Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Power90 - Week 2

We've officially entered Week 2 of the Power90. It feels like a lot longer than that since we started doing Tony's other videos a few weeks earlier, but for the sake of the program we'll leave it at that.

Week 2. After running through the Level 1-2 Sculpting session we decided that we were good with bumping things up to Level 3-4 now, rather than waiting for the halfway point in the program. Holy hell, I don't think my triceps and chest muscles will ever forgive me. The first part of all four circuits is push-ups. 8-20 reps using various arm positions. I'm not even close to being able to complete them all, even in the modified position. Yes, that's right. As I said before, I'm a sissy and I do weakling push-ups with my legs bent. That brings me to my first note of progress, though - last night I actually did SIX push-ups with my legs straight out! SIX REAL PUSH-UPS! That's double the number I was able to do last week! I'm thoroughly impressed with myself, and it's certainly nice to have some kind of measurable progress going.

I'm not going to hop on the scale or whip out the measuring tape until we've been at it for a full month. I don't think that minuscule losses really matter all that much to me, so we'll just see where we net out. Even if I don't end up losing much in inches, as long as I can tell that my strength is increasing then I'm good with that. The goal here is health, not scary olsen-twins thinness.

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Out with Jillian...

In with Tony Horton and the Power90.



I finally got to the point where I couldn't stand to listen to or look at Jillian anymore. My co-worker Lynn did the P90X a while back and loved it. She's actually just starting up as a coach for the program. I always teased her about it, but in the back of my mind I thought it might be something to try after my lactating days were over.

So here we are! C and I are doing it together, which can only help us to stay on track. I need that late-evening motivation when all I want to do it sit on the couch and watch TV. We decided to start with the Power90 rather than going straight for the P90X - figured if we jumped into something that was outside of our ability range then we'd be less likely to stick with it.

2 weeks ago we started circuiting through Tony's Power Half Hour series, and then last night we began the Power90 in earnest. I don't know that we'll go the full 90 days, we might jump over to P90X sooner than that. So far the sculpting on the first set of disks is way too easy. We're going to swap that part out for the Power Half Hour disks.

I'm not looking for (or expecting) any huge bodily transformation. I'm relatively happy with my shape and size, but certain parts could stand to be a little firmer. I've also resigned myself to the fact that my stomach will never be exactly as it was pre-baby no matter how many crunches I do.

Oh! And my first AW! Last night I successfully did THREE real push-ups! I've forever been a knees-bent push-up kind of girl, and I'm very proud of myself!