Round 2: Day 25 - Kenpo X

Wow felt pretty good doing Kenpo again. Got good sweat, decent workout and didn't tire me out. I always lost my balance whenever I did back kick. Not much to write today.

P90X Lean Recovery: Day 87 - Kenpo X

The last Kenpo X for me and I'll stay away from it for a little while. I know I mentioned before that Kenpo is one of my favorite workout because it is fun doing various punching and kicking. However, after doing it for almost every single week for straight 3 months does wear it down.

Anyway, I took a day off today from work because today is MY BIRTHDAY! Yay, Happy Birthday to me..LOL.

I don't really have any plans tonight or anything like that, but last Saturday I had a dinner with my friends and they bought me a birthday cake. I'll have a separate post for that one.

3 more days to the end! WOOT!

P90X Lean Phase 3: Day 83 - Kenpo X

Why did I almost want to sleep in this morning instead get ready to do Kenpo?
Because the weather was so cold and it was still dark. Who wants to get up and do exercise, instead just snuggle under the warm blanket?

Anyway, I BEAT THAT! Kenpo X was fine, but like I said before it starts to bore me and I might not include this workout in my next round. Maybe I will do it once in a while when I feel like I want to punch & kick someone do some fun cardio.

Rest day tomorrow and it'll be RECOVERY WEEK!!
Tomorrow night I'll have a get together with my friends at some Thai restaurant.

Happy Weekend everyone and try to eat clean :)

P90X Lean Phase 3: Day 76 - Kenpo X

I attempted to skip this one and jog/run tomorrow Saturday morning. However the thought that I could sleep in a bit tomorrow conquered it. Did Kenpo X this morning. This workout started to bore me and I even skipped the Star blocks and did extra jumping jacks/X jump/jump rope/run in place instead. Those rise my heart rate more than the Star blocks.

Can't believe Week 11 is almost done and there'll be only 1 more week of resistance workouts and will be recovery week after that and guess what...DAY 90 is coming closer!

P90X Lean Phase 3: Day 69 - Kenpo X

As many other P90Xers, I agree that this workout is the easiest among other P90X cardios. I had to go on faster pace in order to get my heart rate up. Actually the Saunders Cycle warm up is tougher than the workout itself. Same thing with the jumping jacks and x jumps in between. My heart rate only goes up when I do kickings, not so much on punching (unless I go really really fast nonstop that almost lost the sequence), and not at all on the blocks- especially star blocks. Up until now, I still don't get what's so intense on the star blocks.

Image is from Jay Robb™ website

After workout, I had my soymilk mixed in with 3 scoops of Genisoy chocolate soy protein powder and the last Jay Robb™ Yammit Almond Energy Bar. Since I am not a big fan of sweets, this bar is way too sweet for me, also too chewy. It has some weird taste in it I can hardly describe.

Image is from Jay Robb™ website

Among Jay Robb™ bars, the Peanut butter is still the one that I like. Other flavors not so quite.

Wow, it's already Day 69, and going to 70s soon! Can't believe I've come this far!
Rest for me tomorrow or Stretch if I feel really like it.

Happy Weekend!

P90X Lean Phase 3: Day 62 - Kenpo X

I had to hold back a bit when doing Kenpo X so I won't make too much noise. Either way, I was still sweating a lot. After the workout, I had PowerBar Pure & Simple Long Lasting Energy Oatmeal Raisin flavor and a glass of soymilk with 2 1/2 scoops soy protein powder. It was a good after workout meal to give me that energy boost.

Yesterday, I had a really bad stomach cramp right after I ate my yogurt mixed with various dried fruits. I had to lie down a bit in my car after the cramp went away before I drove home from work. Not quite sure if the yogurt went bad or I had it at a wrong time. To be exact, I was having it during late afternoon, so my stomach wasn't quite empty. Anyway, no yogurt for me today, but here's my daytime food/snack list:

• 5 slices of cheese
• 1 1/4 cup box of table water crackers
• 1 Jay Robb™ High-Protein JayBar Fudge Brownie
• 2 apples -sliced
• 2 oranges - sliced
• 2 ripe bananas
• White rice with boiled bok choy and beef stew

Let's see if I can finish most of them.

P90X Lean Phase 2: Day 53 - X Stretch & Kenpo X (make up)

I finally managed to catch up with my workout this week. Since I took a week off from work, I didn't get up that early to do my workout. I had to drop off my parents and my uncle to the tour shuttle pick up this morning and came back and did Kenpo X. My parents will be on the tour to San Francisco and Yosemite for 3 days and 2 nights, so I can use my desktop computer for a bit.

I finished Kenpo around 9:30 am and took a shower and had a pretty late breakfast, like around 10 am. As usual, I had my almond milk with cocoa powder and flaxseed meal, 2 slices of whole wheat bread with PB and a bit pieces of naan bread.

