a tad more of an emphasis on the legs - quite suitable for our goals.

I'd also recommend this workout as an all purpose stand alone video - can be combined with any other type of workout program you're doing and especially great if you play sports... keeps you quick on your toes, like a cat! Good stuff.

Out with the Old, In with the New!

Yeah, I know I didn't say much about finishing up the P90X Lean program, but we really did get all the way through.  Well, almost.  We didn't do much that last recovery week, but that's OK, because we were just mentally gearing up to properly attack our new program... P90X Classic!

Although, it's really more like P90X-Lower Body.  I've shuffled the program around a bit to include more Legs and Back and more Core Synergistics, and less upper body.  So it's going to go a little something like this:

Week 1:  

• Tues:  Legs & Back + Ab Ripper
  
• Weds:  Plyo (can't wait!)
  
• Thurs:  Shoulders & Arms + Ab Ripper
  
• Fri:  Yoga X
  
• Sat:  Legs & Back + Ab Ripper
  
• Sun:  Kenpo X

Then the next week, we'll swap out the first Legs and Back with Core Synergistics and the Shoulders & Arms with Chest and Back.

Why are we doing this, you might ask?  Because while we appreciate how important building our upper body strength is, both of us have much more need of leg strength and core strength... Me for my running, Big E for his ultimate.  We discussed this at length and figured that the P90X program seemed a bit more geared towards having a pretty, beach-ready body with huge guns and sexy triceps, which is great and all.  But we really care more about having really strong abs, strong legs and while looking good in a bathing suit would be great, it's more of an added bonus and less our goal.

When do we start our P90X-Lower?  This coming Tuesday.  And yes I'll be attempting a nutrition plan again (but remind me to tell you later about the awesome healthy energy cookies I made last week!).  We'll also be measuring our results this Sunday so we'll keep you posted!

And The Winner Is...

Drumroll please...

Brad, with all correct answers and fantabulous spelling of Tony's favourite word, "Gawwgeous!"

We'd like to give an honorable mention to Matthew, who did respond in time for our first deadline but just didn't have the third answer correctly.

Please tune in again in a month for another opportunity to win some more awesome free stuff from our friends at Extreme Body Workout.

PS. Brad, please contact us at through the blog to get us your mailing information so we can send you the goods. Congrats!

P90Expert Contest Deadline Extended

Oh no! It seems our contest was a bit too tough... Here, we're going to change the rules a bit.
You don't have to get all the answers correctly, just post your best guess. If no one gets all three right, we'll just do a drawing of all the comments received.

New deadline is Monday January 21st at 5pm P.S.T.

Hope to hear from you!

First Ever P90Xpert Contest

"Tony cracks me up - like the part where he caws and acts like a Pterodactyl..."

"Man, that Eric is something else. Every time I want to whine, I think of him..."

"Joe. Chair Dips. BAStard!"

Are you so tight with P90X that you know what those comments mean, and what workouts they refer to? Do you sometimes think you should get a prize for the moment-to-moment knowledge of P90X you have earned?

Funny, so do we.

Announcing the First Tiny in 90 P90Xpert Contest, produced in happy conjunction with our friends at Extreme Body Workout. We thought it would be fun to test your knowledge, develop our passion for Tony Moments and to help you expand your understanding of the right tools for the job.

The prize this time is a fantabulous Men's or Women's three resistance band set.

Without further ado, here are your P90Xpert Contest Questions
(entry instructions below):

1. What "soup" does Phil stir that makes Tony jealous of his line?

2. What does Sophia do in the Step Back Lunges to add more intensity?

3. Fill in the blank - Tony: "When you're a P90X grad,
it's _______!"

Your Contest Official-ness:

• To enter this contest, please answer all three questions accurately in the comments of this post. (Sorry everyone, this time the contest is US or Canada only!)


• Please, only one comment per person per giveaway post.


• Anonymous comments will not qualify (how will we know who you are?!)


• We will randomly draw the winner from the correct answers in 3 days time - Friday Jan. 18th at 5pm and announce the winner the following day-ish.


• Since we can't notify the winner, please keep an eye out for our announcement, and email us your info if you do win. This is made easier for you if you subscribe to this blog so you don't have to keep checking back, although it's always great to have you pop-in for a read!!


• A Sweepstakes winner's failure to respond to the prize notification within three business days - Wednesday, January 23 at 5p.m. - will be considered such Sweepstakes winner's forfeiture of the prize and an alternate winner will be selected from the pool of eligible entries.

Bring it! See you soon...

I hate it, but I... still hate it.

We have several Tony-isms that we love to repeat but one of our favourites is from the intro to Ab Ripper X, when Tony says: "I hate it, but I love it" as he looks knowingly (evilly?) into the camera.

Well, lately, I've just been hating it. Normally, if I'm not feeling psyched about my workout, I just start it and some time into the thing, my adrenaline kicks in and I start feeling great: pumped, psyched, motivated... Lately, I've noticed that I've just been grumpy all the way through the workout. Even in Kenpo X! Shocking, I know.

