Day 12 - Max Recovery

Well I've just spent an hour longer than usual getting to work, and the canteen has decided to start putting a butt load of sugar in the porridge, so I'm hungry and grumpy.  Not a great start to the day.

In workout news (which presumably is why you're here), today was Max Recovery.  I still hate the plié thigh burners.

It's Asylum's Game Day & Overtime tomorrow, so that should be exhausting.

Day 11 - Back To Core & Ab Shredder

What a difference a day makes.  Yesterday I was complaining that the Insanity Ab workout was too easy.  Today I did Asylum 2's Ab Shredder, and failed miserably!  I think I did better than normal at the reverse planks, but PaintShop still has 1000 images left to brighten before I can encode today's video and take a look.

A word of warning - Ab Shredder features quite a lot of thrusting, which is not suitable for viewing by anyone.  Before watching I'd suggest grabbing some strong bleach so that you can clean your eyes afterwards.  (I take no responsibility for any psychological damage incurred, or physical injuries caused by you following that last stupid suggestion).

Back To Core went OK.  Just OK.  I didn't do particularly well, but I didn't overdo it and hurt my back, so I'm mostly satisfied with that.  It does put a lot of strain on my knees when holding the lunges, and my lower back really started to burn during the band exchange (the bit that looks a bit like breast stroke).

After 10 workouts I'm feeling ok.  I've done a few heavy workouts and everything is still working.  I've been waking before my 4AM alarm, which means I'm getting enough sleep, and so far my diet has been mostly good.  I still don't know if I can make is all the way through the 84 days, but I don't feel like giving up yet.

It's some more stretching with Max Recovery tomorrow, and then week 2 is almost complete :)

Day 10 - Max Cardio Conditioning & Cardio Abs

Well this is getting harder.  I've pulled something in my right thigh, my shoulders are not happy, and just feel knackered.

Today was Insanity's Max Cardio Conditioning and Cardio Abs.  The Abs bit was a doddle - I'm going to have to swap that for something more worthwhile.  The Max Cardio Conditioning however was a struggle.  This could just be the last two days building up on me - I hope it's that, as I certainly don't want to fail this early on.

Watching this morning's video looks like I was nowhere near to giving it 100%.  My form was pretty bad in the warmup, and didn't get any better as I went through the workout.

Think I'll just have to forget about today, have a good stretch tonight, and try to do better tomorrow.  It's Back To Core & Ab Shredder tomorrow, so less cardio and more power.

Day 9 - Strength and Relief

Just a quick update today, as we have company.  Today was Asylum's Strength workout followed by a bit of stretching in Relief.

The workout went OK.  I struggled with the third cardio dumbbell rotation, and the Hip Flys were as difficult as they normally are.  But I did manage to complete 7 rounds of the Pyramid Row Progressions, which I think at least matched my best attempt.

Max Cardio Conditioning and Cardio Abs tomorrow, so that means a very early start (probably 4AM) and a good chance of needing a nap at lunchtime.

Day 8 - Max Interval Circuit & Fit Test

Bloody hell!  That was a wee bit harder.  So much for last week preparing me for this week.  I'm shattered.

 

Yup - That's 1345 calories burned in just under 90 minutes, and I'm feeling it now.

 

I started off with the Fit Test, and either matched or slightly improved on last week's scores;

And then came Max Interval Circuit.  An hour of interval training.  I started struggling during the warm up, and it didn't get any better from there.  I had to take many additional breaks, and by the final set of intervals was pretty much done.  The good news is that according to my Polar heart rate monitor app, today was a new personal best for calorie burn - My previous being the exact same workout in week 5 of Insanity back in May.  This mainly seems to be due to my heart rate staying above 90% for 14 minutes longer than then, which burnt an extra 100 calories.

The rest of this week looks like a fairly even mix on Insanity cardio and Asylum power, with Asylum's Strength workout tomorrow.  I'm hoping to do better in that based on how day 6 went.

In other news, my laptop doesn't seem to like encoding the time lapse video.  It's either cutting off the last few hundred frames or messing up the audio, all whilst blowing fuses.  Hopefully I'll get the video done today, otherwise both of this weekend's videos will have to wait till Monday when I can sit in front of a beefy workstation.

Day 7 - Rest Day

I wasn't sure if I was going to post anything on Fridays, but I thought that today at least I could post a summary of how week one of the Insanity/Asylum/Asylum 2 hybrid workout went, and how it compares to the standalone workouts.

Straight off, I'd say week 1 of the hybrid is far easier than any of the other three.  That's not a bad thing, as I'm expecting week 2 to be incredibly tough.

