Shortcuts - Lower Body

I love Leslie’s walking workouts, and was hoping this rare non-walking Leslie workout would give me a strength option that I could use to do a complete Leslie-only rotation. I have not in the past been too impressed with Leslie’s non-walking efforts---the walks are really her strength, no pun intended, and this set didn’t really change my mind in that regard. But if you are a devout Leslie fan and want to get some strength work in, this will do the job just fine.

This is all floor work. If you want squats and that sort of thing from Leslie, I think her Fat-Burner and Walk Strong workouts are the only places to get that. Leslie also structures this a little differently than in the companion Upper Body workout, doing two rounds of each exercise instead of one. But as in that routine, she does not count reps. She wears ankle weights and encourages you to add weight instead of reps if you want a greater challenge.

As in the upper body workout, there is a five-minute walk to warm-up, then it’s straight to the floor. There are three little sections. In the first, you do a side leg lift on one leg, then tuck it back and do an inner thigh lift with the leg that had been underneath. You do a second set of each, then flip over and do the other side.

Following the leg lifts, you move to hands and knees and do a lift out, a lift up, and quad extension. This is repeated on the other side, and then each side gets a second set. Finally, you flip onto the back and do 2 quick and short sets of quad extensions that way. There is a short stretch, and then that’s it.

I loved the first half of the routine---the pace was slow and careful and refreshing. But I hate hands and knees work. I find it very uncomfortable. And I would have been happy to replace some of the quad work with some standing leg work instead---a set of lunges or dips or something, maybe. I don’t find floor work as effective as standing work.

If you already feel like you get a lot of standing work in Leslie’s other tapes, this could be a nice cross-training option. Or if you just enjoy floor work, this would be a nice add-on. I did not find it exhausting or draining and it left me feeling refreshed. But I do prefer standing work, so I suspect I won’t use this one as much.