Mindy Mylrea, the queen of functional fitness, presents three 15-minute ab workouts on this DVD. The first one uses a medicine ball, the second uses a balance ball, and the third uses your own bodyweight. There is also a bonus 10-minute gliding disk segment.

This is an advanced DVD, but don’t be scared off if you’re at the intermediate level. One of the background exercisers, Susie, demonstrates modifications.

Medicine ball workout: You start this workout by tossing the ball from hand to hand at waist height, then raising your arms higher as you keep tossing the ball from hand to hand. I wouldn’t have thought of this as ab training, but as Mindy points out, “You’ll notice that your abs are firing”. Then you pass the medicine ball under each leg in a figure-eight pattern (it’s handy to have a small medicine ball for this bit) then circle it around your body. Then you move to the floor where you repeat the same movements. As Mindy points out, “When you take your legs out of the equation, your abs fire a little bit more”. This is lots of fun — it feels more like playing with a friend than doing an ab workout. This is followed by some Pilates-inspired moves and crunches using the ball for added resistance. Then you do split push-ups with one hand on the medicine ball, followed by pushups and planks with both hands on the ball. This is tough!

Balance ball workout: This segment is the most challenging — and the funniest. If you like seeing super-fit people falling off their balance balls, you’ll enjoy this workout! It starts off with planks and pushups with both hands on the ball, then moves to one-legged planks with your elbows on the ball. A reprieve follows with opposite arm and leg lifts, and reverse crunches on the ball. Then things get really tough with pushups and pikes with one leg on the ball and the other in the air. Then there are long lever exchanges where you lie on your back with the ball held between your feet and crunch up to transfer the ball to your hands, roll ups using the ball for resistance, and side planks with the ball clutched between your feet as you raise your arm up in the air then tuck it under your body. At this point Mindy falls over. “I just did that to show you what it would look like!” she laughs. This is followed by some very tricky balance work on the ball, as Mindy falls off once again. “Just practice that on your own!” she says.

Bodyweight workout: This workout starts with a series of killer crunches followed by some Pilates-inspired moves. This is followed by Mindy’s own variations of side planks, planks and pushups — she sure has a way of "toughening up" traditional exercises! After all this, you get a well-deserved stretch.

Ratings out of five:
Production values ****
Workout design *****
Instruction *****
Fun factor *****
Music ***
Meets expectations *****
Overall ****½

Instructor Comments:
Mindy is an engaging, inspirational instructor who always seems to be having a blast.

RedPanda