The P90X Workout Diaries — Week 3

*Note from the editor — Zach Petersel is a featured MLB columnist for Bleacher Report, an all-around fitness/nutrition/sports nut, and a guest contributor for Lean It UP.  Zach graduated from Indiana University in 2011 and will start grad school at Columbia University in the fall of 2012. You can follow him on Twitter @ZPetersel

Zach’s column — The P90X Diaries — is a chronicle of his 12 week jaunt navigating the ins-and-outs of P90X .

With the football season finally underway, there are going to be tons of people whose priorities shift from going to the gym and working out to eating wings, drinking beer, and winning fantasy football. Don’t let that be you!

Don’t get me wrong, those are three of my favorite things…in the world…but just because your friends are indulging in calorie black holes, that doesn’t mean you have to. Wake up early and go to the gym before the games start. Find low calorie alternatives to the beer and wings diet by simply making yourself a sandwich. Or, if you still want to get your “man” on, have a BBQ and grill up some seasoned chicken or turkey burgers.

Problem solved!

Getting the body you want and deserve is not only about getting into the gym and working hard, but also eating right. If the mini-rant above wasn’t enough of a give-away, during this week’s P90X Diaries I am going to focus both on my diet and workouts.

My Very Own Shrimp Stir-Fry

Ranging from pork tenderloin, to salmon, to shrimp stir-fry, my diet has expanded greatly over the past three weeks on P90X. No longer am I just bringing sandwiches to work for lunch, but rather turkey burgers with hummus or left over salad with LARABARs or Kind Bars as mid-day snacks.

Before starting this program, I believed that their version of eating “healthy” essentially meant eating spinach, broccoli, cottage cheese, etc. at every meal — wow, I could not have been more wrong!

Not only have I grown to love cooking, but the food I make tastes great! Bear with me here, obviously I am not a world class cook, but considering (as my friends would tell you) all I used to make was pasta with tomato sauce and George Foreman hamburgers, I’ve made some serious progress. P90X provides a wealth of creative recipe ideas to ensure that you’re never bored with what you’re eating.

My favorite part of the P90X cookbook & meal plan is that it walks you through every single step. They tell you exactly which ingredients to buy, how much of each you need for every meal, and how many servings you will end up with so that you can serve your friends and family.

It’s THAT easy, and there’s a great satisfaction that comes with eating your own homemade food — I highly encourage that you start cooking and become your own personal chef (plus it’s healthier and cheaper).

My Own Creation: Salmon, Spinach, and Brown Rice

I can go on and on, but let’s change gears and talk about another workout – Ab Ripper X – which blasts the abs, the part of the body that everyone wants but seemingly never achieves.

In this P90X routine, Horton and his staff have you perform 349 core/ab exercises…in 16 just minutes! No, that is not a typo.

In fact, it is a number that everyone can achieve relatively easily if you put forth the effort.

I have to pause for water a couple of times to either catch up with the DVD or simply rest because my abs or obliques are exploding (in a good way), but no matter how many breaks I take, I come away feeling amazing. The video works EVERYTHING — the upper, middle and lower abs, in addition to the obliques — in yet another intense P90X DVD.

The list of moves are as follows:

• In-and-Outs
• Bicycles
• Reverse Bicycles
• Crunchy Frogs
• Cross Leg/Wide Leg Sit Ups
• Fifer Scissors
• Hip Rock ‘N Raise
• Pulse Ups (Heels to Heaven)
• V-Up/Roll Up Combos
• Oblique V-Ups (each side)
• Leg Climbs (each side)
• Mason Twist

Even if you don’t feel the burn after each individual exercise or even directly after the video is finished, trust me, you WILL for at least the following day, if not the next two or three. I’ve yet to fully recover within 48 hours after performing the DVD so instead of working my abs every other day as the program recommends, I have been going every third day and continue to feel the soreness that nobody likes, but loves at the same time.

Akin to the other DVDs, you get an incredible amount of detail for what seem like such simple moves. Tony simplifies it so that if it is your first time going through it is easy to follow, but he also provides ways of spicing up the routine and changing it up for those who may be in their final month of the program.

Abs are extremely hard to develop and maintain. They’re a relatively small muscle group that requires a lot of stimulation to grow, and body fat plastering the abs is typically the last the fall off & first to come back, if your diet and workouts slip whatsoever. That is why working them to the bone in this DVD, while focusing heavily on a clean diet, has become a staple in my weekly routine.

These exercises keep me sore workout after workout, and I am really looking forward to seeing the final results at the end of the program!

That’s it for week three of the P90X Diaries! Working within my busy schedule I have been able to work out 11 times in 21 days, so a little more than every other day. By no means am I perfect, but that is at least 50% MORE than I would have been able to get into a gym without these DVDs — the product is paying for itself already.

Review The Earlier Weeks –

1. Week 1
2. Week 2

Follow Zach on Twitter @ZPetersel and Lean It UP on Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest for real-time fitness/nutrition tips, advice, info and updates.

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