Men's Health Circuit Workout

It's a companion to The Men's Health Big Book of Exercises. I don't recall seeing it talked about before, but it's a fairly new DVD (2010).

I've been gravitating toward male-led workouts lately to take a break from the fussiness (and sometimes silliness) of some female instructors. It's sort of a combination of the two Belly Off! workouts from Men's Health. I enjoyed them, so I was curious as to whether Men's Health had more!

It is led by David Jack (from the Belly Off! workouts) and Jenn Widerstrom, which adds to the female-friendliness of the workout for me. There are no background exercisers.

Collage Video and Total Fitness DVDs don't carry it. I bought it basically sight unseen from the Men's Health website, since they don't have a clip of the workout (and I didn't think to look for one on YouTube):

https://shop.menshealth.com/dvds/the...rkout-dvd.html

The premise is that you do 3 rounds of eight 60-second circuits, with 20 seconds between circuits and 2 minutes rest after each round, which you can easily skip by pressing the Enter button on your remote. Here is a breakdown of the exercises:

Round 1
Goblet squats (hold a dumbbell by one end)
Mountain climbers/glute bridges
Two-handed dumbbell swings
T push-ups (push-ups with side planks, then holding on each side for 15 sec.)
"Movement sequence": jacks, high knees, lateral hops, skips
Single-arm lat rows
3-way lunges (front, back, side)
"Dumbbell hybrid": biceps curl, Romanian deadlift, clean & press
2-minute break

Round 2: The same as Round 1 but with the exercises done in a different order
2-minute break

Round 3: Same exercises in a different order, but with variations
"Movement sequence": jacks, high knees, lateral hops, skips
Goblet (or body weight) squats
Mountain climbers/glute bridges
Two-handed (or alternate hand) dumbbell swings
T push-ups (hold front plank on elbows)
Single-arm lat rows (or side/delt rows; they call it the "scarecrow position")
3-way lunges (add a hold or pulse to front, back, side)
"Dumbbell hybrid": biceps curl, Romanian deadlift, clean & press
"Bonus movement sequence": jacks, knee smashes on each side, burpees

My only complaint is that the warm-up (14 min) and cool-down (10 min) are too long for my taste, but I guess you can just do as much of either one as you want until you feel sufficiently warmed up/cooled down!

If you're looking for a no-nonsense, meat-and-potatoes workout, this might be right up your alley!

And David Jack is quite easy on the eyes, I might add...! :-D

Instructor Comments:
Friendly, encouraging, upbeat. The DVD is geared toward men (but female friendly), so there is no extraneous or silly commentary. They want you to work hard, and they let you know they're working hard with you.

Juliepie

Juliepie has done a great job of breaking this workout down. I did it for the first time Monday and really enjoyed it. I like the fact that it does NOT require a lot of equipment or a lot of room. Its an intense, no nonsense workout. When I noticed the warmup was 14 mn, I thought "crap" (I typically don't like long warmups) but I did the w/u anyway and I"m so glad I did. It's not the typical boring warm up so many workouts have. The warmup actually made sense to me, I didn't feel like I was doing a bunch of silly, unnessesary moves.

The music...I didn't really notice, it was more "background" noise which is fine IMO for this type of workout. I can seem me using this workout quite bit. I really like that each circuit is 10 mn sections, I see different ways to use this DVD, 10 mn circuit could be used as an add on or a finisher other workouts.

Instructor Comments:
Both instructors have calm, clear voices, they gave clear instructions before each circuit. No whooping, no silly comments. What few times I looked at the TV, both had very good form. I would certainly buy another workout by them

Connie B