My opinion on P90 X, It works but you have to be true to it. My biggest problem with it was trying to mix it in with 12 hour swing shifts, that dosent jive together so well. I could only take it so far. My eating was only about 80% of what the program called for but it still shed some pounds off me, maby a little to much for my liking. I think I looked better IMO when i had a little more bulk and so does my wife. My current plan is to take a hieatus from it, go back to the low rep heavy lifting for a while and maby an occasional cardio. I did manage to get into 32 jeans again with it, havent seen that in a long time I honestly dont think you can get the same info on the internet and do the same as folowing the dvd's, hell that was even difficult at first learning balance and form for some strange exercises than i had never seen before. Again, good work Greg!!
I've been tossing the idea around to give this P90X thing a shot. I'm not overweight (I'm 6' 180 lbs) but would like to lose a little bit of my "skinny fat" and get more cut. Anyway Crick, I've been meaning to ask you since I thought you and I did work the same type of schedule (swing shift). The month of July I'm working mostly nights, 7Pm-7Am. How the heck would I workout on a schedule such as this? Get home after 7AM, workout for an hour, and then sleep? OR....workout before work, work 12hrs, and then get home to rest/recover? Thats the main thing that worries me...that and sticking to a diet. Maybe I should stick with my original plan and start lifting? All I really want to do is lose the beer gut and bulk up a little. I stay fairly active.
OK ill do the best i can and try and make sense of some of my obstacles through it on swing shifts. sounds like you work one month of nights straight with breaks in between, correct?? My schedule is 12 hour nights one week and 12 hour days the next then back to nights the next week. I either work 4 or three in a row before a break and switching again. When i was on nights i would sleep first then work out after i got up and unwound for awhile before going in that night. I would be to beat down to do it after getting home in the mornings. when i was on days i would come home, mingle with the family for a bit then do my workouts. Some days is an hour workout but some are an hour twenty minutes, and these were tough for me because i had to do them together at once. There is no way i could have done one in the morning and the other in the evening on my schedule. I would have been sacraficing sleep in the mornings wictch is a no no, sleep is an important part of it. I had issues with trying to get all my necessary food in on some days (example) After my LAST night shift i would sleep just enough so i could go to bed that night like a normal person and still be able to sleep, SO trying to squeeze in a 3,000 calorie diet on that day was impossable because it was so short of a day. another issue i had was the day i would start my FIRST NIGHT SHIFT. Say i start the day at 9:00am, get up come in at 6:00 that evening and get off at 6:00am the next morning, thats a LONG stretch. I would normaly eat 6 times a day but when your up that long it might turn into 9 meals before you get to bed the next day. I had to miss some days and was making them up on others so it put me behind schedule, i really couldnt do it any other way On my schedule it was impossable to do exactly as recomended and keep balance with the family, something im anal about Like i said, i need a break from it but going back to my old way of lifting is much easier on me for awhile. The bottom line is, swing shifts are the devil, they are very hard on the body, so doing something like this is gonna require alot of modifications, something that is mentioned on the dvd's, if you need to rest or modify then by all means do so!! But on a good note, i feel so much better that i did three years ago when i weighed 230, and was wearing 38-40 jeans. im in 32 now @ 179 lbs I had as
Well, not exactly. I work so many nights in July because we are short a man. Normally, I only work night shifts every other month. Work 4 days, break, work 3 nights, break, work 3 days, break, work 4 nights, and then off for six days. After nights are out of the way...I work some weeks of 7-3 or 3-11. Not that bad of a schedule. Works great for hunting. I was mainly concerned with the month of July. I think I could handle it alright come August. It sounds like I would do it your way if I decided to give this a shot. (Workout before going in on nights or workout after coming home from days). Seems like you and I are alike because I'll only sleep 4-5 hours when I come off nights so I can sleep like a "normal" person that following night. This Thursday, a buddy and me are going river fishing from dawn to about 5 or 6. I should definitely sleep good that night. :D Thanks for all the input.
