10 Minute Solution

[Guest guest]

Today I was going to do the walking video BUT... I can't find it!!! It is a netflix rental too so I HAVE to find it! My house is not very cluttered, not even hardly cluttered really so I'm really frustrated that I can't find it! I'm hoping it didn't get thrown out accidentally! Sigh... will do it when I find it at this point. I'm not giving up yet.

So, instead of that, today I did 10 Minute Solution. I don't know if this is the first one but it is a bunch of different workouts, no particular theme, and is just called "10 Minute Solution." Dozois is in it but she just introduces herself as "" and her name doesn't appear on the case.

I did all 5 workouts on it. Here's what they are and a quick commentary on them.

Boot Camp: cardio and weight circuit. Very fast moving. Cardio was mostly simple though at least one part got me mixed up. She suggests using 3-8 lb. weights and I decided to try 8s. They were just right and really upped my exertion and calorie burn. Not anything really exciting, no compound strength moves, but a solid workout.

Pilates: very tough. She's got the abs engaged for the entire 10 minutes. My neck was not happy with it at all so I had to put at least one hand on my head for some things and had to put my head down on the mat a few times. I haven't done a lot of pilates and haven't done any in quite a while so I couldn't remember how to do a lot of things. She does not discuss form at all either so I didn't really enjoy this workout but tried my best anyway. Lots of breath work in beginning and emphasized throughout.

Ballet: she uses a chair as a barre. It is a leg strengthening workout, no cardio, though the arms get stretched out in dancer poses. I am almost completely unfamiliar with ballet and felt like a hippo on rollerskates trying to do this. I checked this DVD out from the library primarily because I wanted to try a ballet workout. I don't think it was difficult but because she's trying to pack as much as possible into 10 minutes, I felt like it moved a little fast. If I were familiar with the movements it would have been fine though. She tells you how to do each movement and uses all the ballet terms for them but doesn't instruct on form at all. That would have been very helpful to me.

Kickboxing: I don't know a lot about kickboxing form but hers looked terrible to me. Her hands were more like claws extended toward her face than "ready position" and my DH, who took some martial arts classes with my son a few years ago (and again, is very far from an expert) thought her kicks didn't look great either. With that criticism I do have to say this was a good calorie burn and really got my heart rate up. I got a bit confused during some of the kicking combos especially because of the lack of instruction but with practice (and watching that part a few times too probably) I could probably do it.

Yoga: Very quiet, gentle practice. She doesn't use yoga terms much, there's not much focus on breath and her demeanor is incredibly quiet and calm (well-suited for yoga but not what I'm used to from her). It was okay. No modifications shown for beginners though she does mention them. Not bad, not great.

I listed them in the order they are in on the disc. Thankfully for 10 Minute Solution customize your workout format I was able to reorder them because pilates, ballet & yoga are all done without shoes (if you have ballet shoes you can use them for the ballet workout) and I didn't see any point to taking off my shoes for pilates and ballet, putting them back on for kickboxing and then taking them off again for yoga. I did the 3 shoeless workouts after the cardio ones.

Overall I liked this DVD but didn't love it. I'm not putting it on my wish list right now. I burned 250 calories doing all these plus I added on the 15 minute Energizing I practice from Yoga for Inflexible People (the yoga practice left me wanting more so I added this on). I liked that a lot too and I really liked the calorie burn from all of them together. My only problem with the 10 Minute Solution workouts was the lack of instruction on form. She teaches technique by demonstrating something (an uppercut punch for example) but doesn't tell you anything about not locking your elbows or anything else. On the pilates & ballet workouts I definitely could have used that and it wouldn't have hurt on the others either.

That's it for today, I'm thrilled to have gotten in what turned out to be a good calorie burning workout and am off to scrapbook (and eat M & Ms) soon!

Also, OT news: My boss called me yesterday to tell me she'd found a new leader for my meetings on Wednesdays and I can move to the one near my house!! I'm going to my usual location this coming week to say goodbye and then will start in the new location the following week. Saying goodbye is going to be hard. I've gotten to know some of these people really well and I'm going to miss them a lot but I've worked the new meeting before and I know it is a great group too. I'll save lots of money on gas and have lots more time added to my normally crazy Wednesdays too so it will be great!