I saw P90X on tv a few weeks ago and decided I wanted to try it. My friend and I went in on it and are going to do it together although we will do it on our own if our schedules don't meet. I basically want to make this thread to track my progress, but I am not going to bore everyone daily because there is no point in a daily log. I do want to use this thread for questions and to track my progress over time and give a better review of the program than what I have seen on 2+2. I do plan to update it fairly early on to give an overview of my experience with each of the different workouts.

I am a little embarassed to post my pictures since I am big on not really putting myself out there for everyone to see and I'm sure I'll take some heat for posting my pictures, but it is a good way to hold myself accountable for my current health and hope to see some results when I am finished with the 90 days.

Here are some before pictures. I couldn't remember all of the different poses they wanted you to do and I didn't want to go through it all so here are just two to start with. I cut out my head just because I need to keep my identity hidden a little bit. Maybe if I see remarkable results when I'm finished I won't feel the need to hide. Please don't make fun of me. Yes, I'm really italian, and yes, I'm hairy. And I have a tan on my arms only from being at the beach and wearing a cutoff t-shirt.

FRONT:


SIDE (I was turning around as the camera snapped the photo so it's good enough):


I am 25 years old, 5'11" and about 190 lbs. I don't really know how much I weigh because the scale we have at home isn't accurate. I do know that my jeans are looser from last winter and when I went to the doctor at the beginning of the year I was around 195lbs. I used to lift a lot, but I went through some hard times and lost motivation and quit lifting and working out regularly.

Some concerns that I have with the program is the nutrition plan because it's hard to commit to eating the right foods around holidays and when you're with friends and go out to eat. I'm going to try to stick to it as much as possible.

I also will have a problem with watching the videos and working out because I do not have dumbells at my home and don't plan on buying any so I will be going to my local gym and using what they have. It's not a very high end gym and so the space is limited. I will try to make do with what is available and hope that it doesn't hurt me in the end. I am also a little concerned with where I'm going to do the plyometrics, kenpo, and yoga because it's awkward to be doing those kinds of things in an area where there isn't much room while there are other people walking around. My friend and I decided we may use my garage, but since it's winter, I'm afraid it may be too cold. My dad has a kerosene heater so I hope that will be good enough.

Anyways, Day 1 starts 11/25/2008 (Tuesday) around 11:00am. I think my friend and I are going to skip the yoga the first week because we want to try and get back on track for Sundays being our rest day, unless we put yoga somewhere else for the first week.

what is P90X???

Just did a search and found this: http://www.buyp90x.ca/?247SEM

The dude talks about muscle confusion in the commercial. It has to be legit.

Dear ItalianFX,

I know I troll the **** out of you but jesus **** get a hold of yourself. Did you find this on late night tv or something?

Concerned,
ed

lol

IIRC I saw a commercial for this while watching the Golf Channel.

I think what makes this program different is that it claims to work out your muscles in a way that they can never plateau, I guess muscle confusion?

I dont know anything about health/fitness though.

You might never plateau with this program but you might just be running around in circles never progressing or not progressing as much as you should have. That said, from what I've heard, this isn't a half bad thing to try, but there are better things out there you can do for free.

A steady diet of the basic lifts like squats, deads, presses, pullups, rows, and cleans combined with progressive overload may never confuse your muscles but will certainly give you huge gains.

There is no need to continually confuse your body. Confusion is not what makes you stronger. It can make you sore though. What makes you stronger is doing more than you did last time. When you plateau, you make minor tweaks here and there to keep progression going. Drastic wholesale changes are unnecessary and often counterproductive.

The problem I always had lately was sticking to a workout. I'd go to the gym and just get bored within 10 minutes. I'd seriously go down to the gym for about 10-15 minutes do a few sets and then leave. I always felt dumb because I'd go in after some people and leave before them. The gym is tiny so it's not like I wouldn't be noticed. The most people I've ever seen down there at any one time was maybe 5 people.

I just need something to motivate me to keep going and keep me interested. That's a big reason why I'm trying this. I checked out a lot of reviews and even read the majority of the threads on 2+2 that dealt directly with P90x. I know you guys are saying I'm dumb for trying it, but like I said, I need something to keep me interested.

