Week 3 Concludes

At some point during week 3 something kicked-in for me and the intensity picked up considerably, along with the strength results. My theory is that the first time through each workout you're basically trying to survive, the next week you start to gain a little confidence, and by the third you have enough confidence to challenge yourself more. After my first Kenpo karate session I felt awkward, but after my last session I felt like some sort of action movie or video game superhero! I swear, if I'm ever in a situation where two thugs try to attack me, one from in front and one from behind, as long as they attack rhythmically and allow me to reset my feet between kicks, they're dead!

We've decided to extend this first phase by a week to capture that momentum and to keep building on the strength training for one more week (ok, I decided and Amiee is too exhausted to argue!). So instead of week 4 being a transition week of cardio, yoga, and core, we're doing an optional fourth week of the first phase workouts (we checked in the P90X manual and this is common practice for those who had a tougher first week). We started that today and I did 212 push-ups (standard, wide, military, decline, diamond and dive bombers among them) as compared to 154 during the first week, and the quality was also much better. I did 30 reps of "lawnmowers" with a 12 pound dumbbell in week one, and cranked out 15 reps with 45 pound dumbbells today - definite progress has been made.

I'm down 5 pounds after 3 weeks, but more importantly my energy level is up and I can see a difference in my chest, shoulder and arms. Amiee has also commented on my back looking a lot leaner - and it better after doing over 200 pull-ups a week for the last three weeks! I'm not sure how many pounds Amiee is down at this point, but she looks great and is a wonderful person, and a great mother, and I'm not asking anything about the scale or her thoughts on the program anymore! I do think she believes it's working, even if she won't admit it...

Our eating habits remain healthy, but we're definitely not on the diet formally any longer and haven't been for a week or so. My appetite for bad foods has diminished - I don't crave the carbs like I once did and I've had less than a full can of soda in the past week so I think I've kicked that. I do feel like a chemist mixing my supplement shakes 2-3 times per day, but I feel so much healthier that I don't mind the extra time in the kitchen.

Overall, so far so good, and we (I) look forward to future weeks of the program!