Day 73 - Max Cardio Conditioning

Today was supposed to be Max Cardio Conditioning & Cardio Abs, but there was a traffic incident, so I had to cut Cardio Abs so I could spend time driving very slowly to work.........

I struggled to get my heart rate up this morning.  Hopefully it's just tiredness, and I'm not coming down with something.

I'm hoping to have a bit more energy for tomorrow's Back To Core & Ab Shredder.

Day 72 - Strength & Relief

Today's Strength and Relief were fairly tough.  I awoke this morning with very sore shoulders.  Now sure why, as yesterday's workout shouldn't have affected them too much.  Whatever it was, it made the overhead presses more difficult than normal.

I matched my personal best of eight in the pyramid row push-ups, which I'm happy with.  Not sure that I'll ever get to nine, as I'm pretty close to running out of time for the eight.

The rest of the workout went ok.  Once again, my efforts in the pyramid row completely wiped out my arms, and I was unable to complete the following set of hip flies.

It's back to Insanity tomorrow for some Max Cardio Conditioning and Cardio Abs.

Day 71 - Max Interval Circuit & Fit Test

This morning was proper work!  90 minutes of Insanity should wipe anyone out, and it certainly did.

Today was a repeat of Day 8 - Which held my record for calories burned in a day.  Did I beat it's 1345 calorie burn?  No.

  

 Am I upset about it?  Again, no, and I'll explain why.

Firstly, let's look at today's measurements;

No real difference to last week, but you'll see that since day 8, I've lost 2.5Kg.

Now the important numbers - The fit test results.  Today's fit tests went pretty well if I do say so myself;

I didn't just obliterate my Day 8/Week 2 numbers - Apart from the Globe Jumps, I either matched or beat my personal bests set back in March.  Combined I improved by a smidge over 5% on my personal bests, and 25% better than my Week 1 numbers.  I'm fitter than I've been in years!

So, I'm lighter, and fitter.  That means that my calorie burn has to drop.  It's a bit of a pain, as I'll have to get fatter if I want to beat that Day 8 calorie burn.

I'm obviously fairly chuffed.  Hopefully I'll nail that 11th Globe Jump next week and have improvement across all my scores.

It's Strength & Relief tomorrow.  For now, I'll leave you with today's time lapse;

Day 70 - Rest Day & Week 10 Analysis

There's just two weeks till this is finished, three weeks till The Force Awakens, and four weeks till Christmas!  Things are looking good!

I've enjoyed this last week.  Even though I failed to complete week 8, those previous three weeks were a slog, and I needed this downtime.

I'm not going to go too mad with the data, but for those who are interested;

That's 2888 calories burned in just over 4.6 hours this week.  It's strange to think of that as relaxing, as it wasn't that long ago that I wasn't doing any form of exercise.  It'll do for this week.

That's 10 weeks done!  The final two weeks are going to be tough, but I know I can do it!

I'm really looking forward to tomorrow's Fit Test - It has been 8 weeks since the last one, and I'm hoping to see some improvements.  The rest of next week is a repeat of week 2, which is a little daunting, as that holds the record for both calories burned in a week, and calories burned in a single day.  Sounds like a challenge :)

It has been a few weeks since I included a third party video, but this has to be shared;

Day 69 - Relief

The child in me couldn't miss day 69, so I forwent my Friday morning lay in for some relief.

All went well, until I noticed that my GoPro had stopped recording.  I'm hoping it's just a dodgy SD card, and will be testing some spares to make sure it's ready for tomorrow.  If not, then I may have to look at other cameras, which would be a bit of a pain.

Here's what I did manage to capture;

So that's the final stretch before the final stretch.  Just two weeks left to go!

Day 68 - Max Recovery

Yay! More recovery!  I'm ready for a workout now.

I've still got a session of relief that I should squeeze in at some point, but I think I'm done for this week.

Day 67 - Core Cardio & Balance

Better late than never!  I ran out of time yesterday to complete my workout, so will be shuffling things around a bit.  I plan to either do a double one day, or simply switch my day off from Friday to Tuesday.  It's not a hardship, as it's a very light week, an simply a case of squeezing Relief in somewhere........

Today's Core Cardio & Balance went great.  I feel really good after completing it.

It's Max Recovery next............

Day 66 - Pure Cardio & Cardio Abs

It was freezing this morning, but a return to Insanity warmed me up nicely.  I've missed the Insanity workouts, and Pure Cardio is a good one - Just the right length, nicely paced, and a good variety of upper and lower body work.

Cardio Abs on the other hand felt like a bit of a waste.  I need more of an ab workout that it could provide, but this is supposed to be a lighter week.

The week gets even lighter tomorrow with Core Cardio & Balance.

Day 65 - X Trainer & Relief

Today was X-Trainer, and I loved it!  I don't know why, but I felt good, Shaun T kept making me smile, and everything just came together for a really good workout.

