Saturday's Workout

M and I didn't get home last night until almost 1 a.m., and I was ready to collapse before we managed to open our front door. I'd been up since 4:20 a.m. (CrossFit class waits for no one), and I desperately needed my beauty sleep.

Thankfully, the kids spent the night at their grandparents' place, so we got a couple of extra hours of shut-eye before dragging our asses into the garage to exercise.

"Isn't it pathetic?" M mused. "For once, the boys aren't here, and we could have gone out to brunch or the Farmer's Market or something. We could have gotten a ton of stuff done. But instead, we decided to work out in the garage."

Answer: Yes, we are pathetic.

M worked out to her Chalene Johnson DVDs while I did another day of my (customized and expanded) Power to the People program:

• 2 sets of 5 deadlifts
• 2 sets of 5 side presses
• 2 sets of 5 weighted pull-ups
• 2 sets of 10 weighted push-ups
• Handstand practice

And then, for no good reason (other than because we weren't in danger of being interrupted by a five-year-old demanding food), I pulled out my Insanity DVD set and did the Plyometric Cardio Circuit routine.

Big mistake.

At the time, it felt nice to get reacquainted with the pace and exercises in Shaun T's workouts. Having not done an Insanity workout in weeks, I even felt a wee bit nostalgic about the pulsing, mildly-annoying background music. The moves were just as challenging as I remembered, and I certainly broke a sweat.

But did I overextend myself today? Definitely. I'm zonked. After dinner, sitting beside my two-year-old as he watched a cartoon, I fell asleep. When I woke up, I realized that I'd collapsed on my toddler, and was using a small child as a pillow.

Tuesday's Workout

My hands are still bleeding, so I did the Insanity Pure Cardio workout this morning. I couldn't make a fist, though, so when Shaun T called for jabs, I did karate chops instead, which looked super-cool (naturally).

Round 3 / Day 47: Insanity Max Interval Plyo

The great thing about no longer doing Insanity workouts four times a week is that I don't constantly feel like I've been in a car accident. But the not-so-great thing about not doing Insanity four times a week is that I'm no longer conditioned to endure Shaun T's diabolically intense workouts.

Let's just say that Max Interval Plyo punched me in the balls this morning and leave it at that.

Round 3 / Day 34: Insanity Max Recovery

Sure, if you've been beating yourself up with hardcore max Insanity workouts all week, a session of Max Recovery can be a welcome reprieve. There's no sprinting or leaping or spinning or kicking. You might not even break a sweat.

But if -- like me -- you bust out the Max Recovery video after a week of lazing around (with the exception of a single hard workout), my guess is that you'll find yourself questioning why this session has the word "Recovery" appears in its title.

Most of the workout isn't too tough; we do lots of stretches and planks, and I'm fine with all that stuff. But for some godforsaken reason, near the end of the video, Shaun T decides to murder your legs with a six-minute plie squat-and-pulse sequence straight from hell. I hate, hate, hate, hate, hate this exercise. Count 'em: FIVE hates. That's a lot; I usually limit myself to three.

Why Not Do Another Round of P90X Classic?

"Are you ever going to do P90X all the way through again?" M asked me after finishing tonight's workout. At long last, after doing months of ChaLEAN Extreme (and sprinkling in a mix of Insanity, P90X, P90X+, and Jillian Michaels DVD routines), M's thinking about starting her first 90-day round of P90X Classic. I guess she wanted to see if I might want to join her.

"I don't think so," I replied.

But her question got me thinking. Why not do another round? Plenty of P90X grads have repeated the program several times and continue to see improvements in their overall fitness. And God knows I haven't yet mastered all the moves introduced by Tony Horton -- especially the twistiest ones in Yoga X. So why didn't I repeat P90X immediately after finishing Round 1? And why don't I have plans to do another 90 consecutive days of P90X?

I can think of five reasons.

Round 3 / Day 9: P90X+ Interval Plus

The first few minutes of Interval Plus were deceptively easy. After a five-minute warm-up, Tony announces that we're going to do 15 different exercises -- each for one minute. That doesn't sound so bad, I thought. How's this going to be different from Insanity Pure Cardio?

