P90X Workout Review

Holy Crap. I was able to hit my goal of skiing or snowboarding for 7 straight days while on my trip to Park City, Utah. I'll tell you what, I am exhausted as hell. Riding for 4-5 hours a day straight with small breaks here and there started to catch up to me on the last two days. The conditions could not of been better. We've been going on a ski trip every year for the past 7 years and this is the first year that it snowed every day. On 3 of the days it dropped 4 inches while we were skiing or it dropped 2-4 inches over night.

We got into Salt Lake City on Monday around noon. We headed right to Park City Mountain Resort before we checked into our condo for some night skiing. They only had a couple runs opened but we did not care. The couple hours we spent on the hill was a great warm up for the next couple of days.

For Tuesday we headed back to PCMR. It snowed over night and there were blue skies all day. We tried to shred as much of PCMR as possible but the place is so big and the lift lines were a little busy as people were celebrating Mardi Gras. It made for a fun day. My legs were getting a great workout on all of the Blue and Black Diamonds I went down. I've had a set of Volkl Skis for a couple years now and they worked very well with my new set of Salomon Ski Boots. Besides my feet hurting a little from breaking in the new ski boots it ended up being an awesome day.

On Wednesday we decided to get into our rental car and drive out to Robert Redford's Sundance. This place had more of a rustic feel to it. The majority of the buildings were wood and much of the attention was focused on the outdoors...as it should be. It started snowing lightly at the peaks but it was near 45 degrees at the base making the snow very soft. I brought out my K2 snowboard for the day. It ended up being a great day as the views were amazing along with the mountain having a wide open but unique feel to it. I did not get to meet Robert Redford though which would of made it the highlight of the trip.

To keep the adventure going we picked Brighton to shred on for Thursday. It snowed all day again making conditions very soft and alot of fun. What I liked most about Brighton was that all of the runs funneled down to the few lifts they had making it easy to not lose each other. Brighton might be my new favorite place as it had a little bit of everything even though it was not as big of a resort as PCMR or The Canyons. I used my Salomon Snowblades which are a lot of fun when going in and out of the trees as they are easy to maneuver. You use different muscles with them compared to normal skis so its a little bit of cross training.

We had some left over discounted lift tickets for PCMR and used them on Friday. Again, it snowed a couple inches during the day making conditions nice and soft for us to snowboard on. Fatigue was starting to set in from the previous couple of days and a little bit of late night partying.

The Canyons were calling us on Saturday. This place is huge. I snowboarded again as I'm trying to get better at it. Plus, its really good cross training as you use a whole different set of leg and core muscles. It snowed all day again. We even hiked to the top of the Expert Only lift. It was a cool site to see as there was 3 feet of fresh powder to ride on. That part was cool. The rest of the run was a little bit above my ability as there were gigantic moguls everywhere. It would have been easier on skis for me. After 45 minutes of falling, taking breaks, and waiting up for a friend who was doing the same we finally made it down.

For our last day in Utah we drove to Snowbird. I wish we would have gone there during the middle of the week as most of the runs are Black Diamonds. The blue runs were challenging too. It was snowing all day again which made visibility bad. It was not a big deal the previous days but this place was moguled out from everybody skiing on it. There were a couple moments when the nerves jumped up as I did not see a bump until the last second. I even gave myself whiplash when I hit a rut on a catwalk. My snowboard flung me around and I smacked me head. Good thing I was wearing my helmet. We took the tram up to the top and hung out on the back side bowls known as Mineral Basin. If it was not the seventh day of shredding it probably would have been a lot more fun. My mind and body were in two different places after smacking my head. I was exhausted. The runs were steep and bumpy. If it would of been day 1 on my board I would of done better. Since it was not, I did not get to enjoy Snowbird as much. If I get back to Utah in the future it will definitely be the first place I go to.