I'm looking forward to tomorrow's Pure Cardio & Cardio Abs - Bring it on!

Day 64 - Cardio Recovery

It's recovery week!  I'm going to enjoy this one.

Today's cardio recovery was nice and short - Just half an hour.  That meant I got extra time in bed, did the workout after the heating had kicked in, and still had breakfast with my family.  Awesome stuff!

I also did my weekly weigh-in and measure;

There's only one number that significantly changed, and that's my weight - I lost a whole kilogram!  That's my biggest single week loss of the programme!  I'm happy with that.

There's a bit more work to do tomorrow in X-Trainer & Relief.  It's starting to get cold here in the UK, so I might wait for the house to warm up a bit before starting.

Day 63 - Rest Day & Week 9 Analysis

It has been a tough week, made tougher by the preceding two weeks.  If I had another week like this, then I might very well have thrown in the towel for good on this hybrid, but thankfully, it looks like I've reached the peak of this workout, and will get a bit of a rest before it picks up again towards the end.

That end is well and truly in sight - Just three weeks to go!  That's pretty exciting.

So how did I do this week?  I'm not expecting much, as I was still feeling the effects of a rubbish week 8.  As per normal, I pulled the data from my Polar H7 Bluetooth 4.0 Heart Rate Sensor and recorded totals for duration and calories burnt.

Firstly, lets look at the last nine weeks of this Hybrid.  We'll start with the total duration;

The difference in time between weeks 7 & 9 is due to me skipping Relief on day 59 (Back & 6-Pack).

Now we look at the calorie burn;

I burned just 4782 calories this week.  Whilst not terrible, it's almost a whole workouts worth less than week 7's 5302.

Now let's look at those two graphs combined;

It's not great, but this week was not about beating my personal bests - It was picking myself up after last week's fall.  I made it through, and will now hopefully make it through the rest of this Hybrid.

Purely out of interest, I thought I'd take a look at this week's individual workouts compared to week 7's to see where that difference was;

The Back & 6-Pack calorie drop is understandable, as it was 23 minutes shorter than week 7.  Otherwise, I was consistently worse in three of the five other workouts.  It wasn't all bad, and I did feel fitter in this week's Vertical Plyo - It may have just been my imagination, but I felt I was jumping higher and for longer.

To sum up this week, I didn't do great, but I'm feeling better.  I'm looking forward to a lighter week 10, and really looking forward to the final two weeks - I want to see how I've improved in the fit tests.

That'll do for this week.

Day 62 - Speed and Agility & Back To Core

I feel tired.  Constantly tired.  Three more weeks of this, and then I'm taking a few days off!

Today was a struggle.  There were many, many breaks, but I really don't care.  These last three weeks have been very tough, and I'm surprised that I managed to complete this week at all.

Today's calorie burn was lower than day 48's;

I'm not hugely surprised.  Most of my workouts this week have produced lower than expected calorie burns, but I don't think I could have pushed any harder.  I'm wiped out.

Next week I'm repeating week 6's recovery week.  I'm looking forward to a lighter week!

It's rest day tomorrow, and I'll be looking back at this week's numbers.

Day 61 - Max Recovery

That was tougher than expected.  It seems that 12 hours was not enough time for my arms to recover from yesterday's Overtime, so I struggled with what should have been a fairly light workout.

At least I'll have at least 22 hours before tackling tomorrow's Speed & Agility and Back To Core.

Day 60 - Vertical Plyo, Overtime & Relief

That's more like it!  Tonight's workout was a beast, but not only did I make it through, I also managed to improve on week 7's workout by 90 whole calories!  Not too shabby.

Overtime was as horrible as ever, but that's what it's for.

It's Max Recovery tomorrow.  Am looking forward to a slightly more chilled workout.

Day 59 - Back and Six Pack

I was running short on time this morning, so no Relief today.  If I start feeling creaky, I might do it after work.

Back and Six Pack went OK.  I was a bit annoyed, as I was pretty close to completing without a break.  The hip flies and those final flutter kicks are a real git.

It's Vertical Plyo, Overtime and Relief tomorrow.  Hopefully I'll be able to get them done before work, but need to be in early to setup some exams, so may have to postpone.

Day 58 - Power Legs & Relief

This morning's workout was a little disappointing - I was miles off the previous two week's calorie burn.  Not sure why, as I felt I was pushing.  Oh well.

I am starting to enjoy power legs.  It's a fairly low speed workout, but it really feels like work.  The final squat/pulse sequence is a killer, but Shaun T manages to keep me entertained and motivated, so I manage to get through without stopping.

I managed to tear my heavy band at some point during today's workout.  I'm glad it didn't snap, as that would have stung.  I picked up a replacement this afternoon, so I'm good to go for tomorrow's Back & Six Pack.

