Intensity Series

[pugsrule]

Hi Cathe -

I received the intensity series for Christmas, and I love it! I had already purchased Boot camp and Imax 2 separately. Typically, I am more of a cardio person, only doing light weights maybe one time per week. I am concerned that if I start doing the intensity series that I may bulk up. For instance, today, I did muscle endurance. Do you feel that is a sufficient workout for one day or should I also incorporate cardio when doing the 100% weight workouts?

I love all of your tapes and find this new series to be so challenging, but very fun at the same time. I am just looking for suggestions on how to incorporate them into my fitness routine.

Thanks so much and Happy New Year!!

 

[Carol_is_fit]

Not Cathe, but this is common misconception a lot of women have. You will not bulk up by lifting weights. You will build lean muscle, which in the long run will help your metabolism stay high, and help you fight fat. Lean muscle uses calories just to stay alive. The more you have, the higher your metabolism is, and the more efficiently your body will burn fat. Cathe and her crew don't have big bulky muscles, and look at the weight they lift! Muscle Endurance is cardio in nature as well, because of the speed at which some of the lifting is performed. There is plenty of evidence out there saying if you do too much cardio and not enough lifting, you are actually losing muscle. You don't want to lose muscle, if you can avoid it. As we age, we naturally lose it. If you don't keep it in place by lifting, your metabolism will slow down, your body shape will become flabby, and you will get fat, period. I'm sure others on here will give you similar, and better advice, but this is what I've learned from this forum, other sources, and my basic knowledge of nutrition and anatomy and physiology because I'm a nurse. You will LOVE the Intensity Series once you start doing it!! Best of luck to you!!

Carol

 

[balletgrrl]

Hi Carol!

I absolutely would not worry about bulking up with the Intensity Series. As someone who would LOVE to add a little bit of bulk to my upper-body, I can tell you it is VERY hard. You have to lift a lot of heavy weights to even begin adding muscle mass. I would say don't worry about it, and enjoy your new workouts!

Alison

 

[julieb]

Hey - Just wanted to add that aside from not bulking up at all, it is so fantastic to have the extra strength in the upper body area! I am not big at all, and I have been noticing how much stronger I'm getting lifting weights a few times a week. I was cleaning up my workout area yesterday, and lifted my barbell that was loaded with 35 lbs. I just picked it up with one arm without really thinking about it. Then I thought - hey - I doubt that I could have done that 6 months ago! I try to do some upper body work twice a week. Pyramid Upper Body is great for that, and the ab work at the end is good, too! So go ahead and lift those weights. You won't regret it!

Enjoy!

Julie



P.S. I do sometimes combine cardio and weights - You must have Cardio & Weights if you have the Intensity Series, so that's a good one. You might want to consider Step, Jump & Pump from the new Body Blast Series. It's great. Obviously you could combine in other ways. Sometimes I do half of IMAX 2 and then Muscle Endurance. I usually don't work out for more than an hour, though, and I don't always combine cardio and weights. I used to think that I needed to do cario all the time, but I have actually had much better results from doing additional weight training. Good luck!

 

[robyn6002]

Really.. agreed it's highly unlikely you will bulk up on IS. Depends what you are looking for. I've gotten good results with doing all the tapes 1 time a week. Well actually I added L&G from BB I got such amazing results from that. SO I'm actually on a 8 day rotation now. 1 tape a day and a rest day.

A while back there were a few different rotations based on if you were trying to build muscle or not. I've been basing it on the advanced total blast
BC
day off
ME
Imax
C&W
PLB
PUB