lovefilm seem to be intent on sending me all the old bestsellers first.
Elle's workout is largely considered to be one of the highest grossing fitness videos of all time, and one of the triggers to kickstarting the whole 'fitness vid' industry.
And, quite frankly, you can see why. Who wouldn't want a body like 'The Body'? She stands there, all ten feet of her, with her lovely bronzed skin and beautifully arranged hair, and try as you might, you can't help but hate her a little bit for having 'good genes' as she calls it. I'm not normally a hatefilled person, but the minute she says 'I'll never have a body like my Personal Trainer, and she'll never have one like mine, even if we try as hard as possible' makes you want to give up hope and head to the nearest chippy.
So anyway, Elle splits the workout into three aerobic sections, punctuated by two toning and conditioning sections. It gets harder and harder, BELIEVE ME. The aerobics was fairly ok going, left you a bit breathless, but mixed with the toning section I felt everything. The other half reckoned (from his cosy spot on the sofa) that 'it doesn't look too hard'. And yeah, he's right. Elle makes it look easy. The cow.
By the time we got to the abs section at the end (why do they put abs at the end? Why? It hurts so bad!), I could barely lift my arms over my head. It's now two days later, and I still can't lift my arms over my head, But I can feel the result. My arms feel a lot more toned, probably due to the use of weights that Elle suggests you use during the workout.
She also suggests using a chair or bench but our dining chairs are too high for this workout, and they are normal size, so I reckon that you can do without for some excercises, and use the edge of your sofa for others.
There are no extras with the DVD due to the age of it, although there is a great outtake at the end when Elle and her trainer Karen Voight (who leads the whole thing) get soaked during their cool down excercise.
Made me feel better about the fact that I'll never look like Elle MacPherson. Now, back to the biscuits.
Score: 3.5. If you can deal with the pain for the first couple of weeks, you could get pretty toned. Lost a point due to the cardio being a bit weak, and because Elle occasionally comes out with a comment that makes you want to push through your telly.
Showing posts with label Abs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Abs. Show all posts
Sunday, 3 October 2010
Thursday, 2 September 2010
DVD #6 - Rosemary Conley's Fat Attack
You will need a pole. Seriously.
Rosemary reckons that the best way to attack fat is through aerobic exercise and muscle toning exercises. Which is fairly obvious to me, though we may have been a more clueless nation in the early 90's.
But this workout: it's hard. There is a countdown clock in each section so you know how much longer you've got left. Tell you what, when I saw almost 12 minutes pop up on screen at the start of the abs section, and 'when you're in love with a beautiful woman' kick in on the stereo, I wanted to kill Rosemary. I had toyed with these feeling during the first toning section when she had cracked out a pole and was squatting around it*.
The sections are tough going but not necessarily fast. I'm used to the Martine McCutcheon abs section which is an awful lot faster than this. Rosemary does explain each stretch or movement very clearly, so you won't get lost.
I did feel that Rosemary wasn't working as hard as her class. Maybe that's just me, but she did look like she was blagging it. There is an easy version demonstrated, as in most fitness DVD's, but Rosemary seemed to be doing something somewhere in between.
Also, she was always pushing. Even in the cool down routine, she was saying 'if you want a better stretch do blah.' Which is normally OK but I'm not sure that in a cool down you want to be pushing it further.
In the first of it's kind, Rosemary has included a circuit for men, but 'its also suitable for women'. She acquires four, probably unwilling, men and one of her ladies. She says all you need is 'a couple bottles of water and a rope', possibly and unwanted insight into Rosemary's almost healthy sex life...
Anyway, the cicuit has the usual warm up which is uncannily familiar to the normal warm up at the beginning, just with a couple more squats and marches.
And the circuit stations were absolutely hilarious. They had jumping jacks, sit ups, press ups, weight lifting, all to the sultry sound of Hot Chocolates 'You Sexy Thing'. Rosemary then explains the use of the rope, or basically, a line across the ground that you have to jump over. And because the guys go at their own pace, I was falling about laughing for most the time and couldn't join in. Especially when David, her chap doing the high impact stuff, obviously thought he wasn't on film and was clearly not working as hard as he should.