Day 57 - Upper Elite & Ab Shredder

After having three days off, I'm back, and it felt OK.  Not great, nor bad, so that'll do for now.  I was close to postponing/skipping it, but am glad I didn't.  Back to taking it one day at a time.

The workout itself went slightly better than expected.  I didn't match day 50's calorie burn, but very slightly improved on day 43's, which surprised me, as I wasn't expecting too much from myself.

 

Ab Shredder was as unpleasant as usual, and I was fairly shattered after Upper Elite, so there were many, many stops.  I'm again just glad to have gotten through it, so am not hugely bothered about my performance today.

I did my normal Saturday morning weigh-in and measure, and am happy with the results;

The three days off didn't have a negative result on my body, and both my weight and body fat weight dropped slightly.  That's pretty good news, as once I get to a place where I'm happy with my weight, I know I won't have to work out for 7 hours per week to maintain it.

It's Power Legs & Relief tomorrow.  Right now it's time to spend some quality time with my family, have a bit of a chill out, and not worry about anything.

Day 56 - Rest Day & Week 8 Analysis

I'm not going to bother with my normal weekly analysis, as I can sum this one up with one word: Rubbish.

This is my third "Rest Day" in a row, and I'm starting to feel human again.  It has obviously helped that a large chunk of the stress from work has almost gone, so I'm sleeping better, but a bit of a break from the workout has definitely helped.

So that's it for week 8.  I failed miserably, but am not too bothered, provided I can get through week 9.

Day 55 - Speed and Agility & Back To Core

I'm throwing in the towel for this week. The stress from work, and resulting lack of sleep has caught up with me, and at 5 this morning, sat in my exercise clothes ready to push play on Speed & Agility I just couldn't do it. I'm going to have a couple of days off, get some rest, and hopefully start week 9 on Saturday.

Day 54 - Max Recovery

Well it finally happened. Day 54 of my Insanity/Asylum/Asylum 2 hybrid, and my first DNF. 10 minutes into Max Recovery, and I'm just not enjoying it. Feel a bit guilty, but it has been a git of a week, and the double Asylum workout tomorrow might make things feel a bit better.

Day 53 - Verical Plyo, Overtime & Relief

Just a quick update this evening, as I need some sleep.  Workout done, but was again disappointed with myself.  Looking forward to finishing this week,

I gave up half way through Relief, as I had children who wanted feeding, and I still had work to do.

Max recovery tomorrow.  Night night.

Day 52 - Back and Six Pack & Relief

Am still having a rubbish time at work, which is having an impact on my workouts.  I did manage to do day 52's workout on day 52, but it was after dinner (not recommended) and just before I went to bed (again not recommended), so I'm now posting this on day 53.  I've yet to do day 53's workout, but am hoping to fit it in before eating tonight.

As I was doing Back & Six Pack, I thought I was doing pretty well.  Whether it was the food in my stomach, or the long day at work, something made me think I was giving it 100% when in fact I didn't even match last week's calorie burn.  Oh well.

I've accepted that I'm not going to improve on last week's calorie burn, and that's ok.  It has been a weird start to the week, and I doubt it's going to improve.

It's Vertical Plyo, Overtime and Relief later today.  I'm not really looking forward to it, but hopefully I'll find some motivation before then.

Day 51 - Power Legs & Relief

Well it has been an interesting morning.  We had a fire at work, which luckily was contained in time and didn't reach my server room.  Lots of water damage, and a very stinky office, but otherwise everything seems ok!

I was definitely distracted during this morning's workout.  Hardly surprising, but annoying, as my calorie burn dropped from last week.  Not much I can do about it.

It's Back and Six Pack tomorrow.  I might have to do that one after work, as I suspect that I'll need to head into work early.

Day 50 - Upper Elite & Ab Shredder

It's week 8, and I'm still going.  Last week was a beast, but this week I planned to do better.  I think I managed that in Upper Elite, but was running on empty by the time I got to Ab Shredder.  Even so, I slightly improved on last Saturday's calorie burn, so that's good enough for me.

I attempted to Periscope this workout, but the camera on my phone doesn't really have a wide enough angle.  I got fed up with having to move the phone, so gave up.

I did my normal Saturday morning weigh-in and measure before my workout;

Not a huge difference.  My body fat did go up slightly, presumably due to the Pizza I had on Monday, but it did taste really good, so I'm not too upset about it.

It's more jumping and squats in Power Legs tomorrow. 

Day 49 - Rest Day & Week 7 Analysis

The workout has finally begun!  I've been complaining for the past few weeks about the falling duration and calorie burn, but this week things got turned back up to 11.  I did six full Asylum/Asylum 2 workouts (two in one session) along with the normal relief and a round of Insanity's Max Recovery.

I should be feeling pretty good about completing that lot, but I feel that I didn't really push myself again.  Let's take a look at the data and figure out why.