This doesn't mean that I haven't been bringing it though. I've just been really pissy while doing so. I still show up. I still press play. Hell, I've even started adding jumps at the end of my Dreya roll (14 of them today!) Who knows what's driving me through these workouts at this point. I'm like a robot: Show up, Press play... Show up, Press play... repeats itself like a mantra in my brain. I think it's Tamsen's voice saying it.

Part of me wonders if I'm not just a bit worn out, overtired, since I have been ramping up my running distance lately (I did a 12-miler after Kenpo X on Sunday). But another part of me just doesn't care. We're reaching the end of our P90X Lean - next week is a recovery week anyway. And then we'll take the following week off from Tony completely. Who knows, maybe I'll even give Maya a visit?! She might be shocked to see how well I'm doing, and it'll definitely be an easier workout.

Pay no attention to me, I'm just grumpy. If you're looking for tasty healthful breakfast suggestions, check out my latest article for Fitfare. And if you like free stuff, don't forget to tune in next week for our cool free Extreme Beach Body giveaway!

The Rightness of the Right Tools

I'm with the bands. Resistance bands, that is. I used to have a full set of weights, but I also have a small apartment. At some point, when trying to find some dark corner to stash 100lbs worth of weights so my mom didn't trip on them and do a header into the computer table, it dawned on me that my small home was not (just) a gym. So I sold them and got bands.

But I only bought four of them, thinking that I'd gotten the general equivalent of my weights. I had to fake my way through several segments, where I either had too much weight and had to do some goofy compensation or accept the fact that I was never going to realize the full effect of the segment (pull-ups were a joke with the band I was using). Then Extreme Body Workout woke my ass up. They sent me a full set of bands, with such a range of weight resistance that my workouts shifted into high gear immediately.

Yeah, I did feel like someone had just pointed out that I had a nose, thanks for snarking that up for me.

So very much like the fact that going a half-inch deeper into a move, straightening your legs a little more or kicking with a little more precision, using the proper equipment will increase the quality of your P90X experience. Oh, and the sexy curve of your bicep. But you probably already know that...look, it has nostrils, too!

Free Stuff for Youuuuu!

Great news! The lovely folks at Extreme Body Workout have offered to sponsor some tasty giveaways for us. What this means is that we connive to come up with tricky tests of your P90X knowledge and you can win cool free stuff like gear and whatnot!

Check back on January 15th for our first quiz. We'll pool the correct responses and draw a winner at random. So in the meantime, be sure to study up on your P90X workouts (in other words, just show up and press play).

New Year's Ponderings

Happy new year everyone! Hope you're looking forward to the new year as much as I am...

Well, the holidays and holiday traveling wreaked havoc on our little P90X workout schedule. We started out doing pretty well... We decided to postpone our Yoga X before our flight on Friday till our rest day, but then we did our Core Synergistics the next day, at Big E's parents house and Kenpo X the next day. Then it began to fall apart a bit. On Christmas eve, we did the Yoga X as planned but dropped out the corpse and oms. Then came Christmas and between hustling back and forth between both families, we decided to skip the Chest Shoulder & Triceps.

The next day should have had us right back on track with Cardio X, but somehow we were so wiped out from all the hustling about and merry-making, we mutually agreed to skip it. By the 27th, we decided this week was a bust and skipped the Back & Biceps. Given that we've never missed more than one workout this entire time, that week was unprecedented. The next day we were traveling back, and next thing you know, the week is over. Oh well. At least I managed to get in a 10 miler in on Sunday and Big E played beach ulti on Saturday, so we didn't completely end the year as lazy lumps.

Yesterday was the rest day and in theory, today we start up again, as strong as ever to make up for our failings last week. Today's workout is Chest & Back and Ab Ripper and we're off!

We've been discussing the P90X lean and the P90x schedule, as I've begun setting up our calendar for the next cycle, when we move up to the standard P90x plan, and we've come to the conclusion that the beachbody concept isn't exactly what either of us is going for. The focus on upper body, while useful in many ways, isn't our main interest. We don't so much want to look good as want to be strong and supported in our chosen sports (and it wouldn't hurt to look good while doing it). For example, we'd be more interested in more Legs & Back workouts, but not quite as many Chest, Shoulders, Triceps, Biceps, etc. variations. We also feel that we could use more Core Synergistics than are offered in the standard P90X plan, where they only show up in the rest week.

So I've decided I'm going to revisit the plan before we begin it on January 22nd, and cater it a bit more to our shared interests. Along those same lines, I've spoken to many friends who are interested in checking out the P90X workouts but don't necessarily have the 6 days a week to give to it. While I'd agree that in order to maximize your benefits from the plan, it's best to try to adhere to its guidelines as closely as possible, I think it's also important to also be realistic. Doing Ab Ripper 5 days a week isn't going to to much for you, but doing 3-4 workouts a week can still give very good results, especially if the workouts are carefully selected to be complimentary and balanced. So over the next few weeks, I plan to put together some alternative schedules that will offer a variety of timing options as well as slightly different focus depending on what the end goal might be.

Tamsen and I also have some exciting news coming up for you guys, our lovely readers, so tune in soon for our upcoming announcement!