Showing posts with label Turbo Fire. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Turbo Fire. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Efficiency



Probably the most valuable thing I’ve learned in my long tenure at Beachbody is the importance of efficiency. As an athletic trainer it mattered but you always had leeway. Athletes want to win and care less about how much time and effort it takes to do it. Regular folks have more pressing matters than being fit and time is of the essence. Over the years we’ve gotten better and better at distilling the necessities for being fit into as little time as absolutely necessary. We have it down to a science, literally.

I love seeing articles like the one that popped up last week on Science Daily, showing how short exercise can be more effective than long exercise.

Instead of long stints in the gym and miles of running in the cold, the same results could be achieved in less than a third of the time, according to new research published February 1 in The Journal of Physiology.

It not only validates where we do it makes it easier for us to “prove” our results on TV. It’s funny—not in a ha-ha way—that we often can’t cite our actual results from our test groups because they’re beyond what the authorities have deemed “possible”. The fact is, if you train smart you don’t need to spend hours a day in the gym in order to keep your body at peak fitness. Sure, you can be fit using that model, but in my experience I’ve found that most people, including athletes, train more than they should.

On the basis of these novel and earlier findings from other laboratories, Professor Wagenmakers expects that HIT and SIT will turn out to be unique alternative exercise modes suitable to prevent blood vessel disease, hypertension, diabetes and most of the other ageing and obesity related chronic diseases.

We've been using both HIT and SIT for years, so the word unique seems a little strange, but that's probably why we run into issues with the FTC and such. Even though it’s not always “accepted”, we’ve proven that if you’re willing to make healthy lifestyle changes we can change your body composition from obese to healthy in as little as 10 minutes a day. With a 30-45 minute investment you can be down right fit, and an hour a day 6 days per week can have you as fit as people who use their bodies to make their living.

Another fact is that most of your super fit friends train more than they should. As your human lab rat I’ll be the first to plead guilty. I’m quite sure I spent most of my prime athletic years in an somewhat-overtrained and undiagnosed state. I now workout far less than I once did and, yet, since I’m smarter, my fitness stays high enough that I can get into competition shape for many different sports with a only few weeks of sports specific training. While I can say that wish I knew this years ago, I'm happy just to be able to pass on the knowledge so that you don’t have to make the same mistakes I did.

Look for a follow-up post, with examples and more in-depth analysis, later this week...

Thursday, June 28, 2012

The Problem With “Calories In, Calories Out”


One of my themes this year at Summit was “TMI” or too much information when it came to how to best educate coaches. Clichés can be helpful but, when the root is not understood, can also lead to stagnations or regressions in your fitness. One of the worst offenders is the saying “calories in, calories out”.

This is not an untrue statement. The problem is that no watch made records the information you need to know. People are constantly rattling off numbers to me that they’ve used to assess their training that are not only wrong, but crippling their ability to evaluate the program.


In the name of the free market, you can now purchase all sorts of training apparatus that provide TMI when it comes to evaluating your training program. There are many important physiological responses at work that aren’t recorded by your Polar. To ignore them in the name of numbers will lead to an exercise plateau or worse. A deeper explanation will help you understand why we create fitness programs the way that we do.

In order to keep this short and simple I’m going to gloss over some science in the name of clarity. “Calories in, calories out” is correct in that it’s how you calculate weight loss or gain. The issue is that your monitor can’t see most of the factors involved. It cannot assess hormonal and nervous system responses to training or nutritional factors that affect recovery and all three things are arguably the most important aspect of your training.

