FIRM Super Sculpting is a pretty darn good tape--what Bust & Butt was supposed to be but never was. And for ten dollars cheaper, nonetheless. It's all weight work with two to four sets per exercise at around 10 reps per set, without any FIRM-style compound exercises (which I actually kind of like), and no Oof, Jr. ball in sight. The FIRM shows their usual creativity in coming up with new ways to do familiar exercises, which yields great results at times (curtsy-dips) and could cause injury at others (seated barbell rows).

The routine breaks down as follows:

Led by Jennifer Carmen:

• Warm-up*
• Double seated lat rows, bicep curls, double seated lat rows with a twist, hammer curls
• Push-ups on the tall box
• Upright rows, clean & press, bicep curls (2 tri-sets)*
• Double seated lat rows, french press, tricep dips*
• Posterior delt flyes while leaning over tall box*
• Push-ups on the tall box*

• Squats with heels elevated on board, plie squats
• Hip raises with leg extended over box, using dowel and ankle weights
• Lunges, curtsy-dips, cross-lunges, & curtsy-dips*
• Leg press on tall box (includes pulsing reps), overhead press, leg press*

• Upright rows, clean & press, front delt raises, side raises (2 giant sets)
• Good mornings, seated underhand bent row (2 super-sets)*
• Posterior delt flyes and rhomboid pinches while leaning over tall box*
• Push-ups on tall box*
• Tricep dips
• One-arm lat rows
• Bicep curls with suppination at bottom and diagonal curls
• One-arm lat rows

• Dips
• Squats, lunges (2 super-sets)
• Squats, standing outer and inner thigh lifts with ankle weights & dowel (2 super-sets)*
• Ab work
• Stretch

Despite the lack of floor work, the workout hits the inner thighs and glutes pretty well. The key is to keep low on the new leg press pulses. Some of the video participants exaggerate the lift off the floor which take the work out of the glutes and into the quads. The pulsing during the leg presses, lunges, and dips blasts the leg muscles by keeping them contracted.

Safety Considerations (you knew they were coming): 1) With the lower reps, it is tempting to go super heavy on the weight. Although the speed is generally good for this, sometimes the exercise design + heavy weight + speed = too much torque on the joints, as in the case of twisting the dumbbells during bicep curls and double lat rows. 2) A couple of the exercises are pretty close to impossible. The push-ups on the tall box are really awkward on a Rubbermaid box, but it's easy enough to just do them on the floor. I'm not sure what the heck the FIRM was thinking with the bent-over barbell rows in a seated position, especially since the good mornings that they are paired with are done while standing. I just keep standing and go with the underhand grip, keeping Cathe Friedrich's form pointers in mind as I'm doing so. 3) The curtsy-dips work the leg muscles in a new and interesting way. One has to be careful, though, not to cross too far behind with the dipping leg and to keep the front knee and toe pointed in the same direction. Nancy Tucker does a wonderful job of showing good form here, but many of the background exercisers do not.

All in all, I very much enjoy this tape. I like the FIRM's high production values: original music, pretty sets, and nice outfits. Fortunately, I think this all any of us really expect from the FIRM (that and results!), rather than a completely safe workout with educational form pointers (such as we get from the wonderful Ms. Cathe Friedrich). The warm-up is very good, the ab work is just all right but creative, and the stretch at the end is a joke.Super Sculpting is very challenging, comparable in intensity to Tough Tape. It could easily be divided into two full-body workouts that are not identical, but that complement each other.

Should you buy this and Cardio Split I? The weight work in Cardio Split I is entirely from Super Sculpting, and only about half as much. Cardio Split I is about as close as the FIRM has come the past few years to producing a tape that has an even mix of aerobics and weight training, much like the Classics. If you honestly prefer an all-weights tape or prefer a 50/50 split, there would be no need to own both. I don't think there's any advantage to be gained with the separation of upper and lower body exercises in Cardio Split I. There simply aren't enough repetitions to warrant spliting the upper and lower body workouts into two separate days.

Instructor Comments:

Gretchen