Early this morning, I turned on the TV and became fascinated by an infomercial promoting Tony Horton’s 10 Minute Workout. I really like the idea of exercising in 10 minute sessions because a short workout can be both effective and doable. After doing a bit of exploring, I discovered that the basic 10 minute workout can be purchased from both Horton’s Beach Body website and Amazon. If you are pressed for time and could benefit from short workouts, should you consider this purchase? Well, I did buy the basic plan thinking that it might help me squeeze some extra activity into my day. I’ll write another post after I’ve had the opportunity to try the workout, but here is my initial view of whether it’s appropriate for most exercisers.
I love the idea of squeezing 2 or 3 short workouts into those inevitable 10 minute periods between major projects, visits, cooking, etc. And the cost of the basic program at $79-$89 is around the cost of just one personal training session in the Chicago area. However, I have two concerns with the program. First, the exercises in the infomercial were mostly multi-joint exercises. Working out two groups of muscles simultaneously can be very efficient, but if you don’t have good body awareness it can be challenging to do safely and with good form. Second, all of the individuals demonstrating the exercises were able to do so with perfect body mechanics. What happens if your knees cave in because your glutes are weak, or your knee and lower leg roll in because you are flat footed? What happens if your shoulders are rounded from hours spent working on a computer? What happens to many is that instead of looking like the cover model on Men’s or Women’s Health in 8 weeks, they find themselves injured and visiting the physical therapist.
In years past, we were most likely to see physical compensations only in people over the age of 40. Nowadays, we see them in individuals of all ages (even teens) due to hours sitting at computers and overtraining in youth sports. All in all, if you don’t have really good body awareness or are completely free from mechanical compensations, you may want to get some personal training before starting a challenging exercise video program.
If you know that your body awareness is keen and your body mechanics are healthy, then the 10 Minute Workout might work for you. If you aren’t sure but want an effective and safe home workout, please look at my events tab under this website for my “Workout at Home” package. If you are interested and live within 10 miles of my home suburb of Wilmette, IL, I’ll be happy to work with you.
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