Nutritional factors are the easiest to understand. Proper foods and nutrient timing, as you’ve heard in any spiel about Recovery Formula or Shakeology, enhance the body’s recovery process. The faster you recover the harder you can train. As those of you who are P90X Certified know results are based on adaptation to stimulus, and the only place you might be able to gauge this on a watch is with morning resting heart rate.


just some of the stuff your watch doesn't understand

Even more important are hormonal factors. If you’ve read the guidebook for Turbo Fire you’ll see something that we call the AfterBurn Effect, which is your body’s metabolic adaptations to high intensity training. As our training programs get more advanced one of the main factors we’re targeting is hormonal response. In a nutshell, as we age our body shuts down its hormone production (eventually leading to death). Intense exercise is one of the few things that force you to keep producing these. Intensity is relative, of course, which is why we progress from say, squats to squat jumps to X jumps as you move up the Beachbody food chain of programs. But what’s called a “hormonal cascade” in response to training is even more important than what your heart is doing during exercise, and it’s something else you can’t see on your monitor.


adaptive stress that leads to overtraining that only can be guessed at by close evaluation of morning resting heart rate

Hormonal cascades are triggered by your central nervous system, which is the hardest training factor to gauge (why most overtraining comes from breakdown at this level). When you dissect a program like P90X2 or Asylum, one of the main things we focus on is nervous system function. All of those “weird” things like Holmsen Screamer Lunges or Shoulder Tap Push-ups work on something we call proprioceptive awareness. And while it might seem hard to understand, since it doesn’t lead directly to more sweat, the neuromuscular action of these movements force deep adaptations by your body. These changes can take a long time to register but force a massive adaptive response that lead to long-term increased changes in movement patterns that trigger hormonal responses and, thus, metabolic change. Needless to say that stuff ain’t getting registered by a chest strap or pedometer.

Sure, the cumulative effect of all these can be calculated and the number at the end would equate to calories in, calories out. But since there’s no way to measure these numbers without doing a ton of fancy testing in a lab setting you can see why doing one of our diet and exercise programs and trusting us is a better option than scarfing an “Extra Value Meal” and then walking around the neighborhood until your heart rate monitor says you’ve burned 1,500 calories.

Friday, June 15, 2012

See You At Beachbody Summit!



I’ll be doing two presentations at the Beachbody Summit next week. If you’re around on Thursday, stop by the Core area at either 12 or 5 to catch the act. These two sessions will preemptively answer a lot of questions about our products and, basically, help you become a more efficient coach.

I’ll also be at the usual venues, parties, etc, as well as Certification the two days prior to Summit’s official start. You can catch me anytime for a chat but, given there will be more than 5,000 of you this year, that’s going to be more problematic than in years past. So come by Core on Thursday or, better yet, come early and get P90X Certified and I’ll load you up with information that will take your coaching to a higher level.

Here is some information on my two presentations. Click on the highlights for more:

How to put your customers in the right exercise program.

I can state how much easier this will make your job. With the right program you’ll get results as easily as A, B, C. With the wrong one you can struggle and get frustrated and spend a lot of time looking for answers. Choosing the right program is step 1 in getting the best results.

How to recommend the right supplements for the right program.

Supplementation are a key part of your tool kit for results. They aren’t magic but can seem like it when used correctly. Every supplement has a purpose and understanding what it is and how it fits with a customer’s goals is a key part of finding success. I'll also be going over some of our newer supplements, like E & E and the new line designed for Beast, which can be utilized elsewhere to help maximize your training.

Efficient coaching.

Learning where all of Beachbody’s resources to help you educate and motivate your customers are located and how to use them will not only ensure your customers reach their goals but save you valuable time.

Finally, consider getting certified. The more you know about the science behind the creation of an exercise program, the more effective you'll be at teaching it. This is particularly true for P90X , which is both versatile and complex, and can be utilized and structured various ways based on the needs of the individual client. You’re coming to town anyway, so why not add this to your coaching arsenal?