Rosemary then suggests 'rewinding' to repeat the circuit, before launching into the cooldown.
In summary: It's pretty decent, but I can't see the men folk taking it seriously.
Score: 3/5 - I suspect you could get pretty fit with this one, but Rosemary needs a new haircut.
*Some of her dancers were of course using chairs, demonstrating that the workout could be done whether or not you had a pole in close proximity.
Rosemary reckons that the best way to attack fat is through aerobic exercise and muscle toning exercises. Which is fairly obvious to me, though we may have been a more clueless nation in the early 90's.
But this workout: it's hard. There is a countdown clock in each section so you know how much longer you've got left. Tell you what, when I saw almost 12 minutes pop up on screen at the start of the abs section, and 'when you're in love with a beautiful woman' kick in on the stereo, I wanted to kill Rosemary. I had toyed with these feeling during the first toning section when she had cracked out a pole and was squatting around it*.
The sections are tough going but not necessarily fast. I'm used to the Martine McCutcheon abs section which is an awful lot faster than this. Rosemary does explain each stretch or movement very clearly, so you won't get lost.
I did feel that Rosemary wasn't working as hard as her class. Maybe that's just me, but she did look like she was blagging it. There is an easy version demonstrated, as in most fitness DVD's, but Rosemary seemed to be doing something somewhere in between.
Also, she was always pushing. Even in the cool down routine, she was saying 'if you want a better stretch do blah.' Which is normally OK but I'm not sure that in a cool down you want to be pushing it further.
In the first of it's kind, Rosemary has included a circuit for men, but 'its also suitable for women'. She acquires four, probably unwilling, men and one of her ladies. She says all you need is 'a couple bottles of water and a rope', possibly and unwanted insight into Rosemary's almost healthy sex life...
Anyway, the cicuit has the usual warm up which is uncannily familiar to the normal warm up at the beginning, just with a couple more squats and marches.
And the circuit stations were absolutely hilarious. They had jumping jacks, sit ups, press ups, weight lifting, all to the sultry sound of Hot Chocolates 'You Sexy Thing'. Rosemary then explains the use of the rope, or basically, a line across the ground that you have to jump over. And because the guys go at their own pace, I was falling about laughing for most the time and couldn't join in. Especially when David, her chap doing the high impact stuff, obviously thought he wasn't on film and was clearly not working as hard as he should.
Rosemary then suggests 'rewinding' to repeat the circuit, before launching into the cooldown.
In summary: It's pretty decent, but I can't see the men folk taking it seriously.
Score: 3/5 - I suspect you could get pretty fit with this one, but Rosemary needs a new haircut.
*Some of her dancers were of course using chairs, demonstrating that the workout could be done whether or not you had a pole in close proximity.
Wednesday, 14 July 2010
DVD #1 - Martine McCutcheon's Dance Body
I'm cheating here slightly - I own this DVD. My excuse? It was recommended by a friend. A friend who is very tiny and pretty slim already.
Now, I love Martine. I really do. She comes across in everything that she does as such a lovely person, and I honestly think that if I met her in real life she would be a great best mate. To be fair I think she would be everyone's best mate. And she is absolutely gorgeous to boot.
Martine did have one of those bigger to smaller transformations, and she lost a fair bit of weight, but in my opinion, I don't think she was that big to start with, and she certainly hasn't become one of the super skinny celebs that everyone worries about having eating problems.
In this DVD, she looks really happy and healthy, and, as the other half pointed out, she still has great boobs. Bonus points for Martine!
The DVD starts with an introduction to Martine and how she sees exercise, in short, the same reasons as to why people buy fitness DVD's and not gym memberships! Her workout is based on dance and pilates movement, and she has a choreographer alongside her who has helped her to create all of the moves.
So the workout gets going. And I have to say, the warm up and the cardio is pretty intense going for the first 15-20 minutes. Martine says after five minutes of cardio that of this is your first time, you should take a break there. Bloody hell I was grateful for that!
After the cardio, she moves onto upper and lower body toning, then stretching based on pilates, but at an accelerated pace. Ouch. Then, when you think that she can't possibly inflict any more pain, she does abs, right at the end. I did approximately 64 sit ups in less than 3 minutes. INSANE.
