Of all the videos in the CrossTrain series, I think this one may be my favorite. You start with a short low-impact floor section (great for "easing yourself into it" at 4 am) and then follow up with an also-short high-impact floor section. Then you get to the highlight of the workout, which is 6 circuits – 3 step, and 3 step-kickbox. Each of these is about 1 minute, immediately followed by another minute or so of power moves or intervals. Then you switch to leg work – lunges, squats, etc. This style of circuit appeals to me so much more than doing compound moves for the strength circuit, which seems to be the norm. By compound moves, I mean working your upper and lower body at the same time. I dislike that a lot. In this workout, the strength work is legs only, so you can concentrate on the legs and not have to worry about keeping your arms going at the same time.

After all that, you do 10 minutes of back work, which seems really short even though you do 3 sets of everything. It may be short, but it’s very satisfying and I do know I’ve worked my back muscles. Finally, there is a fairly long abs/core section which I didn’t time, but I think it’s around 15 minutes. There is some killer plank work here! You hold the poses for infinity, or so it seems. I always have to rest during this section. It amazes me that the ladies in the video can actually do this without breaking. The planks are followed by traditional ab work, and a nice stretch at the end.

This one is a little longer than the other videos in the series, clocking in at a full hour. I really enjoy this workout, and it gets an A+ in my book.

Annie S.