See you next week!

pic: summit's always rife with photo ops but this pic, from a coach trip in france, is posted for another reason. i'll have both road and mtn bikes in tow and need to train so hit me up if dawn patrol intervals sound fun. i'll go climbing at least once during the week, too, if you want to pack yer boots.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Tips For Fast & Efficient Coaching

“I can’t know all this stuff so I let you guys do it for me.”
- Superstar Beachbody Coach Tommy Mygrant

Every time I speak with a group of coaches I’m reminded that many aren’t aware of Beachbody’s vast array of educational resources that can help you train your customers more efficiently. As a coach you’ve got plenty of things that take up your time without having to try and also be a personal fitness trainer or nutritionist. Beachbody already has a bunch of those so why not use them?

Of course you can’t call or email us personally (which you know if you’ve tried to email me). With millions of customers our trainer customer ratio is decidedly low. But we can still help. A lot.

Over the years we’ve probably experienced every scenario that you’ll encounter as a coach, and many many more, all of which have been answered somewhere in written format. Once you learn where to search you can become the coach with all the answers, most likely spending less time than you do now. By following this quick reference guide to smarter coaching the above pic can be you!

Teambeachbody.com

This should be your home page. It’s populated with popular subjects and content is rotated regularly. As opposed to, say, digging around Yahoo health or some other popular site, the information on this page is directly placed to help guide and motivate Beachbody coaches.

Newsletters

If you aren’t signed up for the newsletters than you’re missing out. Over the last 12 years our content has been praised again and again to the point we’ve had letters from people stating we are the only fitness resource they use. This is because our articles are written specifically to you. When we strategize what goes into each newsletter our primary concern is what our customers have been asking about on the Message Boards. Essentially our newsletter archives are one giant FAQ.

Unfortunately they can be hard to search and 12 years is a lot of pages to scroll through. Here’s the trick that works best for us when we need to find them for reference. Google “Beachbody newsletter and the subject you are looking for”. If you know who wrote an article, like me or Denis Faye, you can add an author for more specificity but Beachbody newsletter generally is enough to weed out the masses.

Blogs

A Team Beachbody blog will be up and running shortly but, for now, we’ve got some more specific blogs that should be on your radar. Carl Daikeler‘s will keep you up to date on the latest happenings at Beachbody. Denis Faye’s “The Real Fitness Nerd” casts a critical eye on what’s going on both good and bad in the nutrition world. And where you are right now, The Straight Dope, is what I call tertiary information—meaning it’s advanced reading for those who want a deeper understanding of fitness and nutrition than what you’ll get in our diet guides and newsletters. And, while less frequently updated, Chalene Johnson and Tony Horton’s blog, as well as Tony's Huffington Post site is always worth a read. All of these should be on your favorites list and checked regularly.

Message Boards

If you’re not using the Team Beachbody Message Boards where have you been? Once the hub of everything Beachbody, this is the place where we’ve specifically answered all of those weird questions your customers hit you with. No matter how bizarre you may think a question is there is a very good chance we’ve heard it, and answered it, before. Our staff has cataloged these answers so they’re at their fingertips, meaning they can shoot you an answer a lot faster than it would take you to search PubMed and try and make sense out of a bunch of hard to decipher abstracts.

Another big plus of the Boards is that it puts us all on theme. Re-purposing FAQs to your customers keeps your coaching message consistent. As Beachbody grows our messaging grows too. The more consistent it is the easier everyone’s job gets.

For the most actively monitored Forums go to Info and Education. That's where the experts spend most of their time.

It should be noted that the boards' popularity once took a hit when coach phishing was rampant in the early days of TBB. That issue is now praciclly nonexistent as we monitor heavily for trolls.

To add more to Tommy Mygrant’s above quote, he also told me that the Boards were a massive time saver for his coaching, enabling him to focus motivating and selling instead of trying to fix issues that were better handled by others. He summed up by saying “I don’t know how any coach gets by without them.”

