Low Impact Circuit

Cathe Friedrich
Year Released: 2006

Categories: Circuit Training (cardio and weights)


My first time with this workout, I was a little disappointed. When it was first released I was still enjoying more complex choreography, and I thought this was a little too simple for me. I had been hoping for a Cardio & Weight 2, which I love and this was not that. The step sections are not as interesting and the strength sections are not as organized. I always felt like C&W provided a decent short upper body workout, but LIC does not quite fit that bill. It is also less intense overall than C&W.

However, I kept the workout, and I now really like it. I don't do step as often now and I can enjoy a less complex step workout. Also, although I won’t really use the strength sections of this workout as a stand alone upper body workout, I do appreciate its functional fitness feel. It is a nice workout that gets a little bit of everything in there: cardio, interval blast (although not very intense), leg work that isn’t super hard but keeps the heart going, and some interesting upper body moves with the band. It is a nice workout for me when I am low on energy, but want to get a long workout in that includes cardio and some strength work including abs.

This workout was part of Cathe’s post-injury and very delayed series where she ended up making extra long workouts with bonuses, because she felt so bad for taking so long. The bonus on this workout is a 4th step combo and 4th blast. This is nice, because it gives the option for a step only premix with all 4 combos and makes the workout a little longer. There are good options for picking parts of the workout. Although the upper body work is not enough for me on its own, it can be combined with some other Cathe upper body short premixes for a nice workout.

The music is not bad, except for the Girls Just Want to Have Fun with a Tuba song, which is annoying. I generally like vocals when doing step so liked this soundtrack pretty well. Not the best of any Cathe workout, but better than a lot of the generic music on some workouts.

Lisa C

05/17/2010