Martine does have several backing dancers/fit people and one of them does the easy moves, so if you are not as flexible as her then there is another way! Some of the stretches are crazily hard and if this is your first workout DVD then I wouldn't recommend going all the way with them.*
What I found slightly surprising was that Martine took a back seat and let her choreographer do all the instructing, whilst she sweated alongsside, clearly working just as hard as me at home. She looked fab and flexible, but you could clearly see some pain on her face at times, which I actually found heartening. I know I am slightly biased when it comes to Martine, but it is good to see a celeb in pain too!
The DVD also has nutritional advice in it, also from her choreographer. He advises that you can eat almost anything you want, as long as you either eat it at certain times of the day, or you only eat certain food groups together. For example, you can eat as much fruit as you like, but only before midday. and you can eat loads of carbs, but not with protein, as your stomach takes longer to break food group mixtures down and it slows metabolism. Whilst I can see where he is coming from, and I'm fairly sure it could potentially work, I also fail to see how it can possibly work in practice.
In Summary: Martine looks great, and is great in this DVD. There isn't as much dancing as you might like, but it is fast paced and you will feel the burn! Possibly not for first time DVDer's, and the nutrition advice is a little hard to follow, but I'm certain that if you did follow it 3 times a week like she advises, and even if you got creative and added weights to some of the stretches, you will see results!
Score: 3.5 out of 5
*I will be including pictures of me doing these workouts, however the ones from this workout were definitely NSFW.
Now, I love Martine. I really do. She comes across in everything that she does as such a lovely person, and I honestly think that if I met her in real life she would be a great best mate. To be fair I think she would be everyone's best mate. And she is absolutely gorgeous to boot.
Martine did have one of those bigger to smaller transformations, and she lost a fair bit of weight, but in my opinion, I don't think she was that big to start with, and she certainly hasn't become one of the super skinny celebs that everyone worries about having eating problems.
In this DVD, she looks really happy and healthy, and, as the other half pointed out, she still has great boobs. Bonus points for Martine!
The DVD starts with an introduction to Martine and how she sees exercise, in short, the same reasons as to why people buy fitness DVD's and not gym memberships! Her workout is based on dance and pilates movement, and she has a choreographer alongside her who has helped her to create all of the moves.
So the workout gets going. And I have to say, the warm up and the cardio is pretty intense going for the first 15-20 minutes. Martine says after five minutes of cardio that of this is your first time, you should take a break there. Bloody hell I was grateful for that!
After the cardio, she moves onto upper and lower body toning, then stretching based on pilates, but at an accelerated pace. Ouch. Then, when you think that she can't possibly inflict any more pain, she does abs, right at the end. I did approximately 64 sit ups in less than 3 minutes. INSANE.
Martine does have several backing dancers/fit people and one of them does the easy moves, so if you are not as flexible as her then there is another way! Some of the stretches are crazily hard and if this is your first workout DVD then I wouldn't recommend going all the way with them.*
What I found slightly surprising was that Martine took a back seat and let her choreographer do all the instructing, whilst she sweated alongsside, clearly working just as hard as me at home. She looked fab and flexible, but you could clearly see some pain on her face at times, which I actually found heartening. I know I am slightly biased when it comes to Martine, but it is good to see a celeb in pain too!
The DVD also has nutritional advice in it, also from her choreographer. He advises that you can eat almost anything you want, as long as you either eat it at certain times of the day, or you only eat certain food groups together. For example, you can eat as much fruit as you like, but only before midday. and you can eat loads of carbs, but not with protein, as your stomach takes longer to break food group mixtures down and it slows metabolism. Whilst I can see where he is coming from, and I'm fairly sure it could potentially work, I also fail to see how it can possibly work in practice.
In Summary: Martine looks great, and is great in this DVD. There isn't as much dancing as you might like, but it is fast paced and you will feel the burn! Possibly not for first time DVDer's, and the nutrition advice is a little hard to follow, but I'm certain that if you did follow it 3 times a week like she advises, and even if you got creative and added weights to some of the stretches, you will see results!
Score: 3.5 out of 5
*I will be including pictures of me doing these workouts, however the ones from this workout were definitely NSFW.
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