To really see how they compare, I grabbed the data recorded by my Polar heart rate monitor for each of the workouts that I completed, and noted the weekly total workout duration and calories burned during the workouts (yes I know that the calorie burn continues after the workout, but I don't wear the monitor all day).

Firstly, lets look at the total duration of week one of each of the four workouts;

There's not much to choose between the two Asylum workouts and the hybrid, as they're within 12 minutes of each other.  Insanity week 1 however was almost 20 minutes shorter than the hybrid.

Now we look at the calorie burn for each of the programmes;

This initially surprised me.  Insanity, the shortest of the four workouts had the highest initial calorie burn.

Now if we combine the two graphs to look at the calorie burn per minute, we get a better idea of what's going on;

Insanity week 1 is pretty much all high intensity cardio, designed to break you down, whereas both the Asylum workouts have more of a focus on strength and building your body up.  The hybrid week 1 has nothing to do with either of these, and just wants to put your body in a place that's ready for a combination of those two contradicting goals.  It's a nice gentle warm up for what is to come.

Is this data definitive?  Absolutely not.  It's based on a single person, completing the workouts at his own pace.  I had a one day break between finishing Asylum and starting Asylum 2, and expect that to have affected the Asylum 2 figures for better or worse.  However, as I continue through the next few weeks, and get both fitter, and more tired at the same time, the numbers will hopefully paint a more realistic picture of how the hybrid compares.

Please don't use this data to decide whether to jump straight into the hybrid.  You should absolutely start with Insanity, progress to Asylum, and then move onto Asylum 2 before proceeding to any combination of those.  I am hoping that this, and future data will help people who have already completed all three programmes decide whether to do this hybrid, redo one of these workouts, or look for something different depending on their own goals.

I'll do another weigh-in, and set of measurements tomorrow, not that I'm expecting much to have changed this week.

I appreciate that this wasn't an overly exciting post, so here are some awesome people doing awesome things;

Day 6 - Championship & Sudden Death Overtime

Well I'm surprised I made it through that!

Today was Championship, followed by the Sudden Death Overtime 3 minute fit test.  The workout itself was pretty good.  The only times I've done this workout previously was after completing 3-4 Asylum 2 workouts, so I'd normally feel pretty tired before I started Championship, but this week has been all about stretching and preparing my body for the next 11 weeks.  I hardly aced the thing, but only needed a couple of small breaks in order to get through.  I even completed the entire weights section, which I don't think I managed before.

The Sudden Death Overtime fit test didn't go quite as well.  If you've not seen/done it before, it's a sequence of jumps in the agility ladder, and you have to see how many times to can complete that sequence in three minutes.  As part of Asylum 2, you're supposed to learn the entire sequence, but I always managed to mess something up, so ended up writing myself instructions;

The last time I did this test, back in early August, I managed 7.5 repetitions.  Today I only managed 5.  The video did freeze two minutes into the test, so I may have managed an extra sequence, but that's still a lot worse than I managed in the other fit tests this week.

Tomorrow is a rest day, and I plan to enjoy the extra hour asleep.  On Saturday the real workout begins with Insanity's Max Interval Circuit and Fit Test.

Day 5 - Off Day Stretch

Well that's the "easy" bit of this workout done.  Tomorrow brings Asylum 2's grand finale "Championship" which has the Asylum 2 fit test at the end.  That will complete the first week of this workout, and after that it's looking like at least 5 heavy workouts per week!

So I enjoyed this morning's stretch.  I've still got a long way to go on my flexibility - I'm still nowhere near getting my elbows on the ground whilst my legs are straight, but maybe I'll get there one day.

Right now I'm feeling good.  My legs ache a bit, but hopefully with this week's stretching it won't get any worse than that.

Looking at advice from the teambeachbody.com message boards, to get through the next 11 weeks I'll need to get plenty of sleep, eat right and take one day at a time.  Worrying about future workouts won't get me there, so that's what I'll try to do.

Day 4 - Max Recovery

Well that was tougher than I remember - My thighs are still not happy!

I started off ok, but as I got into the workout, I started to remember how it ends with thigh burners in plié - Ouch!

The rest of the workout wasn't too bad.  I certainly felt the slow push-ups, and my form on the side planks is laughable at best.

I decided yesterday that uploading a 20 minute video each week is pointless.  Who wants to watch 20 minutes of me?  Plus I'd have to try and match the brightness on each video, add overlay images and a load of other stuff which would just take ages.  So I'm just going to upload a video every day instead!