So after 7 days of skiing and snowboarding I felt whipped. We would go 4 - 5 hours each day. The afternoon pass is what works for us. We use to try to do the all day passes but we would take our lunch break, drink $40 of beer, and burn ourselves out much faster during the trip. Doing the half day saves $15 - $30 on lift tickets plus we don't drink $40 of beer saving us lots of money and energy to go all out.

There is no way I would have been able to go as hard as I did for all 7 days without getting myself in shape first. Leading up to my trip I focused most of my workouts on leg and core specific workouts. I mixed in P90X and Insanity workouts like P90X Legs and Back, Plyometrics, Yoga, and Cardio Circuit Training. The soreness didn't set in until the day after I got home. It was mainly because I have never snowboarded 3 days in a row in my life so those muscles got a much harder workout. My abs feel ripped right now because I was using my toe edge so much the last day on the steeps to make sure I would not fall head over heels and tumble off a 60 foot cliff.

I'm pretty pumped about making it all 7 days knowing that I did not eat all that well and partied all most every night. Its what we do on our trips. From what I've read I was probably burning about 500 calories per hour which comes out to almost 2500 calories burned on the slopes. So anything I was drinking or eating was being burned up. The only thing I wish I would have done differently was bring some P90X Recovery Drink packets and P90X Protein Bars. I didn't bring either because I like travelling light and there was no more space for those. I always take those after a workout to help me recover faster. They would of helped for sure. Its been two days since I got home and I can't stop eating. Next time I embark on a 7 day shred fest I will need to eat much more.

If you are big into skiing or snowboarding and really want to get the most out of your ski vacations then take the time to get in shape before you go. Insanity is probably the best workout to do because it uses your body weight as resistance and is a lot of leg and core work. Both of which are used in skiing and snowboarding. After this trip I think I might be done riding for the season. We put in almost 30 hours of shredding the gnar. One things for sure, I'll be taking the next week off from working out to let my body recover as I'm tired as hell.

Beachbody has had a contest going on for the past 3 months where you had to qualify to go to a business event meeting out in California at the Ritz Carlton in Laguna Niguel. The place looks pretty sweet. Its right on the ocean and does not look that far away from the Santa Monica Pier. The only time I have been to California is to go skiing at Lake Tahoe a couple years ago.

 The rules were you had to sponsor a certain amount of new people to be a Beachbody Coach and make it to Diamond Coach rank yourself. Well, I did it.

Beachbody is calling it their Game Plan Event. Its a weekend event with 3 different meetings talking about the business aspects of being a Coach. They are going to have Darren Hardy of Success Magazine come in and speak  along with some of the top earners with Beachbody there. From a learning point of view it should be very informative.

When I took a look at the itinerary I was excited to see that we will be doing a group workout on Friday night with Chalene Johnson to her new "Turbo Fire" program. I have never done any of the ChaLean Extreme workouts before so it should be fun. My girlfriend has been doing ChaLean for 45 days and really likes it. I can see the results shes getting from it. When I told her I would get to meet Chalene she was so jealous. I read up on Chalene and she is from Michigan and went to Michigan State. I will have to remind her that my Central Michigan Chippewas beat her Sparty's last week.

Saturday morning is what I'm looking forward to. We get to workout with the P90X man himself, Tony Horton. I am so pumped to meet him. I have told a couple of my friends already and they can't believe it either. The itinerary says we are going to be doing P90X Yoga X. I was hoping for something more intense like P90X Chest and Back so I could churn out some pull ups with Tony but this will do. Probably best as he will show me up anyways. I have not touched the pull up bar in 2 months because of the Insanity workout.

I had to sign some waiver thingy stating that I will probably be on a recording of the event so they can publish it later for people to see. Should I get new fancy workout clothes for each workout? Nah, gotta support the home town teams. Probably going to bring a CMU and Detroit Tigers shirt. Have to represent.

It will be my first time going any where with a business like this. I hope to learn a lot from it to keep the momentum going with it. Beachbody has started a new website called Coach Destinations to show people the places Beachbody takes its contest winners. I plan on having my name up there very soon and to be on their next trip.