Insanity: Max 30 Journey Day 33 - Friday Fight: Round 2

During the course of two months, I'd like to take you into my journey as I strive to retain a healthy lifestyle through a healthy balanced nutrition program and Beachbody trainer extraordinaire -- and Men's Health cover man -- Shaun T's brand new workout regimen Insanity Max 30.

Day 33: Friday Fight: Round 2

Well, I knew this one was going to be a barn burner.

For all four weeks of Month 1, I struggled to establish dominance of Friday Fight: Round 1 -- my best effort coming in Week 4 when I had a Max Out Time of 11:24 which was in itself somewhat of a miracle since Week 3 was my other best week and I was only at 8:33. So it's not like I was setting the world on fire with my times.

Again, with this, like many of Shaun T's workouts, it's the sequence of moves. I mentioned it was a struggle in Max Out Strength when I was in the upper body/pushup phase and it continued again today in Friday Fight: Round 2.

More so than the sequence today was the duration of the moves. It's hard to do moves for 20, 30 and even 45 seconds. Friday Fight: Round 2 (and Round 1 for that matter) takes the whole Max 30 to a different level. Each move is a full minute with no rest time in between as you transition to the next move. You're up. You're down. You're moving. You're grooving (I'm not pretty when grooving).

So when the first two moves are plank jacks followed by ski jumps (also in plank) after a challenging five-minute warmup (by the way, I was warm about 30 seconds in), my legs were on fire. I had an embarrassing Max Out Time of 6 minutes, 17 seconds. Take out the warmup and my time was 1 minute, 17 seconds.

I have to improve. I will improve!

I still had another 23 minutes and change left after I maxed out. My only consolation after maxing out was that I dropped to a knee, I looked up at the TV screen and saw a couple of the members in the workout group running to the chalkboard as they had maxed out around the same time as me. Maybe it wasn't as bad as I thought.

Another 23 minutes-plus to achieve week-end glory. I kept pushing and stopping, and pushing and digging. It was a grind, but I got through. It was nice of Shaun T to allow me 30 seconds to take a sup of water at 15:30 and 25:30 of the workout -- because I wasn't parched or anything.

That last minute was high knee punches. I actually somehow was able to lift my knees up to my waist for a whole minute straight without stopping. It was glorious when the clock hit 30:00 and I was done. Another week is over, and I did it up in the morning, freeing up my entire Friday night to go crazy! (That means make a home-cooked meal and watch a movie after putting the little one to bed, if you're curious.) Next up: (much needed) Pulse.

Recap

Workout:               Friday Fight: Round 2

Max Out Time:      6:17
Weep Time:           21:00 (why mention it in the article; you know I hit rock bottom once, right?)

Weekly Weigh-in:   Stay tuned for Day 36 of the journey

Monthly Photo:       Stay tuned for Day 60 of the journey