(What are you looking at, Tony?)

More after the jump.

Insanity Fit Test (Part Deux)

I hadn't revisited the Insanity Fit Test since starting Round 2, mostly because I'm deathly afraid of it. As you might recall, I barely made it through my first attempt at the Fit Test. But now that I've completed my 90-day P90X/Insanity Hybrid, I was curious to see how much (or even if) I've improved -- before all my gains disappear with the onset of laziness and inertia.

My post-Round 2 Fit Test results, after the jump...

Round 2 / Day 88: Insanity Max Interval Plyo

Here's the thing: When both the artwork printed on the DVD and the menu screen on the video shows Tania launching into a Diamond Jump, you know you're going to have to do this move at some point in the workout.

So after completing 95 percent of the workout with no Diamond Jumps in sight, you start thinking to yourself, "WTF? When's Shaun T going to bust out my least favorite move?"

Answer: During the second-to-last exercise in the hour-long session -- after you're totally exhausted and your hair is plastered to your sweaty face like you're Steve Nash in triple-overtime.

I'm done with you, Shaun T. (At least for Round 2.)

Round 2 / Day 84: Insanity Max Cardio Conditioning + Cardio Abs

During Right Kicks / Left Kicks, Shaun T walks over to Tania, who's flying through the moves. "If you can go as fast as Tania," he says to the camera, "keep up with her. If you can go faster, go faster."  I tried my damnedest, but in the end, I had to opt for Plan C: Going (much) slower than Tania.

One more week. Just one more week.

Round 2 / Day 58: Insanity Max Interval Circuit

Yeesh. Shaun T's not messing around with the "Max" workout series. I'm sure I've lost several gallons of sweat this past week. Today, my goal was to try to complete the full hour of Max Interval Circuit without taking any unscheduled breaks, but I had to take a couple of breathers during my final set of Side Suicide Jumps, slumping/sloshing in a pool of perspiration. To quote Shaun T quoting Gwen Stefani, "this shit is bananas."

Still, I feel like I'm slowly but surely getting better at this. There's no way in hell I would have made it through this workout (alive) just a few months ago. Now, I'm able to do things I never could before. And there are a bunch of moves I'm genuinely enjoying: Pedal / Power Lunges, Floor Switch Kicks, Full Body Drills. Shaun T's still kicking my ass right now, but by the end of Round 2, I fully intend to kick some ass of my own.

Round 2 / Day 56: Insanity Max Cardio Conditioning

I remember thinking that the 15 consecutive minutes of super-high-intensity cardio in the Insanity Pure Cardio workout was through-the-roof crazy. Max Cardio Conditioning almost doubles the intensity by demanding almost a half-hour of uninterrupted hardcore moves.

Round 2 / Day 53: Insanity Max Interval Plyo

Insanity bills itself as "the hardest workout ever put on DVD." While I can't verify the accuracy of this tagline, I can't imagine that it's far from the truth. Today's Max Interval Plyo session proved every bit as difficult as I anticipated, and maybe more.

Click below for the blow-by-blow.

Round 2 / Day 51: Insanity Max Interval Circuit

I have no idea how I managed to avoid going into cardiac arrest during Max Interval Circuit this morning.

Insanity is scheduled so that for the first four weeks (or, if you're doing my version of a P90X/Insanity hybrid, first six weeks) is spent getting your body used to daily hardcore cardio. Each session in the first half of Insanity runs about 30 to 40 minutes in length (which -- believe me -- is plenty).

After a recovery week, you put away all the DVDs that came before, and start sweating to the Insanity "Max" workouts, each of which are 50 to 60 minutes long, and kick up the intensity level several notches. I'm too scared and exhausted to peek at what's coming up, but if Max Interval Circuit is any indication, these last six weeks of Round 2 are going to be utter hell.

Details after the jump...

Round 2 / Day 45: Insanity Core Cardio & Balance

I'm halfway through Round 2, and not even close to being sick of Shaun T yet. At this point in Round 1, Tony Horton had me seriously contemplating whether to jam sharp sticks in my eyes and ears.

