I liked it -- the leader, Jennifer Galardi, has a nice energy. She's pleasant but not overly perky and she doesn't seem to mess up her counting (a complaint I have with Denise Austin, who is also annoyingly perky). Then again, Jennifer doesn't do more than about 4 reps at a time, which is nice; she mixes the moves together, so nothing is going on "for the count of 8." The music worked for me, it wasn't popular dance music, but had a nice beat. The DVD is broken into 5 10 minute segments, each with it's own short cool-down, so you can mix and match or do the whole thing. This is key for me because my exercise time varies. The first 3 workouts are all aerobics, so it makes a nice 30 minute workout but even if I stopped after the second, I'd feel like I got some good exercise.
Her routines weren't too complicated for someone used to doing aerobics and she builds them together well, I think.
The last 2 workouts are butt/thigh and abs. I like these because they are all done standing up. I don't like doing floor work on all fours because it hurts my wrists and I feel like my balance is off (maybe that's why my wrists hurt). I had done some butt buster tape which was mostly on all fours and it didn't work for me. Anyway, I like the TMS butt/thigh work. I only did half the ab workout, I just couldn't get the moves down and I am the queen of crunches, anyway, so I didn't feel I needed this tape for abs.
I liked the women on the video, they were young and cute and I liked the outfits -- they changed at least for the first four segments, I really don't remember what they were wearing for abs. The first three aerobics outfits were super cute -- hey, if that keeps me going, so what? That other butt workout video I mentioned had the sluttiest looking workout girls I'd seen, plus, I couldn't look at their chests without feeling for them, they did not have the support they needed and they all looked like they had been surgically augmented. Anyway, that tape was some man's workout program, so go figure that his workout girls looked like reformed porn stars. Actually, being a "workout tape" was probably a cover -- slutty looking girls with big hair, huge chests, and unsupportive clothing on all fours, I was suspicious.
The main thing I did not like about this video was the "fat blasting" banners before each section. The aerobics sections are "simple slimmer," "calorie meltdown," and "fat burning party" and I think each time it had the little "fat blasting" logo. One of my daughters asked me, "Mommy, do you want to burn fat?" I just said "no, but some people might want to." My big thing is to always tell my kids that I like to exercise because it makes me feel healthy and strong and good about myself. ***
I liked this video, I may just buy myself a copy and skip the bellydancing videos. But maybe I should try them to see.
*** WaPo had an article in its Health section about watching what we say about what we eat around our daughters -- it didn't strike me as any news flash, but I enjoyed reading it.
http://www.washingtonpost.
