Day 47 – One on One Base & Back/ARX

I’ve kind of given up looking for the Legs & Back DVD. Either it’ll turn up at some point or my son threw it away (he likes putting things in the trashcan these days). May have to order a replacement disk at some point.

This workout was as killer as last week. I kind of like the idea of doing plyo moves to exhaustion/counting rather than for a certain amount of time. Not sure if this makes me push myself more or slack off a little, but I feel like I can do more moves, just at a slower pace and over more time.

Last time (Monday) I had a workout that involved pull-ups I started using the green band (the tightest band we have, a step up from the red one I had been using). I did that again today. It makes it a little harder to see improvement since I can’t do as many moves as I did with the red band. But I like that fewer moves give me a better burn. And presumably the harder pull is a good stepping stone for eventually doing an actual pull-up. I think I mentioned last time, but it’s odd using the bands to modify when there’s not a modifier on the screen. It’s just Tony doing his crazy pull-ups, while I try to mimic the movement using my bands. I really look forward to seeing some of the modified moves in P90X2.

On today’s plyo moves I also found myself occasionally thinking “how would Pam be modifying this?” Course, with plyo the answer is jumping less high, or not at all. I’ve really been making a point to get myself off the ground. The one exception being the leaping lunge/runner’s pose; I’ve been stepping through my the end of this move as it wears on my back to bend between jumps while lunging. I’m guessing that sentence was hard to visualize. It’s also hard to do.

One plyo move that I actually like better, despite believing it’s harder, is the jack-in-the-box knee tuck jumps. Basically you squat down, touching the ground, then jump up and try to get your knees to touch your hands. It kills my legs but I feel like I can actually get better jumps with this method. Maybe I have momentum from coming out of the squat, or maybe my hands aren’t as high. Either way, it’s nice to feel like I’m getting the move correct for the first couple of jumps. Then, my legs begin to shake and I’m happy to get my feet off the ground. I’m done with my feet no longer can move, or my squat turns into a sit.

Overall, one of my favorite things about my 90 days of P90X/One on One hybrid is that I’m getting to try new routines. P90X is great and has muscle confusion built in, but it’s nice to get the additional challenge. The key to seeing a change is really mixing it up. You won’t get that from doing the same routine every day.