I‘ve been doing P90X for five weeks now, and each week I’ve gotten extremely run down and sick. It’s gotten so routine that I finally asked for help on the BeachBody community forums.
What’s Been Happening
I feel great at the beginning of the week. I try to eat right and stay positive. When we get home from work, I put on my exercise gear and do my P90X as intensely as possible. However by Thursday or Friday, I start feeling run down. My energy levels get very low. All I feel like doing is laying around on the couch doing nothing.
So I skip one or two workouts, and then by Monday I’m feeling okay again. Then the cycle repeats itself.
I suspected it had to do with my diet, so I found a nutrition thread on the forum and shared my situation. A really friendly community member named Troy analyzed my situation, and gave me some excellent advice.
Troy’s Advice
- I’m pretty much doing okay eating the correct types of foods, but I’m eating too much in the evenings and not enough in the morning/afternoon. This means that by the end of the work day, I have low energy because I haven’t been fueling up my body. He suggested that I eat a larger breakfast and lunch, and eat a smaller supper, versus the other way around that I’ve been doing it.
- He also suggested that I may not be eating enough calories. I’ve been trying to eat around 2400 calories per day, but that’s apparently not enough. Can you believe that!? According to Troy I should be eating closer to 2700 calories each day. I checked the caloric calculator from the BeachBody web site, and it confirmed this. The reason for this is because I’m burning over 600 calories from each workout. Additionally, eating more “tricks” my body into thinking everything is fine so it will burn my fat stores. Remember, fat has the highest number of calories per gram, so when the body is not sure it will be getting enough food in a day, it tends to hold on to the fat and burns it last. So in order to lose fat, we need to eat more often in smaller portions, so the body never feels hungry.
- Finally, he suggested that I eat at least one serving of fruits or vegetables at each major meal (breakfast, lunch, and supper). This way I keep up the nutrients and energy better.
Summary
I’m just briefly touching on the subject, but suffice it to say, P90X is definitely a hardcore workout. As such, it requires attention to your eating habits. How and when you fuel your body, and with what, is very important when you burn 600 calories or more per day exercising.
However these principals can apply even if you’re not doing P90X. Simply lower the calories but do the same things… eating larger breakfasts and lunches… eating more often with smaller meals… more fruits and veggies… etc.
Last but not least, it’s important to cut out the empty calories like soda and chips. Not that you can’t splurge from time to time, but they shouldn’t be daily staples if you want to eat, look, and feel healthy.
Tags: Beach Body, Diet, Exercise, Health, P90X, Sick
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