Anyone else doing Caroline Girvan's EPIC programme?

[BigButtons]

I thought I was pretty fit and toned. I have exercised consistently most of my life: weights, cardio, hit, running etc ( now 53). I have just finished day 8 of EPIC and feel like a complete wuss. It was the lunges one. I wanted to be sick even though I was standing infront of a large fan the entire time.
How do people actually manage to get through these? I have just looked ahead to the burpee day and feel like I am simply not up to this.

You are more than welcome.

Just to clarify, the last sentence in my first pargraph should have read:

"However, if all you've got is some light 3/4/5kg weights then CG is probably the better option." Oh, for an edit function.

@Greenmirrorbluemirror that is really quite interesting. I hadn’t heard of Sydney Cummings, I will look up some of her workouts too.

I also have 2 sets of adjustable weights past 4kgs, so not too practical for swapping out frequently, but I do try an exercise on a higher weight then go back to a lower one for the second set if needs be. I’d quite like to bulk up a little, I realise I now have too much body fat to look like CG, I might have achieved her look in my 30s but there’s no way I’m even getting near it in my 50s, but that’s fine with me. My aim is mainly building strength and staving off the aches and twinges from sitting around too much.

I find that if I swap between sessions too much I get sidetracked so at present I’m keen to continue with CG, like @BigButtons. I will definitely look at SC when Heat is finished, it might be good to alternate series. So thanks for that!

Yes- I am interested in trying out a routine that pushes heavier weights at lower reps. I do get frustrated that I am not upping weights as quickly as I wanted, simply because she does so many reps and I cannot sustain a heavier weight without risk of injury.
Having said that I have noticeable definition to my body since starting the epics.

Yes, me too. Although I’ve fallen off the wagon a bit this last week and I’m feeling a bit more bloaty. Not sure if it’s just coincidence.

I had a quick look at a SC upper body. It’s a very different style. She has a lot of weights to choose from and doesn’t always say which ones she is choosing.
I’ll stick with CG- it’s less complicated and I like the no talking!

@BigButtons in the SC routine I do she has 3 sets of weights and she tells you at the start what they are. She will then say whether she's using the light, medium or heavy ones.

I don't enjoy her going on about living your best life at the end of the video I do so always mute that bit but I quite enjoy the chat during the routine - I find the CG breaks between exercises strangely silent!

I will try and link to the upper body routine of her's that I do as I think it's pretty thorough.

This is the one:

Also has anyone looked at 2lazy4gym website? She looks at a lot of different trainers and their routines and gives a synopsis of each of the routines.

@Anjelika thanks! Do you use the same weights as her?

@BigButtons unfortunately not! I use a mix of 4,5 & 6kg and even 3kg on the shoulder lateral raises. Maybe having done a few CG ones recently I might be able to up them a bit!

@Anjelika I’m also still on 3kg on the lateral raises. Although I have finally progressed to 6kg on the flies. I use 8kg on the legs, I could probably manage more fir some of the moves, but heavier weights make me feel my hands will snap off, so I’m stuck at 8 until my weedy wrists get stronger.

I’ll definitely give SC a go, with a calculator to have for the metric conversion . From the snippets I looked at it seems to be structured a bit differently and she does talk a lot, but I liked some of the exercises and they don’t seem to last an eternity like with CG. I might try her after finishing Heat and try to up the weights a bit, seeing as the bouts are shorter.

@Melassa I have finally managed to get to 4kg on the laterals but am still stuck on 5kg for the flies. It’s my left arm. It’s so much less resilient than my right. I am scared of damaging it so will just wait until it strengthens up.
Am about to do day 20 hiit. It’s going to be a huuuge challenge and I will be swearing.

@Anjelika I checked out that website. The only trainer I recognise is Jillian Michaels. I used to loads of her stuff and bought a tonne of dvds back in the day. I didn’t mind the shouting at all but now it bothers me. I also prefer a trainer who actually does the exercises. I felt it was a bit of a cop out yelling at me though the tv when all she was doing was walking round the studio!

I am having to take frequent pauses. If I don’t I will throw up😳.

Finished.
I did the low impact alternatives for some. I found the kneeling to squat jump/ jump easy- weird.
I even managed the 1 minute burpee finisher. I am soaked in sweat.
Feel proud 🥰

I’ll stick with CG- it’s less complicated and I like the no talking!

Oh yes, i love the no talking!! And no starting and then stopping exercises because she's forgotten to move her bench. Carolina just seems more organised than lots of other online trainers - I'm also looking at you, Lilly Sabri! B

Hit post too soon...
It's Caroline, not Carolina FFS - why does my tablet think it knows better? Happens every time...

Anyway, I also like Caroline's introductions/explanations, plus the previews of the exercise that comes next and the % bar.

One of the reasons I also favour Growingannanas is because she has a very similar set-up and approach to CG, just focused on HIIT rather than strength. A perfect match as far as I'm concerned.

@BigButtons are you me? I also used to have an entire library of Jillian DVDs but her yelling and inane comments started to really annoy me. Now I have an aversion to anyone yelling or generally wittering away during exercise sessions. Hence me feeling relief when I found Heather Robinson and CG and now there’s no way I can go back.

Well done on finishing the HIIT, I was just thinking to myself this morning that I should really plough through a CG HIIT session instead of wimping out, plus the next one is Tabata and how hard can it be? Now I’m having doubts again 😬. I will be brave and face up to it though, I’ve managed to convince myself that limited results in certain areas (I.e wobbly tummy) are due to me skipping the HIIT and they are what I need to burn it off (nothing to do with the wine). In Epic 1 I did do most of the HIIT sessions do this wimping out is relatively new to me.

Just finished day 17 legs. The hip thrusts were brutal and I was only using 8kg. I also found I needed to do a lot more stretching afterwards, especially the calves. That calf session was pretty tough, I felt them knotting at the end.

@Melassa it was the tabata hiit I did today. The 10 second rests were brutally short. I liked the actual exercises though. I modified a bit at times.
CG threw herself to the floor at the end and so did I. It got me out of breath which was the whole point. She said in her blurb that we are supposed to find it very challenging.
I do occasionally do the JM yoga inferno- there’s no crazy shouting just encouragement. My favourites were the 20 minute session ones. It would be interesting to see how I would be doing one again. Hopefully I would find it less challenging.
I also had to do loads of stretching after last week’s sessions. My glute muscles were really tight.

This is my workout for today:

Plus Bowflex plank and RL Abs. Sorted!

@FlowerArranger I had a sneaky peak at growingananas super sweaty hiit session. It seems way less hideous that a CG one! I will deffo check hers out when CG defeats me!

@BigButtons - I'll admit I've long given up on Caroline's HIIT sessions....... A I'm too old, and B I can't be bothered. She seems to be on speed at times - all this thrashing about and throwing herself on the floor! I prefer Anna's more measured pace...

[quote BigButtons]@Anjelika I checked out that website. The only trainer I recognise is Jillian Michaels. I used to loads of her stuff and bought a tonne of dvds back in the day. I didn’t mind the shouting at all but now it bothers me. I also prefer a trainer who actually does the exercises. I felt it was a bit of a cop out yelling at me though the tv when all she was doing was walking round the studio![/quote]
@BigButtons CG is listed as a trainer on there and plenty of her routines are listed and reviewed.

@ odd I looked through the names and couldn’t see it🧐

I found it!