As per normal, I pulled the data from my Polar H7 Bluetooth 4.0 Heart Rate Sensor and recorded totals for duration and calories burnt.

Firstly, lets look at the last seven weeks of this Hybrid.  We'll start with the total duration;

Just over 7 hours of workouts in 6 days - Not too shabby!  If nothing else, it's been the longest workout week of the programme.

Now we look at the calorie burn;

 

A 5302 calorie burn for this week again isn't bad, but that week 2 record of 5443 was just out of reach!

You can probably guess where this is going.  Let's look at those two graphs combined anyway;

 

Yup - Week 2 still takes the crown!  It also surprises me just how close last week's recovery week is to this week - they felt incredibly different, but the pace was very similar.

What can I say about this week?  It felt harder, but I feel like I could have done better.  Week 2's data shows that I'm capable of pushing harder over a similar duration, so why didn't I?

If we look at week 2 vs week 7, we see many similar workouts - Strength matches Upper Elite, Game Day matches Speed & Agility, but the two Insanity workout days in week 2 is where I think the difference could be.

If we look at how this week compares to the standalones, hopefully you'll see what I'm getting at.  As we've now run out of Asylum/Asylum 2 data, I'll be comparing this week to an average week in Insanity/Asylum/Asylum 2;

Insanity just kicks butt at burning calories.

It's not hugely surprising then that a week including a few Insanity workouts would have a higher calorie burn than one without.   So if I'm not burning calories with high intensity cardio, then am I building muscle with strength and power?  That's pretty hard to gauge, but maybe tomorrow's weigh-in and measure will show some improvement.

In summary, this week was looong, and a lot of work.  I feel I could have burned a few more calories if I'd either pushed harder, or paced myself better, but I'm not hugely disappointed.

Next week, I get to do all this again.  Yay!

Day 48 - Speed and Agility & Back To Core

Damn that was tough!  Still not as bad as Day 8's 1345 calorie burn, but even so;

That's what two full Asylum workouts look like back-to-back!

Could I have beaten that 1345 record?  I think so.  I think I overdid it at the beginning of Speed and Agility, as I was struggling towards the end of that first workout, and was burnt out by the time I started Back To Core.  I was taking breaks during the Back To Core warmup, which is pretty bad.

That's week 7 done. I know I could have done better, so that's my goal for the next two weeks.  If I can beat this week's calorie burn total, I'll be happy.

It's rest day tomorrow, and I'm looking forward to seeing how this week compared to the others.  It felt like I got a few good workouts in there.

Day 47 - Max Recovery

Just for fun, today I broadcast my workout on Periscope.  Not sure how successful it was, or if I'll make this a regular thing.

Today was Max Recovery.  It went pretty much as expected.

I'll be finishing off the week with Speed and Agility & Back To Core.  That's two full Asylum workouts back to back!

Day 46 - Vertical Plyo, Overtime & Relief

That didn't go well :(

Yesterday I said that today's workout would take just over 100 minutes.  It turns out that the three videos did indeed have a combined duration of 103 minutes, but I'd forgotten about the 10 minute Shakeology ads after each video.  So today's workout only lasted 78 minutes, and I didn't need to get up at 03:30 after all!

It was bloody cold when I started my workout.  The heating hadn't yet kicked in, and I didn't want to wake my wife or children by turning it on early.  It wasn't until 23 minutes into Vertical Plyo that I started to feel warm, and by then I'd wasted half a workout.

I can only describe this morning's performance as "half arsed".  I struggled to keep my heart rate above 80%, so my calorie burn was down on what it should have been.  It did mean that I wasn't completely burned out for Overtime, but I didn't do particularly well there either.

It's Max Recovery tomorrow.  I plan to regroup, and hopefully do better on Thursday.

Day 45 - Back and Six Pack & Relief

I feel like I'm improving!  I made it till half way through the 14 pulse set of the pulse up/mountain climbers before needing a break.  A quick breather got me back into it, and I completed the 16 pulse set.  Pretty happy with that, and should make it all the way through fairly soon.

There are still plenty of other areas that need improvement.  My side planks are still useless, as are my hip flies.  Hopefully I'll see some improvement there.

It's Vertical Plyo, Overtime & Relief tomorrow - That's 100 minutes of Asylum!  Think I might have to postpone that until after work so that I don't have to get up at 03:30!

Day 44 - Power Legs & Relief

This morning's Power Legs went as well as expected.  It started as an uncoordinated mess, and ended in pain.  That's not a bad thing.  I tried to make up for my inability to remember a simple ladder sequence by just improvising, and I made it through the final set of squat pulses.  I'll chalk this one up as a successful workout.

There's certainly plenty of room for improvement, in both form and pace, so I'll try to do better over the next couple of weeks.

It's Back and 6-Pack & Relief tomorrow.