Catherine asks me to post about the “insanity” workouts that are heavily advertised on satellite tv, and what did i think of them?
Here’s my thoughts based on what i have heard off others doing it, and what i have seen in the advertisements.
The people i know that have been through it are based into two camps i find.
Camp one is the minority in terms of numbers, but they say that it works well for them, but they are usually extremely fit people to begin with and usually involved heavily in sports. They do say though that they only do it 3 times a week maximum, because doing the 6 times a week schedule as recommended would “kill them”.
Camp two i find have tried it, enjoyed parts of it, but a large percentage of it they either cannot do, or have got injured attempting some of the movements. They find the schedule impossble at times to keep up with, and are often too sore the next day to keep up with the next workouts.
Both camps found that it remained part of their workout programme for a small amount of time, and the dvd’s were now hidden away in he cupboard, once they got back to conventional exercising.
My own opinion? First of all, i see a lot of jumping (plyometric) type of exercises which can destroy your joints and lead to injury, always a bad idea. I only recommend jumping exercises for teenagers mostly, and thats when they are involved in sports. They can create all sorts of problems for the average person.
Most professional trainers will introduce an exercise programme to you GENTLY, and this means gradually buildng you up. Insanity looks too much like a “get into it full steam ahead” type of workout that doesn’t care what type of shape you are in before you start it. Some of the exercises seem downright dangerous to me, but there are parts of it that are good in principle.
I would have a thorough checkup medically before you consider starting it, and i cannot imagine anyone really doing it long term due to the associated risks.
Of course they say people have great results on it, but this is due to the skills of the marketing people of the company proting insanity! These types of products have paid actors, who usually get out of shape deliberately (they take a photo at this stage), then start eating really well, don’t drink alcohol, get a tan suddenly and train like they have never trained before for 3-4 months!! Then they take the “after” photograph!
This goes on all the time so i wouldn’t trust the so called results section at all!!!
Anyway, its a free country so anyone can attempt this, but now you have my thoughts to allow you to make an informed decision!
