I have a 30 day shred question or two!

[OatcakeCravings]

Hello,

For those of you who have done the 30 day shred DVD I would like to ask a couple of questions.

Firstly - I am very obese and very unfit, do you think that I would manage to do this DVD or should I stick to something easier like the Davina one that I have and can manage until I lose some weight/get fitter.

If the answer to this is no - just do it blobby! Then what weight of hand weights do I need to buy? I understand from the reviews that there is a weights section.

Thanks!

Hi there, i started it yesterday - am currently carrying four stone too much although I do some exercise. Thighs are aching like billy-o this morning but I did manage it all and the exercises are shown at two different levels so you just do the version that suits you. They are short bursts of different exercises but you do have to keep going. I enjoyed it so I would say give it a go - it is only 20 mins after all! We don't have weights so I used two cans of beans

Go for it - but: wear trainers, and mind your knees. I've heard quite a lot of people complain about knee trouble on account of the Shred, and a lot put it down, at least in part, to not wearing trainers. There's quite a bit of jumping, and that's always going to put strain on the knees, especially if you're carrying significant extra weight.

Weights wise, yah, can of beans or bottle of water will suffice. I got a set of 1, 2 and 3kg weights after a while though, useful when you find an exercise too hard or difficult for the weight you're using. I ended up using all three during one work out - some exercises you barely notice a 1kg weight, others you can hardly do!

As Jillian says "I've got 300 pound people who can do this....."

Get good trainers, do the modifiers to begin with. And remember it's only 20 minutes.

Also, if it is hard on the knees then swap exercises around. I'm doing level 3 at the moment, and I have bad knees, so I don't do the knee warm up, I do standing pikes instead, and instead of jumping lunges I do an exercise called "military press with leg extension" from level 2.

I think in Level 1 I held the lunge position as this puts more strain on the muscles but less strain on the knee joint.

One final thing, don't bother with your weight. Take measurements - I do my neck, bust, underbust, waist, belly, hips, thigh and calf muscle. I have never lost more than a kg doing the shred but I have lost 17cm total off my measurements. You might get disheartened if you rely only on the scales to judge how you're doing.

Right - thanks for answering I'm away to order a copy!

Just hope it doesn't kill me!