Anyway, Core Cardio & Balance was significantly today than on Day 43, in large part because I now know to conserve some energy for the plie sequence at the end of the workout. In fact, today's workout felt a little too easy. I know the point of Recovery Week is to take it down a notch, but I'm already itching to ratchet back up the intensity. The prospect of starting Insanity's "Max" workout series next week is a little frightening, but there's a perverse side of me that's eagerly looking forward to having my ass kicked.

Round 2 / Day 43: Insanity Core Cardio & Balance

At long last, it's Recovery Week!

If I were following the actual Insanity schedule (as opposed to a P90X/Insanity hybrid), I'd be doing nothing but Core Cardio & Balance all week. And you know what? That wouldn't be the worst thing in the world.

My review of Core Cardio & Balance -- after the jump.

Round 2 / Day 28: Insanity Pure Cardio + Cardio Abs (Repeat)

To get back into the swing of things after a week-long break from P90X and Insanity, I decided to repeat Day 28.

"Jump down into a deep squat, and do a suicide." So says Shaun T when describing Stance Jacks, but his statement is applicable to the entirety of this workout. Although I managed to complete all of Pure Cardio without any extra breaks (for the first time ever), I felt like I committing seppuku.

Round 2 / Day 21: Insanity Pure Cardio + Cardio Abs

I woke up late and feeling lazy. The kids spent the night at their grandparents' house, so I enjoyed the luxury of dawdling over my morning yogurt and flaxseed in front of the TV. It took forever to bring myself to get off the couch and into the garage to start Pure Cardio.

Shaun T doesn't exactly ease you into the workout, either. Right away, I was panting hard as I tried to keep up during the warm-up routine. By the time the stretching began, sweat was already pouring down my face. And just a few minutes into the actual workout, I felt obliterated. But I followed Shaun T's advice to "dig deeper" -- it's my second-favorite Beachbody mantra, right after Tony Horton's "don't just kind of do it" -- and pushed through the remainder of the session. (I still had to take my usual mid-set breaks during Frog Jumps and Push-Up Jacks, though I tried to keep them as short as possible.)

Cardio Abs was painful, too -- especially the Wide Tuck Jumps and isometric C-Sit Hold. Part of me wanted to just stop the video and substitute Ab Ripper X in its place, but I reminded myself that Ab Ripper X is already on the schedule for tomorrow. The fun never ends.

Is Stretching Unnecessary?

I love X Stretch. It feels good, and it's a nice, restful (albeit sometimes slightly uncomfortable) way to wind down or relieve tightness and soreness. Last night, I still felt achy from running, so I popped in the X Stretch DVD. Over the course of an hour, my body gradually relaxed and my muscles loosened and lengthened.

But this morning, I felt tight again. (This totally bummed me out. Instead of X Stretching, I could have been watching Steven Seagal: Lawman.)

It turns out that stretching evidently doesn't do all that much for your body.

In fact, the latest science suggests that extremely loose muscles and tendons are generally unnecessary (unless you aspire to join a gymnastics squad), may be undesirable and are, for the most part, unachievable, anyway. “To a large degree, flexibility is genetic,” says Dr. Malachy McHugh, the director of research for the Nicholas Institute of Sports Medicine and Athletic Trauma at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York and an expert on flexibility. You’re born stretchy or not. “Some small portion” of each person’s flexibility “is adaptable,” McHugh adds, “but it takes a long time and a lot of work to get even that small adaptation. It’s a bit depressing, really.”

WTF? Haven't we learned from Tony Horton, Shaun T and others that stretching helps loosen our muscles and tendons, and enhances our flexibility and range of motion? Aren't they right?

According to the science, the answer appears to be no. “There are two elements” involved in stretching a muscle, Dr. McHugh says. One is the muscle itself. The other is the mind, which sends various messages to the muscles and tendons telling them how to respond to your stretching when the discomfort of the stretching becomes too much. What changes as you stretch a muscle is primarily the message, not the physical structure of the muscle. “You’ll start to develop a tolerance” for the discomfort of the stretch, Dr. McHugh says. Your brain will allow you to hold the stretch longer. But the muscles and tendons themselves will not have changed much. You will feel less tight. But even this sensation of elasticity is short-lived, Dr. McHugh says. 

