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Fitness Training For Functional Aging with Jessica Smith contains two workouts.   DVD Menu Introduction ABC Routine (running time 29:46) Functional Strength (running time 29:30) End Credits Play All  

Barre Fitness with Jessica Smith contains three 20-minute barre theme workouts. The DVD menu Cardio Ballet Barre Burn Floor Barre Play All Jessica is the only cast member.  There is an outdoor setting for each of the workout.  All the sessions are set to up tempo music. In Cardio Ballet , Jessica uses ballerina movements to get the heart rate up. There is a lot of pulsing and jumping.  Jessica does show various intensity levels throughout the workout so that you can work at your own intensity level. Barre Burn is your toning barre workout. In this workout, Jessica uses a chair and a pair of light hand weights.  This is a circuit style workout in that you perform a series of moves back to back; repeat and then move on to another series of exercises which you perform back to back. Floor Burn uses a mat and a ball. If you don't have a ball, you can use a pillow.  Jessica performs a series of move for the abs, low back, arms, and legs.  C...

Disc 2 of Jessica Smith's Walk Strong 3 8-Week Program is Cardio Cross Train. This DVD has three workouts. Cardio Step Jam Boogie I.T. Cardio Hit! Cardio Step Jam uses a mini/high step.  This is optional.  This workout is essentially a steady state workout. If you use the step, that will increase the intensity.  Jessica takes you through various patterns up, over and around the step.  The moves are a cross between dance and athletic. The choreography is simple and very easy to follow.  There is some single leg work and a little bit of plyo work. Boogie I.T.(Interval Training) is your higher intensity workout and contains many level changes throughout the workout.  You are walking and/or jogging in parts of the workout  There are coordination style drills and there is a mixture of athletic and dance style moves.  There are intervals where you take  it up a notch. The intervals are: Knee to Elbow Hops Skater Skiers 180 degree t...

Disc 3 Sculpt of Jessica Smith's contains three 30-minute workouts:  Metabolic Conditioning, Cardio Interval Sculpt, and Barre Sculpt.  These workouts are mostly focused on sculpting but there is a cardio factor to each workout. Metabolic Conditioning uses a mini-step (also called a high step), two to three set of dumbbells, a mat and a towel.  The step is optional.  In this workout, Jessica introduces each move slowly and then picks up the pace for the latter reps. The ending stretch is just over 2 minutes. Cardio Interval Sculpt uses a mat and dumbbells.  This workout contains 30-second cardio intervals.  Typically you are doing three compound or multi-joint exercises followed by a cardio interval.  The ending stretch in this workout is around one minute and thirty-five seconds. Barre Sculpt uses a chair, mat, and a set of dumbbells and an optional ball.  This workout is also performed barefoot.  There are several distinct se...

Disc 1 of Jessica Smith's Walk Strong: The 6 Week Total Transformation System includes a Welcome to the Program and two cardio workouts. Workout 1 is Cardio Party and along with Jessica there are six cast members.   Jessica states that some of the cast members are community members.  Cardio Party is a steady state cardio workouts with more of a dance flair.  There is a variety of musical rhythms and genres.  Jessica does quite a bit of clapping in this workout. Jessica always takes you back to the base move of walking in place. She then tells you what you are going to do and then you do it. This workout does not really have a warm up but it does have a cool down stretch. Interval Mix is a high energy walking and functional strength (in the form of planks) workout.  In Interval Mix, Jessica takes you through four interval rounds.  Within each round, Jessica increases the intensity as she progresses through the round. Starting with a power walk,...

  Barre Break Thru is Jennifer Galardi's follow on workout to Ballet Body.  In Barre Break Thru, Jen takes you through a 69 minute total body workout.  The workout does includes an advance and beginner exercise modifier. The workout is also performed barefoot. The DVD offers the following menu options : Intro Play All Warm Up Cardio Barre:  Tone, Strengthen, Stretch, Lengthen! The workout starts with a seven minute warm up.  After the warm up, you move into the cardio segment which is around 15 minutes. This section includes lots of plies, kicks, lunges, and leaps. You also use your balance quite a bit in this segment. The Barre segment is 46 minutes length and it is divided into three segments. A standing barre segment, a mat segment, and an extended stretch segment.  The barre segment is about 13 minutes and include lower body and triceps work. The mat segment includes a biceps, core, plank and glute work and is around 15 minutes in length....

Tracy Anderson Mat Workout DVD is a 59 minute workout.  The DVD offers the following menu options: Play Chapters      Mat Intro      Mat Routine      Gwyneth Interview - MAT      Tracy Main Interview      Back to Man In the MAT routine, Tracy takes you through a series of movements that work the legs. butt, arms, and abdominals.  Tracy hits the legs twice. First in a barre/chair sequence and later in the workout in a floor mat sequence. Like most of Tracy's workouts, the leg and butt segments are easy to follow because they are more structured and Tracy cues them very well. The arms and standing abs segments are less easy to follow because the cuing is not as precise or it is non-existent.  Essentially you are just following along. There is a floor abs segment that Tracy cues well enough so that you can do the exercises as she does them. The workout does con...

