Dressed Up Drills

This DVD contains 83 minutes of cardio & bodyweight work and contains a ton of premixes so you can do exactly the workout for you on any given day. Kristen works out with 2 background exercisers in a gym class set. They all work out at a different intensity so you can get just the right workout you need. DVD contains a warmup & cooldown.

Cardio Exercises: knee pull, repeater knee, jog, side leap, mogul hops, shuffle floor touches, side step knee hops, glute raises, power jacks, diagonal hops, power knee punches, kick & punch, soccer drills, 1/4 turn squat hops, side scissor jacks &lunges, skater, and squat hops.

Bodyweight Exercises: balance stick to side leg raise, single leg walk out planks, chair roll backs & side leg extensions, burpee, heel click plank jacks, unge & kick, crunch to side lying leg extensions, crouching hop to walk out planks, low back ankle grabs, double crunch leg extensions, plank knee pull & kick. This is a unique & functional bodyweight workout.

I rate this a high intermediate routine that is easy to follow along to. Each athletic style drill builds up in intensity and is combined to a "dressed up drill." Easy to follow combos, so many premixes, and no wasted time, make this a must-have DVD in anyones library. I know I will get a ton of use out of this dvd, use it for cardio only, bodyweight only, or any combo thereof. Kristen provides lots of motivation and form pointers. I received this dvd to review.

lindseylu

I thought I'd try a different kind of workout (for me from the usual Cathe) and bought this one on a whim from Mary's sale. It was definitely a nice surprise after being repeatedly disappointed in the past with new releases of other instructors. The music is by Move-Ya! and fits the moves and beat pretty good. The set is very bright and cheery and Kristin has 2 backgrounders. There is really A LOT of options on this dvd! There are 11 Premixes for "Just the Drills" and Bodyweight segments and combos of each in shorter variations. There are 14 Premixes of the "Dressed up" drills (adding new layers to the choreography) and Bodyweight segments and combos of each in shorter variations. There is also a Mix/Match option to create your own workout but after completing the first chosen segment, it will take you back to the main menu. There is also a music on/off option.

Today I did the first 3 cardio segments and the first 2 bodyweight segments which equaled 54 min. The choreography is pretty basic drills, but Kristin adds layers to them to make this a really fun hi/lo workout. Even I didn't have trouble catching on to the choreography, being a choreography-challenged person. :) The bodyweight workouts (or core conditioning workouts which Kristin refers to), use a yoga mat and includes lots of balance work. Lindseylu8 (previous reviewer) did a great job specifying the moves so I won't mention those. Some of the moves reminded me of Michelle's 360 workouts or PIYO and are excellent balance challenges. I mean, LOTS of balance challenges!

I don't know if I found this super fun because 1) I've been missing hi/lo workouts with choreography, 2) there just isn't enough of these type workouts out there anymore, 3) my hip issue has made my usual Cathe's seem hard right now, or 3) just needed some new material to get my mind off my current hip limitations or out of a summer funk. This hit all the above and I had a blast this morning! I was even more pleasantly surprised my HRM showed a 335 calorie burn in the 54 min.!

I thought sure I'd have to put this one on my trade list or worse, send it back to Mary, but I'm happy to report it'll stay in my workout collection (for now)!

Instructor Comments:
Kristin was a new-to-me instructor whom I found to be very upbeat and cheery (but not TOO cheery)! You know what I mean. ;) There are two backgrounders with one doing the higher impact moves and the other a low impact modifier. With my present hip issues, I mostly followed the low impact modifier and really appreciated an ADVANCED modifier of the moves. So many times these are modifiers doing LAME moves...not so in this case and she works hard! Love her! There were a few times I got so 'into' the moves that I found myself following Kristin and doing some higher impact moves...well, it was FUN! I also found myself doing a few low impact Cathe-type moves in place of the jumping jack-type moves....i.e. squat digs which always get my HR up. :) I feel there were places Kristin could have cued a little better (especially in the bodyweight segments when you're not looking directly at the TV), but for the most part she does a great job and is very motivating to keep going.

AnMrsDe