Day 32 - P90X Back & Biceps - 12/8/11

Today was the first time through the P90X Back & Biceps workout.  All the other workouts I had done a handful of times before starting out, but I think this one got left out because it was the most redundant.  Back gets worked out with Legs & Back and Chest & Back, and biceps naturally get worked out when doing some of the chin-ups.  So with the limited training time I had, I just never bothered to bring this one into the rotation until I actually started the program.

It turns out, I was right.  The major overriding thought I had with it was that it is a workout that blurs the lines between the sections being worked the most, out of all P90X workouts.  With every other one, you have a definitive rest of one set of muscles while working the next, and there is little if any overlap.  In this case, you do some bicep work, and then when you get to the back section (which will naturally include a lot of pullups), you do some more moves that invoke the biceps as well.  So as a result, I found that the number of pullups I could do seemed lower - more like 5 and 6 instead of 8 and 9.  I guess what that means is that I'm definitely working muscles, and the biceps are the bottleneck at the moment.  Eventually they'll catch up, but at least I have the Legs & Back routine that will serve to work the back as much as possible.  It also means that it is a sore-inducing workout - when I'm starting to feel sore shortly after the workout is done, that means I usually have a relatively rough couple days ahead.  The only solace is that biceps can be rested more easily than, say, legs - which are used for virtually everything you do in life.

Other than that, there is some honing in on weights that needs to be done.  The 10 Kg I had on each bar was too much for some exercises, so I ended up lowering it to 8 Kg, which was better for things like curls.    Looking at the numbers, it kinda looks like 10 Kg is about right for back exercises, and 8 Kg is good for ones that isolate the biceps more.  The only problem is that there is only a few weeks to figure it out before this routine gets taken out of the rotation.

The one exercise that I was probably most sloppy on was the corn cob pull ups.  I had no idea what one of those was - never heard of em.  But when I saw them demonstrating it, I was like 'Yeah, that'll happen!'  I managed to get a handful of them out, but it was obvious I had never done them before.  I do like the variation, though - even though they are pretty rough.