Burn at the Barre The Advanced Workout

Title: Burn at the Barre The Advanced Workout

Instructor: Andromeda Trumbull

Time: 32 Minutes

Level of Difficulty: Intermediate

DVD menu: Play workout

Production quality: average

Equipment used: Playground ball, band (loop band), and barre

A little about me: lately I have dappled in barre as my main strengthening exercises, and have gone crazy trying out new barre (and barre style) workouts, supplementing with Tonique and Dream Body for cardio. I have so far tried Booty Barre, Ballet Physique, Turbo Barre (Cathe), and similar workouts like Tracey Anderson Omnicentric and Callanetics, and consider myself to be an advanced exerciser. I have been going lighter on the intensity on barre days (but still expect a challenge) and going more intense on my cardio (DB/Tonique/running) days. So my goal is to find barre workouts that really burn out the muscles, especially with those little pulses and squeezes that barre work is known for.

For an "advanced" workout I did not find BATB-AW to be a challenge. While I enjoyed many of the exercises, it is the number of reps (read: lack thereof) that made this workout disappointingly easier than it could have been. Right when I started to feel a burn in my muscles, Andromeda would switch and go to the other side. We were constantly switching sides and not working any muscle to fatigue. She introduced the workout as an "express workout," and at only 32 minutes it is certainly short and to the point, but any "advanced" work was compromised by making each set much shorter than it could have been. She also didn't use the word "express" in the DVD title and I did not immediately notice upon purchasing that the workout was only 30 minutes when I was expecting a full length workout.

She starts with a brief dancey warm up (2-3 minutes), then moves on to the barre for a series of leg lifts, then grab the playground ball for inner thigh squeezes and one leg squats, lose ball and put loop band around lower thighs (right above the knee) for various leg pulses to the side and back, with a bent leg then a long leg. Then lose the band for some long leg pulses (sort of in a warrior 3 pose). All of these exercises were effective but she just did not do enough reps of anything to make them worthwhile. Next she did pushups and tricep pushups off the barre (I was using the back of my sofa so I did pushups on the floor, which I would recommend unless you have a very sturdy barre), then down to the floor for a brief plank set with one leg in passe for downward dog/oblique twists (again not very many reps, about 5 per side). She interspersed some very brief stretches between the standing work. Finish with abs, first use no props for a couple of pilates style exercises, then grab the ball for c-curve work with the ball beneath your lower back (I actually found these to be very challenging), and finish with the band for some bridge work with legs in and out to target the glutes again. Then a brief (2 minute or so) stretch.

While I really appreciated the variety of exercises and that there was no real down time between exercises, she could have made it a longer workout - 45 minutes at least - to ADD MORE REPS and make it a more advanced workout, or, eliminated a few exercises but really burn out the muscles with more reps on fewer exercises. The time flew by but I didn't really feel much of any fatigue in my muscles at all. I'll still keep the workout for a light day for its fun factor, but it will not be a go-to for me for a real challenging workout where your muscles are shaking from fatigue. I would rate the workout as intermediate. I am good at going deep into the moves and really trying to get the most out of each move to make it more intense, but even doing this there just wasn't enough reps to challenge me. But there wasn't really enough form instruction to hand it to beginner exercisers either. So it is just a less intense barre workout for a light day or one still trying to build muscle endurance. For these reasons this would be my least favorite barre workout so far (I found this workout to be easier than any of the aforementioned workouts, for reference). I liked the workout enough to revisit it after pre-fatiguing my legs, or for a light day.