Tighter Assets Weight Loss

I had mixed feelings about this workout. On the plus, it has some really nice lower body work in it, and I have always liked Tamilee. On the minus, it claims to be a 'total-body' workout and I found the upper body work decidedly skimpy. And the music was lifted straight from one of Tamilee's earlier workouts.

Tamilee dives straight into the workout with no warm-up, beginning with a leg series working the right side. This sequence includes side squats, leg lifts, knee ups, plies and other simple moves. She sticks with each exercise long enough hat I was feeling it, but not so long that my knees complained. The time also went by very quickly.

Following this, Tamilee takes a break for some upper body work. I thought this section was very weak. There were four exercises done for 2 sets of 8 reps each. I do not see how this would tone anything if it was the sole upper body weight work someone was doing. I understand she was trying to break up the upper body work, but I do not think this section was at all useful. I think you could easily substitute ab work here instead.

The workout concludes by repeating the earlier lower body work on the other leg, doing another useless upper body section, and finishing with some ab work. The well-produced dvd also has a bonus 10-minute ab workout, trailers for other Tamilee tapes, a music-only option and a nutrition guide.

A real beginner would find the lower body work disproportionately difficult compared to the basic upper body work, so I think this tape would be best suited for an intermediate exerciser who wants a short and sweet non-weighted lower body routine. The time flies by quickly and if you are prepared to skip the upper body sections or sub in your ab work, you can be in and out in about 25 minutes. I wish the bonus workout had been an upper body option to make this tape a little more complete. This tape is an okay lower body routine, I am just not really sure where it fits into my usual rotation.

This is a 30 minutes toning workout that could also be considered cardio or maybe circuit, because the leg portions may get your heart rate into your aerobic zone.

The lower body is done with a step and no weights, and it was actually pretty effective. There were a lot of squats and repeated steps onto the step, with some balancing work for the core thrown in. I like lifting heavier weights, but I do enjoy this type of workout also. It was different and I thought it was well designed. You spend about 7 or 8 minutes working one side, then do upper body, then repeat on the other leg before moving on to more upper body. I used an 8" step instead of my usual 6" and I kept my heart rate up during this section, while getting a good burn in my legs.

The upper body section left a lot to be desired, however. It was very short, and only used 4 exercises: Bicep Curls, Overhead Press, Read Delt Flies, and Upright Rows. This is repeated 2 times in the first upper body section and then repeated 2 more times in the second upper body section. I was bothered enough by the fact that it was mostly focused on shoulders, but the repeating it 4 times, really put me over the edge.

The ab work was a short 4 minutes but pretty effective. On the DVD version the Tighter Assets 10 Minute Abs, which was released as its own video, is included as a bonus. That portion really focuses on the obliques, and I really felt them the next day.

If you could be satisfied with a different type of leg workout with no weights and some ab work, then I would recommend this video. If you need a total upper body workout though, this will probably not satisfy.

One more note on the DVD version. There is an almost 2 minute introduction to the video which cannot be skipped. This is very annoying to me, because if I were to keep this workout, I would want to reach for it when I was pressed for time. Otherwise, the DVD is well designed with good chaptering and menus.