Thursday, November 10, 2011

A Historical Tour of Beachbody, with Sweat

On 11/11/11 I’ll be living a historical tour of Beachbody by doing 11 workouts that date back 11 years. If you play along, even just in part, you stand a chance to win $1,111 by logging into the WOWY Supergym during the hour of 11:11 PST. It’s only going to be 11/11/11 once in your life. You might as well do something special.

jon and carl in 1999


Besides trying to set a daily record for Supergym attendance this date has some personal significance. One year ago tomorrow we lost Tuco the Rat and the outside portion of my challenge is dedicated to him (oh, yes, there’s more). I also did challenges on 8/8/8, 9/9/9, and 10/10/10 so this is a tradition. Finally, it’s part II of my November endurance trifecta that began last weekend with a 24 hour mtn bike race (3rd place) and will finish with a birthday challenge Thanksgiving weekend.

I’ve tried to choose workout that make physiological sense for the challenge. Not getting injured is paramount and this should be a good overall workout, even though it’s excessive. Admittedly PAP at the end is silly stupid but it’s too important to leave out. That’s because I’m also telling a story, which is my own personal history working at Beachbody.

#1 Power 90 Sculpt 1/2 (2000)
While not the first Beachbody workout released (which was Great Body Guaranteed) it was the first hit and first workout that I did to evaluate whether or not I wanted to work with the company. I was currently working as a fitness columnist and wasn’t going to shuck for an infomercial company unless their products made sense. Carl and Jon assured me that if their products didn’t live up to my standards they would improve them until they did. Not only was Power 90 solid but it was being led by a guy with charisma to spare. This had potential, I thought, to revamp home fitness. I signed on and the rest, as they say, is history that’s about to pay me back in a very painful way. “Things are startin’ to happen.”

#2 Ho Ala ke Kino (2001)
I’m testing everyone’s dedication to Beachbody with this obscurity. We once doubled as a travel company and had a trip called Power Kauai. Tony Horton and Debbie Siebers would lead workouts for the clients and one morning Tony did a workout on the beach that got filmed and voila! Or something like that. This is a funny low budget feature that still holds up as great workout. “You guys ever do this workout?” said Carl to the staff one day (when you could address the entire company without raising your voice). “Man, if you ever want to feel good check it out.”

pretty sure i have some short shorts to wear for this


#3 Slim in 6 Start It Up (2002)
Our second big hit was a low impact program that subtly breaks you down until you’re begging for mercy. It’s by design but also might have something to do with the fact that Debbie doesn’t always know her own strength. She can do squats as easily as most of us sit in a chair. In one of the Slim Series workouts she’s actually still squatting while telling the audience “we’re taking a little break here.” I’m using Start It Up because, well, I’m not in such specific squat shape and we’re still kind of warming up. But I’ve got the original version, which we had to tone way down because it was destroying people out of the gate, so it’s going to hurt. Btw, the long version of Slim Series is Beachbody’s first graduate program and probably not in your collection. These workouts still hold up—and feel very hard—even after the Insanity years.

debbie taking a rest


#4 Power Half Hour Arms (2003)
“Bam!” This super intense set of 30 minute workouts was the cornerstone of many unofficial test groups I used with our customers to try and sort out how hard they were going to be willing to work in P90X. Because of this they will always have a fond place in my heart and, while decidedly low budget, they stand the test of time and remain in my arsenal. We didn’t shoot these in 2003 but we did launch one of our only failed infomercials that year about PHH. This is unfortunate because it was amazing. It’s also really weird because the entire company (now big enough you had to raise your voice a little) agreed it was the best infomercial they’d ever seen. Carl and Jon decided to chuck that standard format and go legit, using nothing by real people and stories without any glitz whatsoever. We found it incredibly powerful. When it didn’t hit we focus grouped it where the main complaint was “the people don’t seem real.” Go figure.

its time has still yet to come

#5 P90X Core Synergistics (2004)
P90X would eventually change the entire fitness landscape but not in 2004. When it launched our customer base ate it up but the rest of America was, like, “Wtf?! Dude, give me back my Ab Lounger!” Eventually we were able convey the basic science that human bodies require hard work in order to look like Tony Horton. And once converted, it seems like all you wanted was more. And this made my job a lot more fun. “Bring it!”

