Insanity - Day 1

Yesterday was my Day 1 of the Insanity workouts.

I have been very interested in trying some of the "Beachbody" workouts. I normally fall asleep on the couch watching Mythbusters or some episode of Diners, Drive Ins and Dives and always wake up to the promises of wash board abs and a tight tone tummy and firm muscular arms. Who wouldn't be interested in that??? Even more convincing - I have a handful of friends who advertise the workouts and products on their facebooks and in person. It starts to get really difficult to dismiss the workouts and informercials as simply an advertisement when you see the results first hand.

So I decided I wanted to give it a shot. I mean, I have nothing to lose (except maybe the $$$ spent on the dvds), and even if the work outs don't work they way they say and are only a part of a great ad campagin - at least I motivated myself to try something new.

So I decided I would give it a shot. As an *early* 20lb loss gift my boyfriend purchased the "Insanity" system for me. It comes with a nutrition guide, 14 workouts, and a workout sheet. It also has a welcome package and a motivational video which I thought were nice, but the real meat are the workout and nutrition guide.

I love how simple they make it. "Eat the food in the guide, do the workouts in this order on these days." The nutrition guide is laid out really simply too, it gives you a list of 5 or 6 meals to choose for each of 5 meals a day. Despite how simply laid out the nutrition guide is, I won't be working the nutrition guide into this cycle of Insanity. The first reason is because the nutrition guide emphasizes 5 meals a day, and I am already having trouble while on site and away from home doing 3 healthy meals. Also, and more importantly I have been sticking to a "slow-carb" diet for the past 5 months and have been pleased with the results and more importantly have been able to sustain the diet for 5 months (I can't see my self sustaining 5 meals a day for the rest of my life). So as long as I continue to have the energy to do the work outs I think I will continue to use my own diet.

Now for the workout. The first day is a fit test, the schedule has you repeat this fit test every 2 weeks (for a total of 4 times) to track your progress throughout the system. The fit test is a 25 min workout with a  5 minute warm-up/stretch and then a power packed 15 min of jumps, squats and core exercises with breaks between and then finishes with a 5 minute cooldown stretch.

My results of the fit test were:

Switch Kicks : 59
Power Jacks : 44
Power Knees : 55
Power Jumps : 33
Globe Jumps : 9
Suicide Jumps : 12
Push Up Jacks : 11
Low Plank Obliques : 44

The workout wasn't easy, but I don't think it was impossible either. I felt disappointed with my results and think I can push myself a lot harder next time. A lot of my issue came from my lack of coordination, I was so focused on form and making my body move the way it was supposed to (it is highly important to focus on form for these workouts) that I forgot to count, or would mess up and not count the rep due to improper form.

Hopefully my coordination will improve along with my results. The push-up jacks were the hardest for me to do because my arms are very weak, and towards the end, even with breaks I was unable to push my body back up to starting position to complete a rep. During the entire routine I felt burns in my core and hamstrings, so I hope some of the other workouts spread the burn around, but I might not hate having 6-pack abs and thunder thighs.

I am not feeling sore at all, I feel a bit of tightness in my abs but I really didn't get the soreness that I expected, and HOPED to have. Sometimes I love that achy feeling since it reminds me how hard I worked. To be honest I am more sore in my shoulders from lugging my bags around the airport last Sunday then I am from the workout. Maybe that is a sign that I haven't worked hard enough? I will just have to be extra sure to push extra hard for the rest of the week. Maybe it will be a building soreness.

Onward to more workouts!!!