I've already uploaded the previous three days and have edited the respective blog posts.  There's also a playlist available on my youtube channel for anyone who does want to watch all the videos back to back.

Tomorrow is Asylum 2's "Off Day Stretch" before I do a proper workout on Thursday.

Day 3 - Athletic Performance Assessment & Relief

It's Monday, so had to get up early for today's workout.  I say workout, but it was just another fit test, but it burnt a few calories.

Today was the Athletic Performance Assessment - The fit test from Asylum Volume 1.  There are nine exercises to do, rather than Insanity Fit Test's 8, and they're all a bit tougher.

I started off pretty well, beating my previous best scores (which I set back in July) on the first two exercises.  After that, I struggled to match any of my previous scores.  That just means there's room for improvement, but according to the schedule, I won't be doing this fit test again until day 80!  I think I might have to squeeze an extra one in around day 40 so I can see how I'm progressing.

 

After the fit test was another round of relief.  I know I need to prepare my body for what's to come, but the real workouts don't start until day 6.  That's a dramatic difference in pace to the Insanity or Asylum workouts, where they try to destroy you on the first couple of days.

 



 

It's Max Recovery tomorrow.  Although that's an Insanity Month 2 workout, it's very slow paced.  Still, there will be some planking, and that's going to help me on my quest.

 

I need to do something about the lighting for my timelapse videos.  I've just transferred the first three days worth of pictures from the GoPro, and they're all way to dark.  I can adjust the brightness in bulk in Paintshop, but the 18000 pictures I've taken so far are taking a while to get through.........



Day 2 - Cardio Recovery

They're really trying to ease me into this workout.  Another stretching routine!  This one was again from Insanity, but had a lot more deep stretches (stretches that buuuuurn!).

There's not much to say about this one really.  My 8 year old daughter joined me for the whole workout, so it was nice having some company.  I completed the entire routine, so my flexibility should be ok for what's to come.



Tomorrow brings Athletic Performance Assessment - Another fit test, but this one from Asylum Volume 1, followed by some more stretching in another round of relief.  Looks like I'll be well stretched by the end of this first week, and will have a lot of baseline data to track my progress through the next few months.

Day 1 - Fit Test and Relief

Well that was ok.  A 20 minute fitness test, followed by some stretching.

The fit test from the Insanity workout, so is fairly easy going.  However my lack of exercise in the last six weeks has certainly affected my stamina, so half way through I was starting to struggle.  My results in the first five exercises (switch kicks, power jacks, power knees and power jumps) were pretty close to the last time I ran through these tests back in May, but I was nowhere near that level of fitness for the final three exercises (suicide jumps, pushup jacks and low lack oblique).

The stretching felt great.  The relief video is from Asylum, so requires a slightly higher level of flexibility than the Insanity stretches, but left me feeling good about the hybrid workout.  It's hopefully designed to look after my muscles as well as kick my butt.

 

Cardio Recovery tomorrow - That will be nice and gentle :)

Prologue.

I'm not sure this is a good idea.  Starting an 84 day fitness programme in September means that I'm not going to finish until mid December.  And as the only time I can fit a workout into my day is before work, those cold mornings are really going to test me.  Will I be able to get up and do a workout that I'll probably be sick of by then, or will an extra hour under the duvet be too tempting?

But I need to try.  I'm 35, and putting on weight is too easy.  I almost hit 18 stone before I did something about it.  That was just over two years ago, and I wasn't motivated by anything that could be considered normal.  My daughters (6, 3 and 3 at the time) wanted a superhero birthday party, and I couldn't go as a fat batman.  So I grabbed a copy of the "Insanity" workout, did two rounds back to back, and burnt off over two stone.

After that, I was determined to stay fit.  I did another round of Insanity, and changed a lot of things in my diet.  I cut out bread (made a huge difference) cut down on carbs, reduced my sugar intake and increased my protein intake.  I got the next two Insanity Asylum workout programmes.  But that's where things got tricky.  Asylum was a massive step up from Insanity, and it wasn't until this summer that I managed to complete both Asylum and Asylum Volume 2.  According to my calipers, I've droped from 25% body fat down to under 12%, and now weigh 13 1/2 stone.  But I've still not seen any Abs!

So that's my mission.  For the next 84 days I'm going to attempt the Insanity/Asylum/Asylum 2 hybrid workout shown below.  I'm going to record a timelapse of every workout, and upload them weekly for you to laugh at.  I'm going to update this blog after each completed workout, to say how it went, not for the benefit of mankind, but to keep me motivated, so that when it's 5AM, and below freezing outside, I will still get up and do an hours workout.  That's the plan anyway.