In a new review article of the effects of stretching that he co-wrote and that will be published soon in The Scandinavian Journal of Medicine and Science in Sports, he looked at the measurable impacts of a number of different stretching regimens. What he found was that when people performed four 90-second stretches of their hamstrings, their “passive resistance” to the stretching decreased by about 18 percent — they felt much looser — but the effect had passed in less than an hour. To achieve a longer-lasting impact, and to stretch all of the muscles involved in running or other sports, he says, would probably require as much as an hour of concerted stretching. “And the effects still wouldn’t be permanent,” he says. “You only see changes” in the actual, physical structure of the muscles “after months of stretching, for hours at a time. Most people aren’t going to do that.”

And most of us don’t need to. “Flexibility is a functional thing,” Dr. Knudson says. “You only need enough range of motion in your joints to avoid injury. More is not necessarily better.”

So let's recap. We previously came to understand that cool-downs are unnecessary. And we already know that Tony Horton talks too much. Now that we're learning that stretching's benefits aren't as great as we were led to believe, doesn't this mean we can further shave down the time it takes to complete each P90X (and even Insanity) routine? What's left to do besides warming up and diving right into the core exercises?

Personally, I'm going to keep stretching -- not because I think I'm going to become a super-flexible guy, or that stretching is going to enhance my athletic performance. I'm going to stretch because it feels good.

Round 2 / Day 15: P90X Chest & Back + Ab Ripper X

Tony Horton spends a lot of time talking and taking breaks.

Image Source: LCD Love

After working out with Insanity for a couple of weeks, I've noticed that Shaun T doesn't waste time with meaningless jibber-jabber. He doesn't brag about how his dad "pitched a couple of no-hitters," or ramble on about how he "loves-loves-loves" one of his workouts "until daddy takes my T-bird away." Rather, Shaun T is constantly on the move, and the vast majority of his comments involve instruction or encouragement. He hustles people back from their extremely brief water breaks -- during which he's often already demonstrating the next move. Perhaps that's why the Insanity workouts -- at least the first months' sessions -- are so much shorter than Tony's P90X workouts.

I got started a little later than usual, and had only an hour to complete both Chest & Back and Ab Ripper X before the kids got up and demanded food. But I noticed that Tony was -- as usual -- spending tons of time chit-chatting between moves. This was fine (or at least tolerable) when I was a novice P90Xer, but at this point, I know how to perform a Diamond Push-Up and a Close-Grip Pull-Up, and don't need to listen to Tony's explanations for the millionth time. Nor do I want to hear Tony boast about how he can "do hundreds of [push-ups]" but has to "check on the kids."

So I grabbed my P90X Fitness Guide and just cranked out all the exercises in Chest & Back without regard to what was happening on the TV screen. I took a few breaks, but kept them as short as possible before diving right back into the next exercise. By the time I was on my last move of the workout, Tony and gang were six exercises behind. By moving ahead and ignoring Tony's mindless prattle (and by also skipping the cool-down because it's pointless), I managed to complete Chest & Back in slightly under 40 minutes, which gave me plenty of time for Ab Ripper X.

The only negative? With little-to-no rest between exercises, I had a hard time increasing my rep counts. But in the end, it was worth not having to suffer through Tony's douchetastic verbal diarhhea.

Round 2 / Day 13: Insanity Cardio Recovery

It feels a little like cheating to do an easy day of Cardio Recovery when I didn't actually do any cardio yesterday. But then again, the "deep muscle" section of this workout is no cakewalk -- it absolutely kills my glutes and quads every time Shaun T demands that we hold deep squats and lunges. It feels tougher than one-legged wall squats; after all, there's no wall.

Speaking of glutes, Shaun T likes to work the butt muscles. A LOT. My weak, flat Asian ass finds this somewhat problematic.

[UPDATE: My calves and arches are still crazy-sore, so my barefoot loop around Palo Alto today was super-slow today, covering only about 6.5 miles in an hour and fifteen minutes.]