And I'm also not so much looking to get big and strong as I am looking to get in shape and lower my body fat. If you can even see those pictures, I want to get rid of the fat around my mid section. In 2002 when I was very motivated to lift and worked out 3-4 days a week, I probably looked the best that I ever have. I want to get that back and more.

ifx,

While the p90x is not your best option, there are certainly worse products sold on late-night tv.

"A bad program done well is better than a good program done poorly."

It's good you are doing this with a friend. Don't be a tard and "not commit to the nutrition plan" or "skip yoga/whatever else you feel like skipping." It's already not the best program, so don't make it worse by doing it half-assed.

We were only talking about skipping the yoga day to get us back on track to give Sundays as the rest day. We haven't really said anything more than that.

I just got back from the gym doing Chest and Back, and Abs. It was pretty tough. I think it confirmed that I'm out of shape. We really only did the first half of the Chest and Back and then went to Abs. My friend could barely do 1 pullup, and he was having trouble with the pushups. He really doesn't have any strength. He can run for 5 miles without a problem, but he doesn't have muscle endurance.

I was even having trouble, but it was good to have him there to push me while I was pushing him.

I did P90X last year

lost 25lbs in the 3 moths (181-156), gained a lot of strength, but didn't put on a lot of muscle. In the end I just didn't eat enough while I was on the program.

Thanks for starting the thread, look forward to your review.

I think you'd benefit a ton from a pre-workout energy supplement. 2 of my favorites:

white flood
animal pump

not at the same time though.. white flood gives more of a twitchy energy rush and great pump, works very fast.

animal pump gives more power (imo), more of a sustained energy, and has creatine (WF does not).

there are like a hundred similar products out there though, I'd definitely do some research and try one you like.

I did half of Day 2 last night. It has been tough with Thanksgiving right away. Day 2 was plyometrics. I tried doing it in my bedroom, but it required a lot of jumping and so I tried to just do the squats without lifting off the ground on the way up. My legs are still burning today. I know that by the end of tomorrow night, my legs are going to be really sore.

Today, though, my upperback, chest, and triceps are all sore from the Chest & Back from Day 1. It feels good though.

After Day 1 my friend backed out. I knew he would. He said he's not committed to it. He told me that he can't commit to the diet plan and so if he can't do that then there is no point in doing the whole program. He also doesn't want to run into the problem of sticking with it and then 60 days from now not be able to do a workout because he will be hanging out with girls he meets once he starts his new school. They are all excuses. He is very lazy and can't commit to anything. I think the real reason that he is giving up is because Day 1 was pretty hard for him. He has no upperbody strength and I don't think he wants to put in the effort. He said he still doesn't know what he wants to get out of the program, but to me, knowing him, he's just making excuses for being lazy.

I don't mind though because it makes it easier on me to do things when I want them and not have to try to work out schedules together. I'm going to stick with it the best I can though and hopefully see results in the end.

I won't be able to do Day 3 today because it's Thanksgiving and I have a lot of things going on, and the gym I go to is closed. I'll most likely be hitting the gym tomorrow.

LOL@COMMITMENT, the work outs take 60-90 minutes

not that hard for the avg. person to figure out they waste way more than that amount of time daily doing nothing

good luck with the program


i'm already disheartened that your first 4 days have been,
"I skipped the yoga day because...."
"i did half of day 1",
"i did the second half of day 2, skipped out on the jumping parts in the bedroom, stuck to the squat movements"
"i'm skipping day 3 because it's thanksgiving"


maybe i'm misunderstanding what i'm reading but aren't you supposed to be adhering to what it's directing you to do?

Yeah I agree, but with the holiday and family all over the place and the gym being closed it has been hard finding free time.

I never skipped the yoga.
Day 1 was a lot harder than I imagined and trying to slow down for my friend kind of put me behind. He kept stalling and taking his time and it was slowing me down.
Day 2 jumping parts were with the squats, I just didn't jump up in the air like they were doing on the videos.
And I'm not really skipping Day 3, just pushing it back a day since the gym isn't open and I don't have my own weights or resistance bands.

