Day 5: Pure Cardio (aka Pure Hell)

Holy crap.  Today has been the hardest day so far.  It appears to be the first day of the Mississippi summer, which mean that my house is smoldering hot today.  Since I've started Insanity, I usually work out when it's about 68 degrees Fahrenheit in my house.  Today, even with the AC full blast and the fans on high, I could not get the temperature below 75 degrees.  Believe me, that is ridiculously hot to be doing this workout.  Not only is it hot, but it is Humid with a capital H.  I'm talking 94% humidity, which means that the actual 75 degrees feel like a hot, sticky 80 degrees.  Not the best weather to be sweating it out to Insanity.

Anyway, enough ranting.  Today I did the video Pure Cardio which I think should be renamed Pure Hell.  It starts off simple enough with the warm up consisting of the usual exercises:  jogging in place, jumping jacks, Heisman, 1-2-3 Heisman, butt kicks, High Knees, and Mummy Kicks.  As usual, you do this three times, increasing in intensity and speed each time.  After a 30 second water break, you move to a six minute stretching routine.  Then the figurative sh*t hits the fan..

After a short water break, it's balls-to-the-wall, non stop cardio for about 15 minutes with each exercise lasting one minute.  (Oh, you don't think that's a long time?  It feels like forever when you're doing it.)  Here's the rundown:

• Suicide Drills - Not too bad.  At this point, I paused the video to go put my daughter down for a nap.
• Switch Kicks - The martial artist in me loves these, but after about 20 seconds, my kicks had gone from about waist high to knee high.
• Wide Football Sprints - Easy enough.  I just can't keep up the same pace as the video.
• Stance Jacks - These were pretty fun, but after about 10 I'd have to take a break as my form started suffering.  My glutes were burning!
• Pedal - Sprinting a few seconds, jumping into one lunge on each side, and sprinting again.  These tire you out fast!
• Hooks and Jump Rope - I couldn't keep up anymore.  I was hooking when I was supposed to be jumping and jumping when I was supposed to be hooking.  At the end, I finally called it quits and took a short break.
• Power Jacks - After everything I've done so far, I was panting like a dog.  I think I did 5 Power Jacks overall.  Shawn was telling several of his trainees to take breaks.
• Level 2 Drills - After my recovery, these were pretty fun.  I still can't do push-ups, so I did what I could.  Even Shawn had to take a break, which just goes to show how hard this video is.
• Frog Jumps - These are similar to Globe Jumps only you jump back and forth instead of in a square.  My thighs were on fire!
• Power Knees - My body refused to cooperate at this point.  I could have sworn someone replaced my shoes with lead weights.
• Mountain Climbers - This was a bit of a break - maybe that means I'm not doing them quite right??
• Ski Down - I love these!  I swear my dog cursed me when I did these because I accidentally landed on his foot...whoops.
• Scissor Runs - I hate these..  They're not difficult or anything, but they just feel unnatural to me.  I hate doing them.
• Suicide Jumps - Call me crazy, but these are one of my favorites!  I try to go a little slower than Shawn calls them, because I try to focus on keeping my butt down in the plank.
• Push-Up Jacks - Again, I can't do a push-up.  I tried my hardest to do these and got a few little wimpy ones before I finally just did knee push-ups.

Finally! It's over!!  A minute long water break before the stretching routine (which absolutely feels amazing).

I don't know if I'll be running tomorrow or not.  It's supposed to be raining in the morning, which really sucks.  I miss being able to run.  If I get to, I'll post about it tomorrow, but if not, I'll see you Friday!