I have no idea where you got the "you must know thousands" from. I said "99% of the people that I know", meaning I've known roughly 20 people that have completed this work-out, and only one of them has stuck with it. Of course, everyone of these people only really did it b/c it's the cool thing to be doing right now. It's great that it worked for you, though, and I'm sure you will keep with it. Good job.
Donnie, you could probably accomplish a lot of your goals without P90X, seriously. As some people have pointed out, it's a pretty hardcore program that WILL whip you into shape if you stay dedicated to it like I did... but it all depends on your goals and what you're looking for. I'm afraid you may feel a bit "guilty" if you were forced to miss a few workouts because of your sleep schedule and usually what happens then is most people really start abandoning the program because they get an "if I can't do every single workout, I might as well not do any" mentality... Not saying you would, but I've seen it countless times, and not only with P90X; like a lot of former athletes, I've spent my fair amount of time in the gym as well, and I've seen it there tons. Like we talked about, upping your caloric intake while keeping yoiur eating clean and lifting heavy with fewer reps (maxing out at 8-10 per set) will help you bulk up and add mass. You could even follow the P90X nutrional plan and start off with a "fat shredder" phase consisting of something like a 50/30/20 split (protien/carbs/fat) at around 2,800 calories to start off with and tweak from there. Eventually, you'd want to move away from that into more of a manageable -- and sustainable -- 40/40/20 split. Tracking your daily food intake in something like a myftitnesspal.com account will do wonders for you, as well. You can personalize it and set it up for five or six meals a day (I eat six), and I'd be willing to bet you'll be amazed at how you're NOT eating enough. Almost guaranteed. The biggest thing we all hear when people REALLY track everything they put into their body is "How the heck am I supposed to eat that much?!" Alternating your weightlifting days with decent cardio stuff like intervals or HIIT running on your off days -- combined with keeping your eating clean -- will probably do what you're looking to accomplish And thanks, Hooker. Sorry I took your post wrong.
Jeff, I don't think anyone took your post wrong, Rob, me or anyone. Before you edited it, you threw out the challenge "Let's look at lifestyle changes in five years." Hell, I had other people who aren't posting on this thread PM me and say "Looks like Jeff's calling you out. " It was funny given the fact I was simply trying to help you by pointing out the fact that 2,000 calories is WAY undereating for someone putting in the workouts you describe; again, that's more of what a 160-lber should be intaking. But far be it from me to try to offer advice; I knew I shouldn't have when I did it. Do a lot of people quit WHATEVER they're doing in three years? Sure; it doesn't take an actuary to know those numbers. It's the "99% of people who do P90X" thought process that I was addressing. Hooker correctly pointed out that he was only referring to people he KNEW, so I'm not going to argue that; hence, my comment. BUT, I stand by my assertion that you can go to the P90X boards and see person after person after person who did their first round of P90X YEARS ago and still maintain a fantastic fitness level. You also have seem to have got onto this mindset that we're talking about hammering out P90X-type workouts the rest of our lives. While there are a LOT of people I personally correspond with that DO do that, please recall my earlier post about maintaining fitness levels post P90X... integrating an active lifestyle, be it playing tennis, pickup basketball, martial arts training, whatever... combined with a few workouts a week and good eating habits will help maintain a lot of the results achieved in ANY fitness program. It's more about a fitness-lifestyle mindset than continuing to hammer out 60-minute Navy SEAL-type workouts six days a week for the rest of your life -- a point I made in my earlier post.
This sounds a lot like that body for life program in regards to the "life style" change. I knew people on that program that got into superb shape...do any of them still do it...NO. I know a few people on P90X & it is kicking thier arse. I doubt they will make it thru let alone continue for an extended period of time. NOW-and this is just my opinion if someone has always had a physically fit background but life has just kind of gotten in the way, I think these programs are great because a structured regime helps a lot of people. Forces them to MAKE time. But if you have a couch potato who thinks he's going to turn into Mr fitness, IF he makes it thru one cycle, he is VERY likely to let it slide by the wayside, because its like nothing he's ever been used to.
