Days 69, 70, 71 - Kenpo, Stretch, and Chest, Back & Abs Ripper

This will be another quick post because I've gotten myself really behind again. My sciatic nerve is still bothering me, so exercising has been a bit difficult. But I managed to do the last 3 workouts pretty well, plus I played soccer on Friday night. I took a day off on Saturday too (unintentionally) because I had to work, then we were with friends for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

I really hope this nerve problem goes away soon. I'm finding it difficult to put my shoes and socks on and I limp for a bit every time I get up off a chair. Also, oddly enough, when I laugh, cough, sneeze, etc, it hurts my ass! (see previous post if you aren't sure what I'm talking about).

My massage therapist and fellow soccer player assessed me on Friday before my game and she can't figure out what's going on. She did a few tests on me to see where the pain originates, but they didn't really tell her anything. But she thinks the problem either originates from a tightness in my piriformis muscle in my bum, or from a known disc problem in my back...or both. So I'm not really sure what to do about it, aside from stretching the muscle. I'm going to try icing my back tonight instead of my bum and see if that helps. If it does, that will answer my question at least.

I shouldn't be having this many problems!!...back issues, sciatic nerve issues. The whole point of getting into shape was to get rid of these problems! I'm only 33! I can't imagine what I'll be like at 50 at this rate!

Day 60, 61, 62, 63 - Yoga, Core Syn, Kenpo, Rest

Wow, I'm getting really bad at posting aren't I? I used to be so good and post every day. Last Thursday I did yoga, Friday was Core Syn, Saturday was Kenpo and I opted to take a rest day on Sunday. I'm ashamed to say that I also took a rest day today, making it two in a row. I really didn't mean to take the day off today, but I painted all day yesterday and today (see previous post) and my shoulder is killing me and I just want to go to bed now! No excuse, but I still feel guilty. Tomorrow I start week 10!

Day 52 - Kenpo

I feel like I've been a little slack at posting lately. I've been pretty busy and just don't seem to have the time to post anything significant. Today is going to be the same...just a quick post.

Yesterday I took a day off because I spent the entire day painting my exercise room. I'm still not done yet, but I've got the walls covered. I just need to do the design next. But since I painted all day yesterday and the room was a mess, I didn't have the energy to exercise, even if I'd had the space to workout!

Today I cleaned and tidied up the room so that I was able to do Kenpo. I used the hand weights, but didn't use the ankle weights this time. I feel like I got a decent workout, but didn't push myself that hard. No excuse really, just didn't feel into it.

• Breakfast: Kashi Go Crunch (if that's the right name) and skim milk
• Snack: sliced peaches, V8 juice
• Lunch: ham, lettuce, tomato sub and salad with very little catelina dressing
• Snack: protein bar
• Supper: pork tenderloin and some low cal ranch dressing, salad with feta and olive oil, pudding

Day 48 - Kenpo

For today's kenpo workout, I wore my new weighted gloves (1.5lbs each I think) and my 5 lb ankle weights. I pushed really hard and got a great workout. I really like using the weights because they add just a bit more "oomph" to the workout. I can't go fast with the rest of the "kids", and I skip the airborn jumping jacks, but it's all good! 481 cals burned.

Meals:

• Breakfast: WW english muffin, 1 egg, 1 slice turkey bacon, sliced cheese
• Snack: Protein shake with chocolate soy milk
• Lunch: Yellow veggie soup with a scoop of protein powder, spinach salad with strawberries, mandarin oranges and poppy seed dressing. 12 mini rice cakes
• Snack: Small piece of cheese, protein bar, protein shake
• Supper: Lean, grilled chicken burger with WW bun, fat free mayo, lettuce, tomato and cheese.
  

Days 39, 40, 41 - Stretch, Yoga and Kenpo

I went home to Moncton this past weekend to visit my parents, so I had to change my routine a bit. I didn't want to have to lug weights home, so Friday night I did Stretch, Saturday I did Yoga and Sunday I did Kenpo. Tomorrow I will do Legs, Back and Abs, then go straight into week 7 without a rest day.

On Friday night, I had company doing Stretch. My father's girlfriend did the video with me while my father watched. I feel so good after doing the Stretch workout, that I wonder why I don't do it more often. Usually I opt for a rest day instead.

I had an audience for some of the Yoga video the next day, but since it's so long, I guess they got bored! They were quite surprised at how difficult the yoga is. Most people seem to think that yoga is all about stretching and meditating, but it's so much more. I was working so hard I had sweat dripping off my nose during Half Moon pose...man it's hard!

