P90X: Workout 3 - Shoulders and Arms

Upper body again, along with Ab Ripper X.  At least there were a couple of recovery days after chest and back before doing this workout.

Shoulders and Arms moves between shoulder, bicep, and triceps exercises for an hour (time is also taken for a warm up and cool down).  Thankfully, there are some water breaks in there.  You need at least a couple sets of dumbbells for this, not just because of progress over time, but also because different exercises benefit from different weights due to varying angles and muscles used.  A mat is also good as there are some moves that are done lying down.

I like this DVD in part because I like the organization of these exercises – three exercises (each based on a number of reps rather than time), then repeat those three, then a water break, then start the next set of three.  It just appeals to the list-maker part of my soul.  This is another routine where I sometimes follow the warm up with the DVD, switch to live TV for the workout (following along with the fitness guide) and then back to the DVD for the cool down and that is doable because the exercises are based on rep count which I prefer for strength training.

Because almost all of these exercises are done ‘in space’ (as opposed to complete isolation like a machine in a gym) there is at least some recruitment of other body parts.  For example, I find my abs contracting for some of the exercises to keep my posture in line.  Tony is pretty good about describing correct form, but he has a bad habit of not talking about correct form until you’re half way through the set which strikes me as odd.

It becomes apparent pretty quickly in P90X that the strength training workouts are Tony Horton’s forte.  He varies the exercises and moves the workout along at a good pace so that it is challenging but not demoralizing.  There were exercises that I started the program with 5 lb. weights and ended the program with 12 lb. weights.   I count that as progress.