Jillian Michaels, America’s toughest trainer. That’s what they say anyway and I have to admit, she’s pretty tough. The 30 day shred program says you can lose up to 20 pounds in 30 days. I always take those claims with a grain of salt, I think weight loss is different for everyone depending on your body type and how much you have to lose.
This video has three different levels, from beginner to advanced, and they are all tough! Each workout is 20 minutes long with a warm up and a cool down. I thought the first level would be easy, I walk at least three miles every day so I figured I could do this. Let me tell you, it’s tough. Jillian has designed these workouts to keep you moving and to get your heart rate up. It works.
The program includes strength training, cardio and an ab workout. It’s all broken down, three minutes of strength, two minutes of cardio and one minute of abs and then you repeat it . This may only be twenty minutes but it will make you sweat and you will feel the burn in muscles you haven’t used in a while.
Through the workout Jillian gives modifications if you cannot do the full exercise. All you need to do this are hand weights and a mat if you are exercising on a hard surface. In the beginning I used soup cans for the weights because I hadn’t done any strength training in a while. You can progress through the levels at your own pace. I initially wanted to do each level for ten days and then move to the next so I could complete them all in 30 days. It didn’t work out and I think it’s better to let your body decide when to progress.
Initially I could only do the exercises in the first work out with soup cans, and then I progressed to weights. I let my body tell me when to move to another work out.
All in all, this is a good workout, in a short amount of time. It’s great for those of us with limited time. The only thing I think is missing is more stretching, other than that, it’s a good well rounded workout that will kick your butt into shape.