#33 Postby BeansNBroccoli » Wed Jun 12, 2013 9:57 am
Okay, so I fell off the wagon for a couple weeks. No, not the vegan wagon, but the lifting wagon. I've been having a lot of trouble fitting gym time into my schedule since I stared with a new lab, especially because I'm job hunting like crazy right now and that's a full-time job in and of itself. However, yesterday I decided it was time for no more excuses. I don't want to lose what progress I've made and I want to keep pushing harder and I'll get back into a gym as soon as I can. For the time being, I dusted off my copy of P90X and I'm going to make an attempt at sticking with it (or at least as close to the program as my schedule allows). This means I might be doing 2 a days on weekends to make up for some missed time during the week, but I figure it probably doesn't hurt for me to do a Yoga X session in the morning and upper body in the afternoon/evening.
Yesterday I stared Day 1 which is Chest, Back and Ab Ripper X. I didn't go quite as all-out as I could've because I haven't done the program before and I wanted to make sure that I could maintain good form and actually get through the entire 75 minutes. I read enough blog posts yesterday from people that couldn't get through Day 1, and I didn't want to make that mistake. Of course, I may be in slightly better starting condition than those people, but I didn't want to take that for granted. When I revisit this workout next week I will go harder, that's for sure. The whole workout is essentially variations on push-ups, pull-ups, and some weighted rows. Pull-ups are a weakness for me, so I did the first round un-assisted with low reps and allowed myself to use assistance and crank out more reps on the second round. The Ab Ripper X workout was also something new for me, as I don't usually do a lot of straight ab work. Usually I've done a little core assistance work on the roman chair and whatnot, but I feel like I get enough core workout from keeping everything tight and using good form for squats and deads. However, I kept at it and matched the trainers on-screen almost rep for rep throughout Ab Ripper X, but I've definitely got some room for improvement (that's the whole point, right?).
Anyway, right now my plan is to try to stick with this P90X for a couple weeks and if I find myself working out efficiently at home and enjoying it, at that point I'll try to find a few more plates to add to my at-home-gym arsenal. Currently I've only got 45 lbs in plates, an EZ-Curl bar, and a couple empty dumbbell bars, but it was enough for this first session. I had to keep my reps higher than I would've liked optimally, but it's a start and I don't necessarily want to invest the time/money in finding new plates if I'm not going to be able to keep up the motivation to work out at home.
BIGGER NEWS THOUGH: Yesterday I made a KILLER chickpea salad that functions like a mock tuna salad. Used homemade vegan mayo, a few cans of chickpeas (one processed into the mayo for thickness and one mashed up by hand for bulk), fresh grated carrots, celery, onion, and a few sheets of nori crumbled up and processed for that "ocean" flavor... so good. If anyone's interested I'll type up the exact recipe but I've gotta say that nori made all the difference and really elevated it from a boring chickpea salad to something much more exciting.
. Form looked good in the vids. You might be able to get a little lower on squats (as already mentioned), but I think it is fine. Some just aren't made to get below parallel. Myself included.