After this weekend I should be back onto a normal routine.

right on, i'm just hoping you adhere to the program closely so we can all see your true results from doing the program, if you catch my drift.

Day 3 - Shoulders and Arms, Abs.

I did the Abs last night to give me something to do so I didn't do them today. Abs, if I remember correctly are 3 days a week. The schedule is lifting including the abs, then a cardio activity. It alternates. And then there is a rest day on the 7th day, usually Sunday. You do this for 3 weeks and then the 4th week is more of a cooldown week with more stretching and yoga.

Today I did the Shoulders and Arms. The workout was Shoulders, Biceps, Triceps, repeat. There were probably 4-5 intervals with different exercises. I'll tell you what, if you go fullblast from the beginning there is no way you'll be able to keep up with the weight. I was already hurting after the first interval. I started the shoulders/biceps with 25lb weights and after the first interval, into the second I was moving down to the 10-15lb weights depending on the exercise. I was failing within 8 reps, but it felt great to get that burn. My biceps are still pumped after about an hour and a half. I can tell right now that if I continue with the program, I am going to see results fairly quickly. It was nice not having my friend there because I could go at my pace.

When I was done with the whole workout I could barely lift my arms to put my sweatshirt on and could barely lift my arms enough to steer my car.

I am near the end of this program myself and it does work, it is really more for leaning out and gaining alot of strength and flexibility rather than gaining alot of muscle mass. I started out barely doing any unaided pull-ups and now by week 10 I can easily sets of 10+, even started adding weight to some of them.

I would suggest doing week 1 over again, that's how I did it just trying to get somewhat adjusted to the workouts, then it gets alot easier. The diet is just as important as the workouts, I never did phase 1 of the diet plan since I am not overweight, but phase II is really easy after the 1st couple of weeks.

Good luck, Plyometrics is a brutal workout, I would suggest doing the cardio-x in it's place for the 1st month.

Really hope you stick to this to show us if works, friend who is obese bought and tried badly for 3 days at this and I plan on tryin once I get down to 240ish to try and get super lean so stick to it for yourself and us.

I'm kinda pissed more people don't do Body for Life. I just wanna post sweet Bill Phillips pics.

It's 2AM and just did the Yoga. I am going to be busy all day Saturday so I wanted to get it in while I was free.

The yoga is the longest of all of the workouts. It is 1.5 hrs long.

The first 45 minutes is doing a bunch of movements that are repetitive for the most part in getting to the actual stretch. This is the hardest part of the whole workout and it will make you sweat. I didn't think Yoga was that difficult. My whole body was shaking from trying to fight my flexibility. There were some things I just had to relax on because my body was shaking so much and my legs were getting so tired I could barely hold myself up. I almost wanted to give up because I was getting worn out and I couldn't imagine going another hour doing this. I looked in the book though and saw that some easier movements were coming so I just kept taking a few breaks and tried to fight through the pain.

After the movement workouts, it goes into more balancing things. This is relaxing and I enjoyed it. I think I have good balance so I didn't really have much trouble with it. All of the people on the video are already flexible, 2 hot chicks, so they make it look easy. One guy is fairly new at it and throughout the whole workout you can tell he is struggling.

After the balance is the floor work and that is pretty much some stretching, which you probably did in high school if you played any sports. Some of the stuff was new though and it felt good to hold the stretch in place.

Towards the end was what they call "The Yoga Belly," which is holding some postures that work the abs. It requires holding your legs up in the air and moving them to the side and I had trouble with that because I was already tired from the hour and 20 minutes of everything else. I did my best though.

The ending is the best where you just do a few more stretches and there is one where you just lay on the floor for a minute just relaxing. I could have probably fell asleep if I stayed there long enough.

So overall, it was long, and it was harder than I expected, but I'm sure once I gain more flexibility I'll be alright. I think the length of the whole workout will turn a lot of people away. The first 45 minutes are brutal and looking ahead to next week makes me kind of cringe at the fact that I'll be doing it again, but I'm going to commit to it and do it.

