19 May, 2012

P90X Day 22: Yoga X

Short post tonight. I think.

I discovered two important things to remember today.

First, doing Yoga X first thing in the morning is HARD. I’m stiff and my muscles are tight. In addition, we really need a new mattress, so often when I wake up, my back is a bit sore lately. I couldn’t even do one of the back stretches this morning. Hurt too much. And then I came out of it too quickly too, which you’re not supposed to do. That only made my back feel worse. Yippee.

Second thing I learned today is that I need to eat more. Most people starting out on an exercise program like P90X are overweight. Well, most people period are overweight, so that’s hardly a surprise. Phase I of P90X is called Fat Reducer for a reason, and probably most people again will find the diet plan for Phase I very restrictive.

I’m not in that position. I was lean to start with, and I don’t eat very much. And it was already high protein and low carb. I just had to increase the protein and cut out a little bit of fat. Anyway, the diet plan I worked out using the P90X math is a lot more calories than I’m used to consuming. I tried it for a few days. I couldn’t get very close to the number they wanted. I felt like I was gorging myself. And I gained weight. During the Fat Reducer Phase. And not because I was already putting on muscle mass. The calorie count for the diet plan was just too high for me.

So, I adjusted it down, by quite a bit. I have still been eating more than I’m used to eating, but only by a couple hundred calories or so a day. Well, these last few days I’ve been hungry all the time, and have even bumped up my caloric intake by another 100 or so calories. It hasn’t been enough. I’ve still been hungry, and I’ve been losing weight again. I probably need to add at least another 100 calories, maybe even 200. And then I’m starting to get pretty close to the P90X recommended number. Imagine that.

The funny thing is all of this has been going on during the least intense days of P90X there are. Yesterday was just X Stretch, and today was Yoga X. Both of those are hard, but I guarantee I’m not burning anywhere near the calories I burn doing Plyometrics. This means my body is starting to consume more calories on its own. This is exactly what I’ve been hoping for, and working for.

A friend of mine tells me that you burn an extra 4 calories an hour for each pound of muscle mass. I think that’s the right number. I’m sure he’ll correct me if it’s not. That works out to 96 calories a day. Call it 100 just to make the math simple. If my body needs another 200+ calories a day just to maintain itself, then I’ve added about 2 pounds of muscle. Pretty simple.

This also makes it simple for me to figure out where I want to be. I’d like to add 500 or so calories a day to my diet. Actually, 750 would be better. If I can do that, then it’ll make my eating choices a lot easier. I’ll be able to eat more of what I want to (within reason), without having to think about the benefits and disadvantages of every single bite. That tells me that I need to add somewhere around 7-8 pounds of muscle mass. Now, I’m not sure what it’ll take to do that. Perhaps more than a single round of P90X. But I know where I’m headed, and my body will tell me when I get there.

Ok, so I barely talked about Yoga at all today. But you’ve heard me describe it all before. Only difference is that today was really rough for me. I think if I do it first thing in the morning again, I’ll extend the warm up segment a bit, because I definitely wasn’t ready today.

Tomorrow, a new DVD! Core Synergistics.

Can’t wait! Stay tuned.

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