What is P90X?

The textbook answer to what is P90X is that it is a DVD based home fitness program featuring Tony Horton. That is like describing Michael Jordan simply as a basketball player. P90X is actually the most popular home fitness program every put together, with well more than 1,000,000 copies sold.

P90X is produced and distributed by Beachbody, which is the leading producer and distributor of home fitness programs, as well as nutritional supplements. As with all Beachbody programs, P90X has both fitness and nutritional components. While most people know P90X for the 12 DVDs that come with the program, a significant portion of the results come from eating properly.

For a detailed description of the different exercise DVDs, you can follow this link. Fundamentally though, there are 5 strength workouts, 3 aerobic workouts, 2 core workouts and a yoga and a stretch workout. The P90X schedule uses the Muscle Confusion philosophy, which essentially implies that the workouts do not repeat on a frequent basis, so your muscles do not get used to the workouts. The schedule has you do strength workouts every other day, three days a week. There is then yoga and 2 cardio workouts on the alternate days. There is also on optional stretching workout for your rest day.

The workout schedule is divided into three different phases of 4 or 5 weeks each.

One thing that is important to note is that P90X derives it’s name from Power 90 Extreme. Power 90 is an extremely popular program from Tony Horton, and a follow up program was a natural. Extreme means that P90X workouts can be extremely tough, and the workouts generally range from about an hour to an hour and a half a day. If you can take the commitment, it will provide results.

The nutritional program is also divided into three phases. The program starts out with a low fat/low carb approach and increases carbs and decreases protein in the subsequent phases. While more details will be covered in later entries, the surprising part of the nutrition plan is that it actually has people eat many more calories than they think they need. The high protein means that there is a lot of bulk to the food. Also, given that you are doing hard workouts for more than an hour a day, you are potentially burning an extra 1,000 calories a day.

In the end, what really makes P90X is Tony Horton. If you don’t like Tony, you won’t like P90X. If you like his corny jokes and overall energy, you will stick with P90X. There are plenty of workouts out there, but what made P90X so popular are the results of hundreds of thousands of people who spread the word. The reason they had the results is that they stuck with the program, and the only reason they stick with this program, above all others, is Tony Horton.

If you want to purchase P90X, you can follow this link.