Perfect Design Series Level 3 is a 51 minute workout that uses a chair for the butt/leg segment of the workout. Following the warm up, Tracy takes you through an intense glute/leg workout were you are doing multi-component exercises for a high number of repetitions.  In many cases, you are working through several planes and a range of motion as you extend, bend and sweep through the various exercise. During the warm up segment you are simply following along. The cuing instruction for the leg/glutes exercise is very precise and detailed. This segment is about 35 minutes of the workout.. Tracy starts out cuing the mat ab exercises but this turns into a follow along segment. This segment is roughly 5 minutes.  As usual in the Perfect Design Series, there is no cuing of the moves in the standing ab/arms segment although Tracy does give you instruction on the "intent of a move" as she goes through this segment which is roughly about 5 minutes. There is a very brief cool down ...

The second disc in Tracy Anderson Perfect Design Series is Level 2. Level 2 clocks in at just over 47 minutes.  In addition to a mat, this workout also uses a chair.  After a brief warm up, Tracy takes you into the glute segment in which you do a series of moves on the left lead (our left, Tracy does not mirror cue) and then you repeat the series again with the right lead.  Expect lots of reps per exercise. The next segment is the mat abdominal segment and Tracy moves through these exercises pretty quickly. The reps are significantly less than the glute segment and the transition between the exercises is very fast  Tracie does use the chair in the mat ab segment - mostly as something to work around. Next up is the standing ab and arm segment and like Level 1, Level 2 is free from. Tracy states during this segment that we "should get in tune with her cuing". The problem is that she does not cue this segment. You are just following along as best you can because it...

Total Body Balance is a workout DVD by Jessica Smith that features four 20-minute workouts. The DVD menu offers the following options:     Introduction     Play All     Cardio Flow - 20:57     Sole Sculpt - 22:07     Core Stretch - 23:32     Cardio Dance Sculpt - 20:43 All the workouts are performed barefoot.  Cardio Flow is set out doors.  This is a fusion workout that includes ballet, a bit of modern dance, and big movements. Along with Jessica, there is one other cast member that shows advanced progressions. Sole Sculpt   is your sculpting workout.  It also has an outdoor sets.  Jessica uses a set of 3lb weights. The other cast member (Asha) uses a pair of 5lb weights.  After a 4 minute warm up, Jessica takes you through a series of sculpting moves that include a lot of 4-limb movement. For almost every exercises you are using both the upper and lowe...

  Great Glutes is the latest lower body workout by Cathe.  If you do the bonus with the main workout, the workout clocks in at over 62 minutes.  Otherwise, the workout is around 55 minutes. Cathe breaks the workout roughly into five sections which are : Compound Legs/Glutes Glide Disc Legs/Glutes Stability Ball Legs/Glutes Floor Work Bonus Chair Legs/Glutes The workout moves from one exercise to the next with breaks in between as Cathe talks to either give you time to relax or to set up the next set or exercise. The music in Great Glutes is all instrumental.  This was nice compared to some of the other workouts with the strange vocals. There is a mixture of dumbbell weight and body weight exercises. Other equipment used is the stability ball, glide disc, mat and chair. There are 8 premixes: Great Glutes Extreme (62:36) No Stability Ball (55:40) No Glide Discs (54:21) No Floor Work (53:05) Timesaver #1 No Floor Work (45:43) Timesaver#2 No Glide ...

Xtend Barre Lean & Chiseled is a 55 minute "dance and Pilates inspired workout". The workout is led by Andrea Rogers. Along with Andrea, there are two cast members - one who demonstrates beginner modification moves and one who demonstrates more advance moves. The workout is broken up into the following sections: Warm Up (6 min) Upper Body (11 min) Barre (23 min) Core (10 min) Cool Down (5 min) In the Upper Body section, Andrea uses 1 lbs weights. The Barre Section is the lower body section and Andrea uses a chair in place of a ballet barre. For the Core section as Mat is used. The set has a really clean and minimalistic look. The music is good. The workout isn't necessarily set to the music but the music has more than just a background feel to me. For the most part the music sounds like something you would hear in a "hip" clothing store. This type of workout is always challenging for me; and this workout was no different. I really felt my muscles fati...

The total Zumba Ripped workout is 60 minutes, but the workout is divided into two 30 minute parts. The first part Zumba Toning is led by Jani Roberts, Beto Perez and Pamela Soccoro. They take turns teaching certain parts of the workout. I like the new instructors and thought they did a good job with their cuing and their energy. This part of the workout uses the Zumba Toning sticks. The toning sticks that come with the workouts are 1 1/2lbs. You can purchase the 2 1/2 lbs at the Zumba website. The 2 1/2lbs sticks are $24.95. I thought about getting them but then shipping and handling would have been $8.50. So I passed. I didn't really care for the sticks as a toning tool but they do add a bit of pizazz to the routine. They rattle. The breakdown for Zumba Toning : Nunca Me Viste - Warm Up - Latin Disco Get Your Sticks - House (Biceps and Abs) La Luz Del Flow - Merengue/Hip Hop (Legs, Shoulders, and Back) Te Estoy Amando - Cumbia Salsa (Back) Con Movimiento - Reggaeton (Abs, Chest...