That's probably a pretty fair and accurate asessment of who will incorporate what they've learned into their lifestyle for the long term, rybo.
I agree with Ryan as well. I know a few people as well as well the wife knowing some who bought it/got it (P90x) and claimed they could not do it. I laugh at this as there is no, "I can't". Everything is shown to you to do what you can, do the best you can. There is NO keeping up with the people on the DVD the first time (first week). Like they said on the Plyo dvd, they had hot shot athletes that could not do it, people from class could. It's a personal choice. Me? I'm into week 9 and I have NOT missed a day. In the beginning, wow....the first week...wow. Do that and then come talk to us that have made it this far. LOL :d One must be dedicated. Will I keep this regiment up for life, hell NO. It's very time consuming, usually an hour a day, sometimes more. I will however finish the first 90 day cycle and start a second one with some steel weights thrown in. I will continue to do this until archery season and then pace myself through the season. I am not where I want to be although I'm below my high school jeans size and building muscle. I have a goal, when I meet that goal I will go into a maintenance program consisting of both free steel weights and what I've learned through out the P90x cycles. One thing I feel is that for the first 90 days, there is no part time but that's the way I do things, all or nothing. :d After all, I'm my biggest competitor.
I can not see myself starting P90x right now. But, if I do, I agree with everything Rob said. Pretty much what I am looking for. Diet is the killer for me. I have never had a strict diet regimen for muscle gain/fat loss. I am 5' 9" and about 187lbs right now. I just want to lose the belly fat(really about the only fat I have right now. I developed a bad case of No-Butt-at-All a few years ago.) I really need a diet right now for the splits Greg is referring to and how to change that up once I get to the level I want to be at. I speed walk and lift weights pretty much every day right now.
LA... one of the most helpful tips that any of us who just completed this round that I went through did was to sign up for a myfitnesspal.com account; it's totally free and has nothing to do with P90X other than fitness-minded individuals often think alike. It's really a cool site, and it's user-contributed -- meaning that most of the meals you're eating or will eat are already entered into the database. It's also peer-reviewed so that you can pretty much bet the nutritional information for those meals will be correct. If you want to check out the contents yourself, it's easy to do so. Entering your meals in this site will allow you to track your intake from a couple different standpoints: you can have it track ANYTHING you want -- protein, carbs, fat, sugar, sodium, etc. The neat thing about it is you can use it to keep track of your splits as well, as it breaks down each and every item you enter into those aforementioned categories. It not only keeps a running tally, but also tells you how much you've got left to eat for the day -- or more appropriately -- how much more you NEED to eat for the day. I used this to perfection once during Round 1... I had my favorite aunt and uncle drop in from Texas unexpectedly about halfway through my inital program... Everyone was invited over to my Mom and Dad's that night for some of Mom's famous homemade enchiladas. Mmmm... talk about awesome!! I'd eaten four of my six meals already that day, so what I did was plug in my after-Ab Ripper X protein shake that is always my sixth meal of the day, leaving a "hole" for my fifth meal, which would be dinner at my parents' house. I went ahead and entered every ingredient Mom would use for her enchiladas, including the hamburger meat, lettuce, cheese and tomatoes. What that did was automatically calculate out where I would finish for the day -- and more importantly -- tell me exactly how much I could eat over there without going overboard. Worked to a "T"... I got to enjoy an enchilada guilt-free because I knew I was still spot-on with my numbers that day. It's really a slick site and can be of great help to you for your needs regardless if you undertake something like P90X or not. Once you get to the point where you're pretty much eating consistenly off the top two tiers of Michi's Ladder and start gaining a really solid grasp on portion size and how it makes your numbers come out at the end of the day, you don't even need to be so diligent about entering everything. It certainly helps speed up the education process in the beginning though.
