Insanity - Totally Crazy

Insanity – Totally Crazy

I made it! Two months, dang...What a workout program. So much sweat, so much soreness. I'd definitely call it an investment in fitness. I had to change my diet, adjust my schedule so I'd have enough time to workout when I get home, and occasionally do a late-night workout. I stayed pretty true to the program. I missed one full workout, and two half-workouts. So overall I guess I missed two workout days. Not bad considering there's 54 total workout days. I'll count that as a win.

Fit Test

Insanity begins with a fitness test, which you repeat about every two weeks and, of course, the program ends with it. The Fit Test consists of 8 exercises. You perform each exercise for one minute and go for as many repetitions as you can. Take a one minute rest, then on to the next exercise. You're supposed to track your results to see how you improve. So I did! Here they are:

	Week 1	Week 3	Week 6	Week 8	Week 9 (final)	Improvement Day 1 to Day 60
Switch Kicks	95	101	116	124	132	37
Power Jacks	42	46	51	53	59	17
Power Knees	74	88	95	99	103	29
Power Jumps	32	35	40	46	58	26
Globe Jumps	8	9	10	9	10	2
Suicide Jumps	13	16	18	19	20	7
Push-Up Jacks	28	33	37	40	44	16
Low Plank Oblique	50	52	62	67	74	24

Description of each exercise:

Switch Kicks – Standing straight, kick your leg forward at hip-height, hop as you switch legs and kick the other one, each kick is 1 rep.

Power Jacks - Start standing feet together, hands above head. Legs move apart like a jumping jack and go into a squat, arms come down to your side as you squat. Really burns the legs.

Power Knees - Support your weight on your right leg, body is at a slight angle, hold your hands above your head. Raise your left knee toward your chest as you bring your hands to your knee. It's like a Tae Bo move. My standing leg tires out more than everything else.

Power Jumps – Start in a slight squat, jump and raise your knees to the same level as your hips, bring your hands to knees while in the air. Land and repeat. This one's exhausting.

Globe Jumps – Start in a squat, hands on the ground. Jump to the right, raise your hands above your head as you jump and land back in a squat, hands back on the ground. Jump back, then jump left, then jump forward. That's 1 rep...yeah, 4 jumps is 1 rep. Really tires me out.

Suicide Jumps – Start in plank (aka push-up position), kick your feet in close to your hands, jump straight up while reaching your hands overhead, land and go back into plank. That's 1 rep.

Push-Up Jacks – Start in a normal push-up position, do a push-up. As you bring your chest to the ground kick your feet apart about shoulder-width. As you push back up kick your feet back together.

Low Plank Oblique – Hold a low plank with your forearms on the ground. Bring your right knee up toward your right elbow (I count that as 1 rep), right let goes back and do the same thing on the left side (2 reps). Kind of feels like a lizard-crawl.

Pictures

I can hear some of my friends saying, “pics or it didn't happen!” So here you go. Just keep in mind the quality of my camera sucks. Things like lighting and how steady my hand is effects the picture a lot.

Day 1	Week 2	Week 5
Week 8	Day 60

Looking back at the pictures (I actually haven't looked at any of them until I wrote this), I look the most trimmed down at week 5. I think that's because the first month of Insanity is heavy on cardio. The second month has more strength training based workouts so while I was getting more exhausted I don't think I was burning off as much. That's what I tell myself.

Now, the more I think about this the more it doesn't make sense to me because muscle burns fat, so if I'm building more muscle I should be trimming down in month 2 just as much as in month 1. So I'll get real here. I slipped in my diet the 2^nd month. Not badly, but enough to make the week 5 pic look like the best one, of course camera quality could also be to blame...right? I have a reason for the diet slip up, more on that later. Right now, let's focus on the positives. Given the picture quality, it's tough to really see the changes in my physique. So here's some of the things I notice are different from day 1 to today.

• Today, what my gut looks like normal is what it used to look like when I'd suck it in
• All my clothes fit more loosely
• I had to tighten my belt a notch
• My chest resembles a pectoral muscle and doesn't look so man-boobish
• I still got some love-handle action going, but for the first time ever my lats are broader than the love-handles
• I feel more fit and confident in my appearance
  

What I Got Out of It

I learned a few things doing Insanity. Like I make a variety of noises depending one how close I am to my limit. As I start to get tired I breath heavy. When I get more tired I start panting. Grunting kicks in near exhaustion. Then when I'm really near the breaking point, I start to whimper. Sort of a high-pitched squeal. Never knew I did that before, it's kind of funny.

When it comes to eating I can resist temptation. I passed on several desserts and dining out opportunities. But I can't fight off stress and I stress-eat. Now I don't mean the “I had such a long day” kind of stress, I mean the kind of stress that's subtle and dwells in the back of your mind. When you worry about something inwardly, but outwardly you seem fine. That kind of stress. It's like a silent doomsday countdown. I had some of that going on during the second month of Insanity. I ate some cakes, some pizzas, drank some beers, and ate a few larger portions. Now I didn't completely gorge myself, but I let it go enough that you can see a slight inflation going on in the week 8 picture. Guess I need to find a good way to deal with that kind of stress. If I can, who knows, I just might get that sweet tooth under control.

I managed to get a few new eating habits. Vegetables aren't so foreign to me and I even started liking vegetable juice. There's a dash of portion control going on too. I get full on less food, which is different...and good I guess. I cook for myself more often, which is both healthier and less expensive than eating out as much as I did before Insanity.

Most importantly, I got through it! It's a tough workout and I was able to push through the moments of utter exhaustion. And I got results! Not the whole “ripped in 60 days” you see on TV but I'm slimmer and have some muscle definition. I feel a bit proud of myself.

What's Next?

Good question! I could do Insanity again. Maybe. I definitely feel that if I did it again I'd continue to improve my fitness. The better I got the further I could push myself during the workouts. The fit test results show I haven't hit my limit yet. But...not right now though. It's time to mix things up. The new UFC gym is opening up soon (hopefully within a week of writing this) and I got a good deal there so I'll check that place out. I'm sure they'll have some Insanity-type workouts.

Thanks to everybody who's been reading these blogs. I appreciate the comments and all you silent readers. Much mahalos. And keep reading. Though Insanity is finished, the blogging shall go on!

Oh, and since the start of Insanity I talked about how Shaun T. would ask “How y'all doin?” and my reply was always “fricken horrible!” Well, at the end of Insanity it's still the same ;)