#6 Yoga Booty Ballet Pure & Simple Yoga (2005)
I’m not sure what year we shot this, actually, but from here on out the challenge is going to be a fight to the finish and pulling the yoga card from YBB means that I don’t have to do it for a harder program. I also wanted to throw some love Gill and Teigh’s way since they’re great people. Wildly popular on the west side of LA, YBB never struck a consistent chord with our customers. But that doesn’t mean the workouts are any less effective. If you’re looking for something different to simulate your training give it a shot.

#7 Chalean Extreme Push Circuit 3 (2006)
The first time I met Chalene Johnson I felt she’d be our next superstar trainer. Obviously I didn’t know since I was still waiting for the PHH show to hit but, anyway, she had the it quality Hollywood types are always yappin about. Like Tony Horton, only different. And while we had a lot of success with Turbo Jam her next program, Chalean Extreme, never quite took off. This is too bad because it’s a great program. The problem could be the title. It’s an intro program and perhaps Extreme is scaring off part of its audience. But like Slim in 6, just because anyone can start it doesn’t mean fit folks will find it easy. The workouts, especially as the program progresses, will challenge anyone. Of course it still might take off. It took a few years for P90X to find traction and I’m still thinking Power Half Hour's ascendency is on the cusp.

#8 Insanity, The Asylum’s Game Day (2007)
I’m cheating here because Asylum launched in 2011 but I was only going to get one representative from the Insanity series and Game Day fits the bill perfectly. At least if it doesn’t kill me. Apparently P90X wasn’t enough for you guys so we offered up a stiffer challenge, which you went after like Fluffy on catnip. I wonder what the people who said we were nuts while filming P90X would have thought watching Shaun drop mega fit trainers during the filming of Insanity like Brock Lesner with an overhand right? Then we went even bigger with Asylum, which is my personal favorite workout series at the moment (at least until P90X2 comes out). Game Day is its pinnacle and it’s an absolute blast. So painful; but with a 4th quarter with the game on the line kind of way that takes me back to my youth. “This is not Insanity, people. It’s the Asylum. I’m not messin’ with you today.”

definitive asylum shot: it's a fine line between resting and vomiting


#9 RevAbs Strength & Endurance (2008)
Would a rose by any other name smell as sweet? Most Beachbody customers are now well aware that to get a six-pack you need to train your entire body. The public, perhaps, is not and maybe they think RevAbs is a workout series done on the Ab Lounge and that's why it's yet to spend any time at number one. This full body program based around Capoeira is led by one of our most intellectual trainers, Brett Hoebel, whom I love working with because I don’t have to edit anything he writes. So buy RevAbs if for no other reason than you’ll make my job easier. Thank you.

#10 Turbo Fire HIIT 15 (2009)
“Ya gotta dance with the one that brung ya,” said Darrell Royal and we listened, putting Chalene back in front of a class and shooting verite style to create Turbo Fire. In actuality development was more scientific than that but TF is like going to class down at the gym. Except you don’t have to go to the gym or choose which class you need to get the quickest results. It’s kind of like going dancing except there are scientists in the background making sure each move you do strategically benefits your physiology. On HIIT days the band is particularly enthusiastic.

#11 P90X One on One PAP (2010)

This is a P90X2 preview and a great example of the full circle world of Beachbody. I came to Beachbody after mainly working with athletes. And while I found the non-athletic community great to work with—both easier to train and far more appreciative—sports performance is my forte and in my roots (both dad and I were coaches). Getting back to, as the old coach said above, what brung me has been my most interesting as well as greatest challenge yet at Beachbody. And while you’ve read plenty about PAP, my buddy Marcus and his training facility P3, here on my blog over the last few years you’ve never seen it implemented like this. I’m sure I’ll learn a little more by the day’s end. Assuming I survive as Marcus, nor any other trainer worth their schooling, would recommend PAP at the end of this kind of day.


