I suppose that after
giving all this advice, I should nut up or shut up
After 2 full rounds of P90X helped me drop a bunch of excess fat, I'm focusing on adding lean mass which is a lot tougher than it sounded. Unfortunately, it's not about eating whatever I want as long as I work out, because that just translates right back to fat.
Through the first 4 weeks of Round 3 of the X, I came to the realization that my body has adjusted already. Despite increasing the weight, and feeling the fatigue immediately after a workout, my recovery time was just too fast. Some lingering soreness, but nothing to the intensity of when I first started. I hardly broke a sweat either. All of that told me that I had gotten used to the routine.
So I've shaken it up in the last 2 weeks by increasing my protein intake, attempting to lower carbohydrates where possible, and slowly bringing in unsaturated fats. My workout routine also consists of dumbbell-focused exercises of additional sets and slightly more reps but with stepped weight increases per set.
For P90X, a typical resistance series might be 8-10 reps of Exercises A, B, C, and D, then a repeat of that cycle before moving to the next group. For this one, I'm doing 4 sets Exercise A, with rep ranges of 12, 10, 10, and 8 respective reps. Each set gets an increased amount of weight, so for the 12 reps, I might be pushing 30 lb. 'bells with each arm on dumbbell bench press, for example. Then for the next set, I'll increase it to 35 lbs. per arm (and repeat with the next set), but for the last set of 8, I'll try to push 40s.
The intent is to increase the
total reps and weight compared to P90X, but incrementally.
Whether it'll work in the long-run, I don't know, but as of today, my upper arms have gained ½" in circumference, compared to August's measurements just prior to starting P90X. That I've lost the fat layer around them over the last 6 months
AND they're bigger now makes me happy, and tells me that all of this "health 'n' fitness" stuff is working.
Especially affirming when I donated blood in early November and the nurse remarked that I had no fat in my forearms when she was looking for the vein to stick.
For my MCCC plan, I am going to focus this month and March to gaining mass and all of April to trimming it down with maintenance resistance and increased aerobics (but not in that ridiculously unhealthy bodybuilder way -- I still like water and food).