I began phase two this week and I was excited to get going after the recovery week. The second phase in the P90X standard program starts with their Chest, Shoulder and Triceps routine. This is the first time I was doing this routine and from what I read in the P90X book it looked interesting. I just hoped it would push me and I would get a little sore from it.

As I am writing this it is two days later and I am still sore in my triceps and my shoulders a little bit. My chest was a little sore the next day but it is ok now. I am very happy that my arms are feeling it. I did some unique exercises in this routine ones that I haven’t ever done in 9 years of working out so I had no idea how good they would work. Needless to say I am not disappointed at all with this routine. My favorite exercises in this routine are the Pike Press, Slow Motion Push Up and the Side Tri Raise. The Pike Press is where you have your feet up on a chair and your hands on the floor. Then you stick your but in the air so your body makes a V shape, and then perform a press by coming down towards the crown of your head and going back up. This exercise was making my shoulders scream after only a few reps but I was loving it. I had never done this exercise before and it was exciting learning something new that really works the shoulders. The Slow Motion Push Ups where just push ups where you go down to the floor on a 4 count and come back up on a 4 count, you do switch your hand position from wide to standard to military push ups. I like it because I could really feel the burn. And lastly the Side Tri Raises are when you lay on your side and place your opposite hand on the floor and the other hand right beside you, you then just lift yourself off the ground engaging your triceps. It was a good exercise that was difficult and didn’t require weights.

I really liked this routine my body is really feeling it and I know it worked. I think P90X is really onto something with this muscle confusion concept. These were pretty much all new exercises for me and different from the other ones P90X has used in the previous routines. So needless to say I think my muscles were confused and the proof is in how they felt the next day!