Beav-X-90: Figuring Things Out

Sunday, August 21, 2011: The White Tiger and I were preparing for bed.  We'd just completed a virtual marathon of celebration: our 3 year anniversary of dating, our vacation to Portland, my birthday, our return to Des Moines, a family wedding in Atlantic, then my family's celebration of my birthday at our house that very day.  We were bushed and wacked.  Then, I got a text.

Ed Veak: "90 day fitness challenge starts tomorrow. 5am at the gym. Fatty stats will be taken and review of workouts. Short workout and then yoga at 6:00 for anyone who wants to stay. Be there!"

Me: "Jen?"  (I had recently replaced my phone.  Anyone who I had met in the last two years wasn't saved in my contacts).

Ed Veak: "Nope, Ed. We decided to start a workout challenge at 5am.  You had expressed interest so I included you in the text.  Sorry for the short notice but you are welcome to come play. Bring friends, but let them know, no whiners allowed :)"

Me: "Ha ha, sounds fun/scary. I will try and make it." 

This is what I look like at 5 in the morning.  Notice the Tiger is just a blur.

 

And, that's how, with no mental or physical preparation, I got started on my current fitness odyssey.  Every morning, for the past 3 weeks, with just a few days off for my century ride, I have crawled out of bed at 4:30 in the morning, put on clothes, made coffee, and headed to Ed and Jen's gym, which is more like a dungeon that early in the morning.

Now, after 3 weeks, I have two contradictory emotions about what I have dubbed as "Beav-X-90."  (I thought it would be a play on P-90-X, but I thought it was P-X-90, but I've been using incorrectly, so now I am stuck with it.). 

First, the workouts are great.  Hard, dynamic, and with enough healthy competition that I push myself.  I actually feel like I have a core.

This morning, for example, we did the following workout:

Warm Up
60 seconds box steps alternating legs
60 second cross-leg step ups left side, then right side
60 second box jumps
60 second squats
60 second clean squat press
60 second lunges, alternating legs
5 "man-makers" (like a burpee with dumbbells, a push up, and two rows).

Workout--Dumbbell Complex (the weights are mine; everyone chooses their own weights)
10 dead lifts (I did 50 pounds today)
10 bent rows (40 pounds)
10 clean squat press (30 pounds)
10 weight squats (30 pounds)
10 push ups
10 push press (over head press with a little hop, 30 pounds)
10 back lunges with weights, alternating legs, with weights, arms over head (20 pounds)
1 full room sandbag drag down and back, alternating arms (imagine being in a downward dog.  Then, lift one arm and pull a 20 pound sandbag towards your legs, then shuffle legs back, scuttling across the room with your ass in the air.)

We made it through 1 warm up and 3 sets of the workout (though I wimped out on the last sandbag drag).

The workouts are all sort of like this.  Ed calls it "functional" fitness.  Whenever we run with a sandbag over our shoulders, we are reminded that now we can run with a child, like out of a burning building.  Functional.

These ladies (Jane, Tracy, and Mollie) are both hard-core fit and hard-core nice.

Second, getting up at 5am is ruining my life.  When you have to be somewhere at 5am, you have to get out of bed at 4:30am, which means, you need to be in bed by about 8:30pm.  Do you know what happens after 8:30pm?  Just about everything.  You have to give up any hope of seeing your friends, watching television, or having "downtime" in the evening.  I have to come home, exercise the dog, make dinner, then go to bed.  It also means that I have to stop drinking coffee at about 3 in the afternoon, I am chronically exhausted, and the Tiger and I get about 2 hours of seeing each other in the evening. 

On one hand, this is problematic because it all happened so quickly, and right before classes started, that I haven't felt able to get the rest of my sh!t together.  For example, I should probably be eating better, more protein, etc, but I haven't really had time to go to the grocery store to buy all the healthy food that I am eating.

I did lose a bit of weight the first week, but I am pretty sure my body was just flushing out all of the gallons of IPA I drank while on vacation in Portland.  

On the other hand, I get to take naps before I go to work. 

Also, I think I need more cardio?

Also, a week of Beav-X-90 helped me rock the Urban Assault.  

Also, I miss the Y, and Lexi time in the morning. 

Also, now that a few weeks have passed, I am getting a bit complacent.  I need to keep pushing myself.

All of this happened so quickly, I haven't had time to really process. 

Yesterday at brunch, I was talking to my friend Austin about working out.  He responded to an invite to attend Beav-X-90 with "I'm done exercising for the year.  I know that's not the healthiest approach, but that's how it's going to be."

I have to say, that idea was like the first time you hear about sex, or etsy, it just blew my mind.  Being done with working out for the year, not exercising anymore until January, or March, or whenever?  That idea hadn't even occurred to me.

Of course, Austin is the most gorgeous creature, slim as a fawn, with glowing skin and eyes.  Austin could give up working out for a few months.  I, on the other hand, didn't work out for a week while in Portland and felt like a massive, slow moving, river barge.

Then, I thought, "well, what would happen if I quit working out?  Or quit Beav-X-90?"  Even though it is ruining my life a little bit, and the week of Thanksgiving seems as distant as the stars, (which I never see because I have to go to bed when it is still light out,) I hadn't even thought of quitting.  Sure, I might skip a regular Y workout here or there, when I haven't had enough sleep, or need to go to work early.  Now that I have committed to Beav-X-90, I am so bull-headed that I have to finish.  I can't quit.  I couldn't live with myself if I did. 

Consider, poor Bob, who worked out for the first week or so, dropped out.  The Tiger is a sporadic presence, but he took last week "off" and "didn't hear" the alarm this morning.  I even fear for Ed, who misses occasionally for work commitments or Interbike, but then calls the rest of us "pussys" if we show any sign of weakness.  (Uh, listen, I feel like if a group of ladies are kicking your ass in the showing up department, we need to think of a different word for weakness, other than "pussy."). I just feel bad for this guys.  I don't even want to mock them.  I just feel the weight of their shame. 

So, I can't quit, but if I am going to really rock this challenge, and keep my friends, I am going to need to figure somethings out.  1) how do I get motivated to go the grocery store?  2) when do I see my fitness buddy, if she is too sensible to get up at 5am?  I really want to take advantage of this opportunity to kick my fitness up a notch and lose some weight before the holiday season.  

On the plus side, I just read an article about a fancy-pants gym for celebrities and special ops that sounds similar to Beav-X-90.  We must be really hip.

Look for more updates and figuring out in subsequent blogs.  If you will excuse me, I need a nap.