Sara Kooperman
The instructor: I admire Sara Kooperman and her dedication to the field of
fitness, particularly in training instructors and enhancing their skills. She
is very knowledgeable and has commitment and passion about fitness. Her
communication skills are excellent and she has a great smile that is very
engaging. I have other videos with Sara and she particularly shines in strength
training videos. Her video Strong Women: The Elegance of Power is one of the
toughest workouts I've done and it is fun to boot.
Her video Step Combat is not her best. From an instructor's perspective the
combinations are fine and she has some interesting moves that work well
together. For the most part, the choreography is fun, but she does have some
moves than can be tricky and awkward. I wrote the combinations down and with
some modifications though, they have worked fine for me. The instruction on the
video drags on for too long and may frustrate any instructor with some
experience. She is too repetitive with the same move. After 2-3 times of
performing a part of the combo, you have it and are itching to move on. As for
a workout, there are several mistakes in the video (the background exerciser
trips on the step at one point trying to accomplish a tricky move) and Sara
loses track and screws up the routine at another time. Some of the moves did
not flow well and were uncomfortable. I am careful with moves that require a
lot of turning on the step where a torque of the knee is possible. The music
was too slow and Sara went over the breakdown too much. Since this video is
geared for instructors I wish she could have put more combinations in and taught
them at a faster pace.
If you are looking at this workout to do at home, I think you are better served
by Becky Chamberlain's CIA step kickboxing video. I enjoyed many of the moves
Sara showed, and how they progressed, but this tape is not up to speed with the
rest of her videos.
Janet O'Neil
10/11/00