I just have to add my two cents to these reviews. I think this tape is great for someone who is at an intermediate to advanced level of cardiovascular fitness but is new to step, or for someone who is new to Kari and wants to "audition" her. But it's not, in my opinion, for someone who's looking for a video that will grow with her. You can up the height of your step and add power to increase intensity, but you can't change the fact that most of this video is just really basic stepping and will get pretty boring pretty soon. There's very little traveling, very little turning, and no TIFTing. I found myself looking at the clock, and the workout, including warm-up, is only 30 minutes! The choreography does get more complicated towards the end of the workout, but even then it's only moderate, if that. I also found that some of the steps were backwards from the way I'm used to doing them. For instance, she has you do repeaters at the corners of the step, lifting your *inside* knee. This tripped me up several times. Ditto with the knee-ups that she has you travel along the bench.

Kari's cueing is just... well, weird. For instance, she's really careful in the beginning to explain exactly what a basic step is, and she has you do several at half-time. But by the end of the video she's having you do *much* more complicated steps (after all, nothing's less complicated than a basic, right? hence the name) without breaking them down at all. I was fine with this, because I already knew the moves, but I thought it was weird.

I thought the ab section was great and will hold on to the tape if only for that reason. I watched the "Deep Thoughts" speech, just out of curiosity, and personally I didn't get anything out of it, but some people might. I just wish they wouldn't hype it so much on the box, where they call it a "special bonus section."

I really think this is a good tape for advanced beginners or for people who really don't like to learn a lot of choreography. But it's not for the advanced stepper who wants moderate to complex choreography from the get-go.

Anne S.