I did Kenpo this morning at my mother's house and she joined along for the first little bit. She put in a good effort!

It is really hard to eat well when everyone wants to prepare you a good meal, so I wasn't able to eat very healthy this weekend. Plus, I went to my best friend's baby shower today and there was all kinds of finger food. Tomorrow I'll get back at it!

Day 34 - Kenpo X

Today I decided to do kenpo wearing 5lb ankle weights. It definitely made the kicks harder and I felt like I got a good workout in my butt and hips. I think I'll probably continue to use the weights from now on.

Today was also the first day that I used my new heart rate monitor. I'm still unsure if I'm setting my limits right, but I decided to set my lower limit at 133bpm (the lower limit for a moderate workout) and the upper limit at 170bpm (the upper limit for an intense workout). I spent most of the time in the 160's to 170's. If I noticed I was going over 170, I would pause and get it down a little bit, which is what Tony says to do.

From what I've read, staying in the low to moderate workout levels is better for weight loss, but this was pretty near impossible. So I just focused on trying to keep my heart rate below 175ish.
I ended up burning over 500 kcals during the kenpo workout. Afterwards, I went for a walk with my friend since it was so nice out today, so today I burned a total of 930 kcals!! This is really good because I had pizza for supper! I really haven't been doing very well with my nutrition lately.

Meals:

• Breakfast: 2 pieces multigrain toast with almond butter, juice
• Supper: 1 piece of pizza, garlic fingers with donair sauce, small glass of diet coke
• Snack: chocolate bunny, blueberries

Day 24 - Kenpo X

Kenpo X, or kickboxing today. I seemed to have lots of energy today and was able to put more into the workout than previously. I also had to hurry through it because I had things to do afterwards. I did the entire workout, but I skipped the breaks where you do the running and jumping jacks. I'm quite enjoying recovery week!

Unfortunately I was up 4 lbs today! Yikes! Just curious when other people started losing weight in this program. I'm starting to see more definition in my muscle tone and I know I'm decreasing body fat, but I kind of hoped I'd have dropped a couple of lbs by now. Anyone else out there seeing the same trend?

Day 20 - Kenpo X

Love this workout, maybe because I can actually do all of it! I felt quite energetic today so the workout went really well. I was pretty much able to keep up with them the whole time.

I think my extra energy came from the fact that it was "beautiful" out today. And I use the word "beautiful" loosely because it was only about +9C (48F for you Americans). But it was sunny and warm for March in New Brunswick and I took the opportunity to shovel some of the snow off my deck, wearing a tank top and slippers. I felt very Canadian!

Day13 - Kenpo X

I'm almost to the two week mark! Today was Kenpo. I like this workout and I can pretty much do the whole thing.

A co-worker/friend just started this program, but she is doing the Classic version, where I'm doing Lean. I'm getting the impression that the Classic is quite a bit more difficult than mine. I kind of knew this, but to hear her talk about her workouts, mine don't seem quite as bad. I've sort of been wondering which program I really should be on, but I think I've picked the right one for me for now. My main goal is to lose weight, and the Lean program sounds like it's best for that. I'm already planning ahead though and I think once I'm done the Lean program, I'll do P90X again and do the Classic version next time. I'll take the summer off though because I'll be playing soccer 2-3 times a week, but in the fall, I'll plan on doing it again.

Day 6 - Kenpo X

I feel kind of guilty because I missed my workout yesterday and I don't really have a great excuse either! I had a few things to do right after work yesterday and I'm also taking care of my friend's dogs, so I was late getting supper. We ran into town to get a sandwich from Great Canadian Bagel (so yummy!) and oops, made a quick stop at Dairy Queen on the way home! I was so full by the time I finished that I couldn't make myself workout at 10pm. On the plus side, I have been eating really well all week, so I don't feel too bad about cheating with a sundae.

I guess I haven't mentioned this yet, but I'm not doing the P90X nutrition plan. I just decided that I'll try my best to eat healthy and see how that goes. If I need to, I can always try the plan and see if it works any better.

So today I did the Kenpo X workout. It was fun! I really like doing kick-boxing exercises, so I found this one was quite enjoyable. I still have to be careful of my back so I didn't get as much out of it as I probably should have. But it was better than nothing and it still had me sweating pretty hard.

I'm looking forward to the Stretch video tomorrow.