tonys shows the it compared to my decidedly not it star quality as we banter about pap

But wait, there’s more! In honor of the best dog ever I’m adding 111 minutes of outside activity, either running or riding depending on the weather. During this time I’ll throw 111 rocks for Finnegan. At least I’ll be warmed up after Game Day.

we miss ya, buddy

Tuesday, August 09, 2011

A Realistic Training Template For a Busy World

I can’t believe that it’s only four weeks until I leave for Europe. The final phase of my training program has snuck up on me like a ninja in what’s been a chaotically busy summer. But that’s life as a recreational athlete. Every day doesn’t revolve around training. Training comes down to what I can fit in around everyday life. And this is the case for, like, 99% of the people I work with. And one of the major keys to success is getting them to adjust to the fact that their training schedule is a proposal, not game where one wrong turn means that you lose.


Last night I drew up my template for my final prep for Worlds. It’s a guideline for the volume, intensity, and amount of recovery I think I need to be ready for the race. But it’s only a logical proposal based on science. It’s not a daily schedule, even though it looks exactly like one. My realistic goal is to tick off what’s on the plan, and follow its structure, within the constraints of life. This means that my training log will probably look a lot different than what’s written here, but should yield the same results as long as I stick with the principles reflected in the schedule.


I’m writing this because rarely does a day go by when we don’t hear questions from customers who think that if they deviate from their workout schedule all of their hard effort will instantly disappear. We even stopped using suggested days on our schedules because we got so many “if I do Chest & Back on Tuesday instead of Monday will P90X still work?” type of questions.


Training is not magic. It’s not a game or a trick and there is no on and off switch. Our training schedules follow logic and are very important—as is the template I made last night—but only as a guideline. You need not follow the schedules to the letter to get results. You need to adhere to the principles to keep training hard enough, give yourself enough rest between similar workouts, and not over train and hit a plateau. Doing a Turbo Kick class at the gym instead of HIIT 20, a company softball game instead of Kenpo X, or going a little overboard at your friend’s wedding… it’s all just nitpicking. Success comes from training hard, seeing your program though to its end, then finding a new challenge to keep you moving.


The schedule here is my race-prep training only. Not listed is my mobility work (yoga, stretching—at least a short session daily), weight training (one PAP session per week for the next three weeks), prehab/rehab/core (2x/week), and climbing (Worlds are in Spain so climbing is definitely on the agenda—2-3 short sessions per week).


Friday, October 29, 2010

Return of Gadfly: The Inside Dope at Beachbody


We used to have a gossip column in our newsletters, written under the pseudonym of Gadfly. While I can’t promise to be bringing him (or her/it) back here at TSD my insanely busy schedule has dictated that I explain some of what’s been going on around the office because I’ve been too busy to write about anything else.

Let’s start with Asylum, which is on the top of the list because I’m going over the cueing on the final (yes, should be soon) round of edits. As soon as I check this off we’ll officially be on the final road to release. For you folks who just can’t get enough of Insanity I’ll just say this: that program is like a warm-up for Asylum.

And speaking of upping the ante, we’re into the nitty gritty of the Tony Horton One on One previews for MC2 (if you’re not getting these you might want to start now). Why I say this is that we’ve got a host of outside experts pushing Tony out of his comfort zone. Since Tony’s always pushing you out of yours it’s probably nice to hear that he’s human. What we’ve got on tap—all shooting in November—are three workouts that are far different than what you’ve seen before from Tony.

First we have a new Core/Synergistics where Tony teams up with his ski buddy/trainer extraordinaire Steve Holmsen. Tony’s been training with Steve for years for you’ve seen some of his handy work already but we’re looking at this one as the next level.

Next, we’ve taken a huge step in upgrading Kenpo X by signing on with some of the biggest names in martial arts to create what we’re calling MMX. I’ll wait to reveal the names but Tony’s actually nervous about working with them, and he’s not exactly the nervous type. Wow (inside joke on P90x development).