Monday I started over again and went back to Chest and Back. I wanted to get back on track so that Sundays could be rest days. I still haven't been able to repeat the workout. I think it is because I was going to the gym right after waking up, without eating, and it was wearing me out too quickly. I was starting to feel dizzy and so I decided to finish the first half and just head out. I still keep up with the Abs though as I love doing that and can do it at home easily.

Tuesday I did Plyometrics again. The hardest problem is having a place to do it. Plyometrics really works your legs and there are some parts where you have to jump. If I do it at home, the only place I can do it is in the living room, but if I jump I have to really concentrate on taking the landing impact off the floor since it shakes the room. I could try doing it in our garage, but it has been pretty cold and I'm concerned about that. The one thing I like about the Plyometrics is that the ending is fun. You do some baseball, basketball, and football motions to end it out. It's a good way to end the workout. I am also finding that if you really push yourself, it'll be over before you know it and it feels good when you're done.

Wednesday was Shoulders and Arms and I really like doing that one. When I'm lifting, my muscles pump up and when curling, the vein in my biceps really start to pop out. I have always liked working my arms.

Tonight I'm planning on trying Kenpo. The schedule says to do Yoga, but I did Yoga last week and that was pretty tough. Not that I'm going to stop doing it, but I want to try Kenpo and see what it is all about. I'll do Yoga on Saturday.

The nutrition plan has been tough. I've been just trying to eat what I think is good to eat. The worst part is going to bed hungry. Do you guys know of anything I can eat closer to bedtime so that I am not laying in bed hungry and unable to sleep? I try drinking water, but I feel like that only adds to the problem. I think I need to get the diet plan in check, but at the same time I feel that if it is such a hassle to do it, I won't want to do it for very long and it'll be tough to stay motivated to always watch what I eat. I've been hooked on toast with butter and peanut butter. I have a craving for it all the time. Also, I feel like now that I've lowered my carb intake, I feel like my blood sugar levels are way down. I often feel weaker and hypoglycemic and can really feel the spikes if I eat a carb like pasta. Is there anything to regulate that?

So in the ~2 weeks that I've been doing this, I feel like I'm seeing "some" results. My body has been sore so I know it has been working. My main goal was to reduce the fat around my midsection and I think it has started to, but it's hard to tell. I also want to boost my self-esteem and confidence as I always have trouble with depression and so when I lift/workout, it helps a lot. The hardest part is getting started, but I'm sure once I get comfortable with everything, I'll really be into it more and more.

I did Kenpo Thursday night and I don't know if I wasn't putting in enough effort, but I found it really easy. It was pretty close to what I would think kickboxing or Tae-Bo would be. There is a lot of punching and kicking. Again, they do some jumps during the break and I was at my house so I couldn't keep up with them. That is really been the biggest problem so far in not having a suitable place to do the Kenpo/Plyometrics. I can't really go to the gym and up to the aerobic room because I won't be able to watch the videos, and can't really do them at home because it shakes the living room. I could probably go out to the garage, but that is tough also because there isn't much room in there.

Friday I did the Legs/Back in my house. It required pullups, but I didn't have a pullup bar so when they did pullups, I just did pushups. I know it's not fully the same, but it worked for me. Today, my calves are really sore. I can tell the leg workout really worked. I did the wall squats and my legs were just burning like fire. There are some exercises in there that I don't feel did much for me and could probably get a better workout doing something else, but I stuck with it and overall the workout made me breathe hard and get sore.

Saturday I didn't do anything and Sunday (today) is the off day. I worked Saturday night and was busy during the day doing a few things so I wasn't able to do anything.

I'm looking forward to Monday and doing Chest and Back again. I think instead of doing pullups, I'm going to try and do the Lat pulldowns. It's similar to what they use with the resistance bands and it'll probably help build up all of the same muscles since I have trouble doing the pullups once I start getting tired. I'll still do some pullups and eventually once I strengthen up with the Lat machine, I'll go to doing more pullups. In the past, I have found that I can strengthen my muscles quicker by using a machine that allows me to use weight that is manageable and doable. I'm not going to give up on the pullups, just need to supplement it with something else for the time being.

And as always, the Ab workout is awesome. By the end, I think, you'll do about 349 ab movements.