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Day 5 of the P90X® programs brings back several great workouts, including Ab Ripper X and several exercises from the back routine first done on Day 1. In addition, however, Tony Horton and the gang bring on some leg exercises that don't look like much, until you try to DO them!

This workout is also different in the fact that although the back exercises repeat for 2 rounds, the leg exercises are all done only once - and that is enough, believe me. For anyone who really struggled with Yoga X on Day 4, be prepared for some of your leg muscles to give out earlier than you would normally expect them to.

However, that being said, the standard P90X guidelines continue to apply during this routine - "Do your best, forget the rest". P90X in general is based entirely on that philosophy. As long as you are truly giving the program your best effort - but also listening to your body - you'll see the promised results.

The following list of exercises will only include the leg exercises, since the back exercise were covered in the earlier reviews linked to above. I will input the name of those exercises so that you can see where they fell in the workout, however.

Balance Lunges

With your foot kept up on a chair, you lunge forward and back over the other leg 25 times in a row. It seems easy at first, but starts to burn pretty quickly.

This is a great exercise for being able to modify the intensity because you can back off if 25 reps on each leg is too much for you, and you can hold onto dumbbells if you want to make it harder. 

Calf-raise Squats

This is an awesome combination exercise that, as the name implies, combines a standard squat and a calf raise. You do the squat first, then when you come up, you raise all the way up onto your toes.

Again, you can add dumbbells to make it harder. Reverse Grip Chin-ups were the next exercise, followed by…

Super Skaters

If you've ever seen speed skating on television, that is the movement that you're doing here. You bend over as you kick one leg back, all the while balancing on the other leg in a forward lunge position.

To make it easier, you can touch the toe of the leg that you're not balancing on to the floor, and to make it harder you can swing your leg behind and to the side, rather than just swinging it backwards. 

Wall Squats

Talk about looking easy but being incredibly hard, in this exercise you basically put your back against the wall and slide down to various positions, and then hold it there. After about 10 or 15 seconds, your legs are on FIRE.

You can make it easier by sliding up the wall more, and harder by holding yourself in the position where your legs are exactly parallel to the floor. Wide Front Pull-ups were the next exercise, followed by…

Step Back Lunges

This exercise isn't too intense, so grab some weights to make it more difficult. Rather than stepping forward into a standard lunge, you step backwards into a deep lunge, going all the way down until the thigh of the front leg is parallel to the ground, knee behind your toe.

Drop the weights if you get worn out, and then kick out some more reps to muscle failure. If it is too easy, pick up heavier weights and/or pause for a full second in the bottom position. 

Alternating Side Lunges

Coordination is the hardest part at first about this exercise, since you are trying to lunge out to one side while keeping the other foot planted. This is done for a total of 24 reps, and hits the inner and upper thighs if done properly. 

Pick up or drop dumbbells to modify the intensity. Closed Grip Overhand Pull-ups were the next exercise, followed by…

Single-leg Wall Squats

After the regular Wall Squats, and the exercises since then, this one is really hard. It is basically the same movement, only you hold one leg out as close as possible to keeping both thighs parallel to the floor.

You can modify your depth to make it easier or harder. The closer your thighs are to parallel with the floor, the harder it is. 

Deadlift Squats

This exercise is similar to the Step Back Lunge, only you never put the rear foot on the ground, which means that not only are you really working the forward leg, but you are having to balance the entire time, too.

Getting far enough down so you can touch the floor with your hands - yet without the forward knee going over your toe - is the hardest version of this exercise, while not going that deep makes it a bit less intense. Switch Grip Pull-ups were the next exercise, followed by…

Three-way Lunge with Two-Kick Option

Coordination once again comes into play in this exercise, and the more proficient you get at this movement, the more you will get out of it. In essence, it is a lunge to the left, then at a 45-degree angle to the left, then straight forward. After each lunge, you do a straight leg or bent-knee kick. After all 3 directions, you switch to the other leg and do the same thing.

Straight leg kicks are harder than the bent-knee kicks, so there aren't a lot of options for making this exercise easier, but you can make it harder by really going for it on the kicks, and also getting really deep on the lunges. 

Sneaky Lunges

This one is weird at first, but once you get the hang of it, it is both effective, and also fun. It is basically a set of lunges that you do back and forth across the room, staying up on your TOES the entire time. You also modify the position of your arms and your body throughout the exercise, which makes it even more difficult.

Until you get good at this movement, you'll probably spend more time on flat feet than on your toes, but work up to staying on your toes the whole time to crank up the intensity. Reverse Grip Chin-ups were the next exercise, followed by…

Chair Salutations

The set up that Tony does to get you into position for this exercise is the real magic, because it does a great job of stretching your body in preparation for this static contraction sitting movement. In essence, you are sitting on "air," feet together, with your arms overhead.

You can modify the intensity of this exercise by holding your hands higher overhead, and also by sitting down into a deeper squat. You could also hold the position longer, although the prescribed 30 seconds will be plenty for most people. 

Toe Roll Iso-Lunges

This is a back and forth movement where your body never significantly leaves the starting position, but rather you roll back and forth on the toe of the back leg. The start position is a deep lunge with one foot solidly out front, and the other leg as straight as possible to the rear.

Roll back and forth on the toe of the leg that is to the rear, and never let the knee of the forward leg go past the toes of the forward foot. Modify the length and depth of the lunge to change the intensity. Wide Front Pull-ups were the next exercise, followed by…

Groucho Walk

The Groucho Walk is basically a 4-step forward walk and 4-step backward walk while in a low squat position. It sounds easy, but it most definitely is not. By this point in the workout, your legs are really burning, and don't be surprised if you find yourself physically incapable of lifting your foot off of the ground by the end of this exercise.

You can modify the difficulty of this movement by walking in a lower or higher squat position, and also by taking more or less steps forward and backwards. 

Calf Raises

This was a really good exercise because you do 3 different calf raise positions, and at 2 different speeds. Everyone grabs dumbbells for this one, and you do a toes-in version, a toes-straight version, and a toes-out version. 15 slow and 10 fast reps are done in each position.

Make it harder by holding onto heavier ways, or by holding the "up" position for a full second or longer before doing the next repetition. Closed Grip Overhand Pull-ups were the next exercise, followed by…

80/20 Cyber-speed Squats

This exercise is basically just a really fast squat, but the 80/20 comes in because you put 80% of your weight on one leg, and only 20% on the other leg. Switch to the other leg and repeat. This is the last leg exercise in this routine, and it is a great way to "take it home" and finish strong. Switch Grip Pull-ups were the next and final exercise in this workout.

Conclusion

Definitely impressed with the workout that this routine gives to your legs, yet without using very much external equipment, or even heavy weights. After doing countless reps with large weights in the gym environment, I was skeptical about how good of a leg workout could be delivered in the home environment.

P90X not only delivers an incredible workout, but it does so by simply modifying some basic exercises in order to either make them more difficult and/or to put them in an order that really cranks up the intensity.

This leg routine is an extreme challenge, to be sure, and it can easily be modified to make it easier or harder, which makes it both a short-term and a long-term workout solution.

See other related P90X Review posts:

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