Now onto the food part! Finally I can upload my food pictures again.
After late breakfast, K and I went to Walmart to shop some stuff for my parents to bring home and our household stuffs. After that we just walked around in the mall and did window shopping. It was a nice feel to walk at the mall during weekday. It wasn't that crowded and you could find parking very easily!

Since we had our breakfast quite late, we had lunch around 2:30 pm at Subway.
I ordered 6" turkey sandwich with 9 oat wheat bun with lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, a bit of mustard, salt and pepper.

K also ordered mostly similar stuff as I had, except he had ham slices, some mayo and no salt, pepper and cucumbers.

After lunch, we went back to Walmart because I forgot to check out what brand of soy protein drinks that they carry. Unfortunately, I couldn't really find much option except for that EAS brand and it was pretty expensive compared to the regular whey protein drinks. In the end I ended up getting Kashi Go Lean® protein bars.

I bought 2 individual bars, but I stated to nibble the other one before I got a chance to take the picture. Couldn't help it, I was still a bit hungry even after I had that Subway sandwich. Did my stomach start to expand? :p

We got home and decided to catch up on 2 LOST episodes that we missed for the past 2 weeks. While watching, I was snacking on the 1/2 apple that my mom couldn't finish yesterday, and finishing up Kashi Go Lean bar that I ate earlier on the way home.

After we finished watching LOST, it was already around 7 pm, and we decided to heat up some left over stuff as our dinner. K had some bread and toasted 1 naan bread and a bowl of soup.

I had a bowl of mixed vegetable soup (nappa cabbage, lots of carrots, tomatoes, ginger and some fishcake), topped with fried onions that my mom made.

Seeing K enjoying his naan bread I couldn't help to nibble on it too. I had at least 1/2 of it.

What's the best to have after a dinner? Fruits!! Yup, that's my dessert. I don't have sweet tooth nor I like sweets, so fruits are the best bet for me. I had 2 oranges and they were so awesomely juicy and super sweet!! That surely filled me up. I didn't take the picture of the orange since I'm pretty sure you know how it looks like..haha.

I didn't have a chance to clean up the kitchen last night, so I made sometime to clean it up before doing X Stretch. It was awesome and for some reason I almost fell asleep when doing the stretch. It just felt so good, especially my left back shoulder has been feeling a little stiff lately. Those head rolls were such a relieve. I might want to do more of it. Additionally, my right shin also feels hurt lately. However, those haven't bother my performance yet but doesn't mean I should ignore it.

Speaking of which, I finally got my free soy protein coupon from Genisoy!

They're so awesome! I emailed them, asking if they could give me free sample for their soy protein drink since I read a lot of good things about it. They replied back since they don't have free samples, they willing to send me a coupon for 1 free soy protein shake. Woohoo!! I can't wait to try it! I am not a big fan of whey protein so I want to give this soy protein a try. Gotta have this protein drink if I want to build some lean muscle, right?


Anyway, it's a long post. And tomorrow I'll be doing Cardio X. After that, maybe I could give that Kashi Go Lean® protein bar a try.

P90X Lean Phase 2: Day 48 - Kenpo X

I feel I wasn't as intense doing Kenpo X today compare to last week, probably due to my lack of sleep. Some of my relatives came by to visit last night so I had to postpone my usual clean up until they left. Regardless, I still drenched so no complain here. I found it become more challenging to raise up my heart rate, especially at the beginning of Kenpo, when we were doing the punch series. My heart rate didn't go up until I reached to the kick series. I was starving after I finished the workout so I gulped down my usual "recovery drink" and ate 1 medium banana. Those bananas are getting riper so I better finish them off before they go bad.

Here's my day food for today

• 2 slices of whole wheat bread with peanut butter
• 2 chinese pastry puffs
• 2 medium bananas
• 3 sticks of carrots -cut into matchstick size
• left over hummus - I gotta make more later
• Boiled chinese broccoli, some steamed fish meat, steamed chicken meatball and some white rice (all in that rectangular container, sorry can't really see much)
• 2 peeled oranges & 6 oz. blueberries

Tomorrow is rest day and I'll get to sleep in a bit. And another exciting thing is I will be off from work for the whole next week so I can spend more time with my family and to top it off next week is P90X Phase 2 Recovery Week, so no resistance workouts *yay*. I don't have a particular plan with my parents yet but for sure I will bring them to Big Santa Anita Canyon, the hiking place that I used to go when the weather gets warmer. Another plan will be going to museums and parks.

EDITED @ 8:53PM
That Chinese pastry puff was not that good so I only ate 1/2 of it and tossed the rest. I didn't bother to eat the other one so I gave it to my brother after I got home. I only ate 1 banana, which was getting really ripe and couldn't eat the other one. Finished the oranges & the blueberry in the afternoon then munched on the carrot sticks after I got home, dipped into the hummus before dinner. I guess I brought a little too much food for my daytime meal..hehe.