Finally we have PAP, which you’ve been hearing plenty about here. And while the real expert is Dr. Marcus Elliott I’ll be filling in for One on One since I’m the one who’s been working on transitioning this elite-level training to the masses.


Conversely, success of both Body Gospel and Brazil Butt Lift have starting to bring our old core (non X/Insanity/hard core) audience back and we’re making plans to offer more intro programs, including a revamped Power 90 (our first hit program) and a simple Debbie Siebers IPhone app program that should be out fairly soon.

Oh, and speaking of apps I almost forgot that thing that’s taking most of my time later: our new P90x app. Deciding we were a bit late to this market we’ve contracted the best app builder team on the planet and made it our top priority. These guys really know their stuff. Prepare to be blown away soon.

There's the alarm. Don't want to get caught gossiping. Actually, it's a meeting reminder for the app. Hmm, I didn’t even get to all of our news. Maybe we’ll have to re-enlist Gadfly as a full time correspondent.

karla mohtashemi-reese's pic is so typical: me working away, tony on TV. ha! btw, the coaches beat us (in dallas) and tony summed it up nicely: "your before pictures couldn't have done that!"

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Transition Phases



There aren’t transition phases built into the Workout From Hell. That’s not a mistake though, to be sure, periodizational training wasn’t as common in the 80s as it is today. When each phase of a program follows a straightforward progressive overload principle transition phases aren’t as necessary. Let’s take a brief overview as why you sometimes want to transition between phases and other times you don’t.

In its simplest sense it depends on the total intensity of the program you’re doing. In P90x, for example, you’re simultaneously training across various energy systems to your maximum. Your body is stressed in many various ways so that there is a pretty short window of opportunity for improvement before hits a plateau from simply overstressing itself. Another modern program, Turbo Fire, combines HIIT (high intensity) training with more traditional cardio (low intensity) and bases its transitions (recovery phases) on the overall intensity of the phases so the amount of time between transitions varies throughout the program.

Because the WFH only targets one energy system in each phase, which changes every three weeks, you don’t need a week of doing something different in between to adjust (like 90x). You will find, however, that your body can’t react right away and this provides you with a self-induced transition phase. When you drop your repetitions the first workout or two are a learning experience. Your body has become accustomed to doing a higher number of reps (time) and there is an adjustment period as it tries to recruit higher threshold muscle cell motor units (intensity).

To aid your body’s transition I recommend beginning the first few workouts in a phase with exaggeratedly slow movements. In the WFH you shouldn’t be moving fast anyway but, in almost any program, when you begin a new phase you should concentrate on technique first. Only when technique is mastered do you want to begin to push intensity (weight, speed, etc).

Keep in mind that intensity doesn’t equal hard in your mind. Intensity is defined by how stressful an individual exercise is on your body, not how hard it feels. Low intensity workouts can be very hard and painful. Try riding your bike for 8 hours, or doing one of Debbie Siebers’ Slim Series workouts. There are no hard movements it still hurts. Conversely the most intense exercises might not hurt much at all (unless you get injured). A box jump wearing a 40lb weight vest won’t tire you out but it will put incredible stresses on your body. This is why there are times, especially in a complex program like P90X, where your recovery weeks can feel harder than the rest of your program.

pic: for your retro viewing pleasure, more catherine destivelle

Monday, June 28, 2010

The P90X Newsletter Archive

The P90X specific newsletter began in 2009 and we've got an indexed archive up on my site:

P90X Newsletter Archive

It's not too differenent from the normal Beachbody Newsletter except the content is often geared more towards graduate-level workout programs instead of any workout program. Topics may include anything about nutrition or fitness but you'll also find targets subjects customizing P90X, how to create hydrid programs with Insanity, Turbo Fire, 90X and any of our graduate programs, a how to use our workouts for sports specific training. If you don't find a subject you're looking for don't forget to look on our standard archive, which goes all the way back to 2000.

Beachbody Newsletter Archive