# risers you use with stepping ?

rgs424

rgs424

Cathlete
I have always used 0 or 2 risers, bur recently am trying to move up to 4 (2 on each side). Goodness !! what a difference between 2 and 4 risers ! It really kicks my butt ! I am doing the low impact routines for now so that my legs and knees have a chance to get used to it. But it has been quite a change !
 
I generally use zero (two on Low Max) because my knees simply cannot take it. Calorie wise, your really aren't burning much more by adding risers if I recall a recent discussion on the topic correctly.
 
I use two risers (one on each side) for all of Cathe's workouts except for Low Max, LIS (from 4DS) and LIC where I use four (2 on each side).

Most of Cathe's workouts are too high impact for me to use four risers so I just use four on her lower imapact/lower intensity workouts to give my heart rate a little bump.

Allison

http://www.picturetrail.com/allisonj90
 
>Calorie wise, your really aren't burning much
>more by adding risers if I recall a recent discussion on the
>topic correctly.

Beavs--you're absolutely right. I remember a little while back, LauraMax posted that she burned only 5 fewer calories doing Low Max with 2 risers instead of four.

Allison

http://www.picturetrail.com/allisonj90
 
I use an 8 inch step (I guess that's 4 risers, but I have a Reebok step, so it's an adjustment, not risers) for most of her workouts. The ones I don't are the IMAX and IMAX 3. When I'm feeling energized I'll use the 8 inches for IMAX 2 though! When there's a lot of jumping up with 2 feet or over the step, I put it down to 6 inches.

~Chris
 
I just use one on each side, except when I do Low Max. I'm too short to take it higher than that.
 
I just recently, in the past week or so, tried using 8" for LIC and I felt like I was going to trip and fall and break my ankle. I am too short to do that...
 
I use an 8 inch step. I tried a 10-inch in the past, which was nuts. I loved the extra cardiovascular push it gave, but oh dear, was it tough on the knees and Achilles tendons.
 
"I remember a little while back, LauraMax posted that she burned only 5 fewer calories doing Low Max with 2 risers instead of four."

Allison, this is amazing to me. I totally believe you, but it's really opened my eyes, because when I use 4 risers in any of the IMAXs I'm huffing and puffing and miserable, and when I use 2 I can breathe ok LOL and find the workouts to be challenging but doable. I usually use 4 anyhow to try to burn more calories, which I now see is not necessary.

This makes me wonder if our perceived exertion is really a good indicator of how many calories we're burning. I've always thought that a feeling of OMG!!! is required to burn the most calories, but from these posts it seems like you can get good calorie burn and a great aerobic workout without the I'm-almost-maxed-out-here feeling. Less is more sometimes, I guess ;~)
 
Always 1 set of risers for me. My knees can't handle 2 sets of risers - my legs are too short and it would basically be doing leg press step aerobics if I had 2 sets of risers.
 
I use no risers on the high intesity stuff(Imax2,OMG) and for low impact 'maybe' one set,it depends on how im feeling .I haven't used an 8inch step since my early days when I did Basic Step with Cathe!
 
>
>"I remember a little while back, LauraMax posted that she
>burned only 5 fewer calories doing Low Max with 2 risers
>instead of four."
>
>Allison, this is amazing to me. I totally believe you, but
>it's really opened my eyes, because when I use 4 risers in any
>of the IMAXs I'm huffing and puffing and miserable, and when I
>use 2 I can breathe ok LOL and find the workouts to be
>challenging but doable. I usually use 4 anyhow to try to burn
>more calories, which I now see is not necessary.
>
>This makes me wonder if our perceived exertion is really a
>good indicator of how many calories we're burning. I've
>always thought that a feeling of OMG!!! is required to burn
>the most calories, but from these posts it seems like you can
>get good calorie burn and a great aerobic workout without the
>I'm-almost-maxed-out-here feeling. Less is more sometimes, I
>guess ;~)

It was amazing to me too! And such a relief because the dread factor associated with doing workouts like BM2, the Imax's, etc. with four risers was just so bad for me that I wasn't doing them at all. Once I went down to using one set of risers the dread factor went away but I was still burning major calories and feeling like I worked my butt off.

Allison

http://www.picturetrail.com/allisonj90
 
Don't forget that calorie burn isn't the only reason for doing cardio. You also strengthen the heart muscle and improve lung capacity, which is what's happening when your perceived exertion is higher. .... up to a certain point, of course. You can always work too hard and have a heart attack. :p
 
Okay, I hate to be the dissenter here, ES-pecially when it means going against Beavs (from whom I think I was separated at birth!), but I noticed visible results when I went from no risers to one on each side. Okay, I'm not sure about the calories burned, but I my legs seemed to get firmer, faster.
 
LOL TeTe!! You could be right. I just know that I end up with pain in my knees...which also ups the dread factor. To compensate I add a bit of pep to my step (not The Step!) to compensate. I did BM2 this am sans risers and found that I enjoyed it very much. Doing two on each side as they do in the video would put my knees out of commission for a few days. I'm also a clumsy stepper and therefore not to be trusted. Thank goodness for elliptical machines and Coach Sean for the all out burns!
 
There is no way I could do two risers per side...I did it with the easier ones (Body Fusion, LIS)a few times, and, while it didn't hurt my knees, I was tripping a lot(which tends to take the fun out of the whole process!).

I will sometimes take it down from one riser to no risers in the middle of a workout if I feel like I'm not going to make it to the end.
 
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