Day 17

Today is day 7 of the first week of P90X3. This day is what you would call an option day. You can take the option of rest and do nothing or maybe incorporate something you like to do ie: mountain biking, hiking, jogging, walking or some other activity no matter how intensive it is. You also have the option of doing the Dynamix workout. Today I rose around 815am, rolled around, turned on the TV and thought about what I wanted to do. My back was sore and not from the workouts but rather from the car accident in 1995 (SSDD if you don't know it Google is your friend). I took the option of doing the Dynamix workout.

Knowing from P90X program that day 7 was a stretch option and was not any where near as vigorous as the other workouts but more vigorous than just laying around and stretching. What I didn't know is how it worked fully and how intense it really was. The Stretch X I think it was called was only 15 or 20 minutes if I remember correctly, but I could be wrong. With Dynamix, as with all the workouts in P90X3, is 30 minutes as well.

When I got the P90X3 program I opened the boxes and buzzed through some of the materials right away. I also started popping in discs to see what was what. One of the discs I started was the Dynamix disc, but after watching the first series of exercise/stretching moves, I put in another thinking I had a pretty good grasp of what that one was all about. I was wrong.

Although we do a lot of upper body work throughout the program or at least through week 1, Dynamix really focused more from the core to the floor.... Huh, a rhyme. What I mean is that there are a lot of core involved and lower body involved movements and exercises. They are designed to stretch but so is yoga and you work in yoga. You will work a little in this workout, not to the extent of the other workouts, but don't think this is just laying around and stretching all relaxed. I was really surprised to see all the lunge work in this one as well. Sadly surprised as lunges are my least favorite and probably the most effective or they wouldn't be there.

One thing I really enjoyed was the increased involvement of the lower back and sneaky way in which it was stretched. The movements seemed to focus on lower body, but with the lower back getting in the mix it really does help with the stretching and increased core ability. Remember that the core is not just abs, but the back is in there as well, and it's always been said to have strong abs you have to have a strong lower back. With this entire set of workouts you notice how all muscle groups get involved at the same time to increase the burn, work and amount of calories expended.

Week 1 summary:
The workouts were good. I am still sore in many places, but not to the point where I can't move. I feel good about how it progressed and yes I can definitely improve in a lot of areas. I can already feel my chest gaining strength, but let's see how I do tomorrow. I know I need to focus in on some areas when doing those workouts, especially getting my calves burning. With a week in, I should be upping my intensity level every week as I gain confidence in the moves and conditioning.

My diet was, I will say pretty good. My weight today by the scale is at 330 lbs. I know I started around 350 lbs 2 weeks ago, but I didn't actually weigh the first day. This week was Christmas week and the diet suffered a couple of days in there. I am back on track and have been replacing breakfast with a shake every day since starting P90X3 last Monday. I am looking forward to the week coming up and seeing how I respond with a full week of clean eating while doing X3.

One week down 13 weeks to go.