Btw, my parents went to my relative's place this whole day so I had a regular dinner with my brother and my hubby.
Lightly fried tofu with oyster sauce & onions, mixed vegetable soup (bok choy, carrots, tomatoes and fish cakes) and left over soy sauce chicken & eggs.

P90X Lean Phase 2: Day 34 - Kenpo X

Did Kenpo this morning. Boy, how I just hate seeing Westley Wesley Idol to be in the Kenpo video workout. His form was so flabby compared to Vanessa and Tony the former marine. I don't want to brag but I think my form is much BETTER THAN him! K mentioned that maybe Westley Idol gave big donation of making this Kenpo X video so Tony just had to give him a spot to be in the video. Thus Westley Wesley thinking he's one of the monetary contributor, didn't think he should work too hard.

Anyway, enough rant about that. I still like Kenpo even though I can feel that it doesn't work me out that much compare to the other P90X cardio workouts. I still need to work on my kicks though (especially the back kick). This morning I didn't wear proper workout pants so some of my kick movements were wobbly.

P90X Lean Phase 1: Day 24 - Kenpo X

I had a workout buddy this morning....it's K. It seems like my motivation starts to lure him into doing morning workout, but we'll see how long will he last. Anyway, we had to get up a bit earlier so we will have ample of time to get ready to work.

K is pretty new in this Kenpo, despite he did this once before. I could understand that after the second jumping jack session, he decided to call it off.

As for me, I felt really good this morning. I didn't even crash towards the end of the workout. In fact, I felt I had lots of energy to burn. Maybe I got enough sleep last night (slept before 10 pm and got up at 4:30 am this morning). Or maybe I had good dinner last night (homemade whole wheat Indian roti dipped into lentils & tomato stew, steamed broccoli and tomato & cabbage soup)..Yummers!

As today's breakfast:
1 cup of green tea (at home)
1 cup of plain soymilk (w/ 1/2 tsp sugar for taste)
1 almond bread
1 cup of green tea bag (at work)
2 pieces of mixed nuts/blueberry

Lunch:
3 pieces of whole wheat Indian roti
1 bowl of lentils tomato stew with steamed broccoli
1 small apple

Snack:
Mango slices & oranges
1 small apple

Dinner:
TBA

Note: Btw, I noticed I have a small bruise on my left hip bone. Prolly because of the banana roll yesterday on top of my thin mats :(

P90X Lean Phase 1: Day 20 - Kenpo X

I had hard time going to sleep again last night, but at least I wasn't awake for the whole night, unlike the other day.

However, I got up extremely late (in my terms anyway), around 5:40 am. So after getting ready and everything, it was 6 am already. I finished everything around 7 am sharp, which was not bad. Just the timing was pretty tight as I had to quickly put everything away (my laptop, mat, shoes, put the coffee table where it used to be) and hit the shower.

I tried to raise up my intensity when doing the punches and kicks. The more I moved the hips around, the more intense my punches are. But my side kicks and back kicks were still wobbly, but they are higher than before tho.

At last, finally weekend is HERE again! Can't believe this month is almost over and I am almost done w/ Phase 1. Next week will be Recovery week, so the workout will be less intense.

P90X Lean Phase 1: Day 13 - Kenpo X

It's Kenpo karate time, people. BRING IT!!!! Surprisingly, my upper thighs aren't as tight and sore as yesterday, so I survived Kenpo workout this morning, minus the Saunders Cycle warm up. However, my knees are still a little sore and stiff, probably from the Legs & Back squatting and Yoga's Bound warrior pose. I still couldn't manage to keep my prayer squat as firm as the P90X folks.

Anyway, it's Friday which means, tomorrow will be my weekend for both workout and work..isn't it wonderful? I can sleep in a bit, though the latest I get up is about 7:30 am. I can't sleep in too late.

Also for those who celebrating Lunar New Year (or Chinese New Year as most people call it), Happy Chinese New Year!!!

P90X Lean Phase 1: Day 6 - Kenpo X

Kenpo X is one of my favorite workout, despite what other people said that it's the most inferior workout among P90X program. It's fun cause I can pretend that I know karate moves even though I'm sure my kicks and punches can't even knock down anyone..haha.
I'd say I enjoy any workout that involves cardio with Plyometrics as an exception because it's too much for my knees to handle the jumping squats that it has.

I'm still struggling doing the "Saunders Cycle" warm up, especially with the squats. I'm pretty bad in any squatting workouts because of my weak knees.

Anyway, it seems like I survive the 1st week of P90X Lean Routine. Tomorrow I can sleep in a bit and take a break...or maybe do X Stretch, depends on my mood.