Insanity: Round 2, Week 1, Day 2 – Cardio Power and Resistance

I actually got myself out of bed at 5am today! AND I was in bed at 9:40 last night and lights out a 10pm! That’s a miracle. I can’t stay up past 10 if I want to get out of bed at 4:30. When I turned the light off last night, I told myself I was only allowed to snooze my alarm clock 3x and had to have feet on the ground at 5am.

So up at 5am, I was. Had my Energize and grabbed my water with a Nuun tablet and headed to the basement to do two things; 1) wait for the Energize to kick in and 2) give myself time to wake up a little more.

Pushed play around 5:45… I usually look, or maybe it’s just how I feel, like a fish out of water during the first 2 sets of the warm-up, and then suddenly during the 3rd set, I’m all into it and gung ho and sweating. And then Shaun T slows it down for 7 minutes of stretching. WTF? So I did my 8-counts per stretch and moved through it. Shaved off 2-minutes of the total time.

Of course, I didn’t realize I was fast forwarding right into power jumps, belt kicks, hit the floor, and V push-ups. I probably would’ve enjoyed a 2-minute break had I remembered this.  —> this is pretty much what I did during the rest periods. 3 full rounds of these same exercises. Then he throws in some tricep dips and ball push-ups at the very end, because I’m not tired or anything.

Second group of workouts – hurdle jumps, globe jumps, moving push-ups, and plank runs. I actually like this group of exercises, but I’m so beat by the time I get here I just don’t want to keep going.

The benefit of this being my second round, I’m:

• Able to push harder
• I feel stronger
• I cuss him out less
• I can do more

The benefit of taking pictures during workouts:

• I can correct my form
• I get the visual proof I look as much in pain as I feel

 

 

Often throughout he’ll say “If you don’t look like this, you need to take a break.” I’d be taking a break for 40 minutes if that was true.

Last bonus exercise? 8 squat hops, 8 push-ups. Who doesn’t love that at the end.

And then at the end, I get to do this… until Shaun yells at me to get up and stretch. Then I sat (on a tile floor) and let the sweat drip from me.

Tomorrow is supposed to be my “Cardio Recovery” day, but I’ve been challenged to do something this week I don’t normally do. I’ll most likely skip the Cardio Recovery and go for a walk/run in the morning instead.

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Insanity: Round 2; Month 1 – Day One/Two

Where have I been? What have I been up to? It’s been since October 2015 since my last blog. Back in May (this year) I said “I’ll blog my progress every day.” I didn’t.

I’ve been in school working on my Master’s degree. I thought, no it won’t take up much of my time. It seems like every other 8-week term it’s taken my life. I can’t juggle all the balls I have in the air, so my love of being a Beachbody Coach has been put to the back burner while I go through school.

To get to the matter at hand… Insanity, Round 2!!! YES! I said it, Round 2!!! 

I never thought I could complete this program, but I did. So how did Round 1 go? Eh… I kind of half-assed Month 1 and then something clicked in Month 2. Did I workout 6 days a week? No. I tended to skip the Recovery days and rested Sunday’s, sometimes Saturdays. BUT something clicked in Month 2 and I did pretty much 5-6 days a week of Insanity for most of the 4 weeks. So I decided to start Round 2 after a week off in between finishing Round 1.

So — Month One, Day One/Two… what does that even mean? It means I skip the Fit Test and do Day 2 of the program. I know, I know… follow the calendar, Jenn. I do follow it, but quite honestly, I don’t care about the Fit Test. I don’t care if I can do only 10 power jumps and 15 power jumps in 2 weeks. I feel it. Through Month 1 and Month 2 I noticed the strength in my upper back, shoulders and arms and core when I didn’t have to always modify push-ups. I can do real (ok, I go about half way down) push-ups. That is MY fit test.

Moving forward…

The Warm-Up — so one would think “Shoot, I’ve done this before. 40 minutes is NOTHING after 4 weeks of 60 minute workouts. I’ve got this.” Yea, F that… I went right back to “I think I’m going to die!” during the warm-up. 3 Rounds of the warm-up, then stretching. Knowing the format of the stretches, I move through them faster than the workout does. While he’s talking form, I’m moving into a different stretch, giving myself a 4-to-8 count through all stretching moves. I shaved off about 1-minute doing this because I added a stretch in somewhere.

The Workout — here is the CORE of the work. 20-25 minutes of hard, intense exercise. I love it. 2 Rounds of 3-sets of HIIT moves. Each set has 4 different moves you do for 45-60 secs, and then a 30 sec break. The last set will add on 1-3 “bonus” type moves. These are the moments you’re calling him a total jagoff because you think you’re already dying and then he adds 3-minutes onto your last set.

How many times is this guy going to tell me to check my heart rate in the middle of jumping around? Doing Power Jumps and in the middle of it Shaun T is saying “check your heart rate!!” It’s high, I feel it, it’s beating out of my chest and I can’t breath. I don’t need to stop and check my heart rate, pal.

The Cool down — Amazing stretching.

What am I eating these days? 

• I’ve re-joined Weight Watchers. Yes, ha, I’m a Beachbody Coach and they have those awesome colored containers for portion control. For me, it’s too much stress to add onto my already stressed shoulders. Weight Watchers takes away the guess work.
• I’m still Gluten Free 98% of the time. I’m Dairy Free like 20% of the time, although I should up it to like 90%. I’m Egg Free probably 50% of the time. I don’t eat them regularly like I used to, but I don’t always avoid things I know might have them.
• Shakeology – while I believe fully in the product and even the price behind it, right now I don’t have it as regularly as I was. When I do, it’s only Chocolate Vegan. I probably have it 2-3x a week at the moment. It’s not that I’m avoiding it or lost my belief in the health benefits, it’s more I need to avoid sugars for awhile to continue healing my gut. Once I’m healed, I’ll bring more Shakeology back into my diet.

Supplements I take:

When I workout – I always take Beachbody Performance Energize to wake me up and pretty much force that 5:30am workout.

Otherwise, I take a Probiotic, magnesium glycinate, Vitamin D3 2000 IU’s, and Vitamin C (3 chewable tablets)