Hi Melinda!
Thought I'd answer you here in the forum -- hope that's okay with you. Anyway, thanks so much for your questions -- again, I'm not a professional -- like I said, I just read alot -- and I found that book to be a good book to help me understand rotations and the difference types of exercise and the different energy systems in the body and why it's a good idea to mix them up.
I understand not wanting to mix up the workouts -- it can be confusing. So here are the things that I've decided for myself -- please if anyone disagrees, it's okay to post and let me know. This is just from reading the book and sort of coordinating things together. After I'd read the book, READY, SET, GO! by Phil Campbell, I had the same questions and so I read a little more (read a book on interval training) and then looked over Cathe's videos and here's what I've decided -- again this is strictly my opinion and I'm only posting here to help you as a sort of guideline.
Again, there are five different types of exercise that one should incorporate into their workout every week: 1) cardio 2) weight work 3) anaerobics 4) plyometrics and 5) stretching.
From what I can see almost all of Cathe's workouts are plyometric -- I looked up the word and discovered that it's a kind of exercise that involves jumping, etc. Cathe's workouts on the step and even her kick boxing are plyometric -- so you don't really have to worry about that. Her Interval workouts (IMAX1, IMAX2, IMAX3, LOWMAX) are all anaerobic workouts. Her weight workouts speak for themselves -- as far as anaerobic or power weight lifting -- in my opinion most of her weight workouts incorporate this -- particularly Muscle Endurance, MuscleMax and Power Hour. I don't have the Slow and Heavy series or the power series so I can't form an opinion about those.
Her step workouts are all mostly cardio -- Body Max has it all, I think -- cardio, anaerobics, weights, plyometrics, stretching. It's one of my favorite workouts, but it's a 90 minute workout, and something I can rarely do, as I simply don't have that much time to workout.
Her circuit workouts all are plyometric -- some are strictly cardio and some are anaerobic -- I tend to think of High Step Training Advanced as anaerobic -- also Bootcamp to me is anaerobic -- although I know a few people whose heart rates do not get up there very much on Bootcamp. Cardio & Weights is pretty much cardio and weights workout -- no anaerobics in my opinion.
But again, you might have a different opinion. Circuit Max is in my opinion anaerobics plus cardio and weights -- my heart rate always gets way up there with it. I only have one of Cathe's Kick boxing workouts since Kick boxing is not my favorite -- and I consider it -- Kick, Punch & Crunch -- more of a cardio workout than anaerobics -- she does have some drills on KPC, but by definition anaerobics is getting the heart rate into the higher zone and then letting it come down again -- and is classified by those benchmarks that show that it's anaerobics (out of breath, slight adrenaline response -- there's two more that he gives in the book that benchmark anaerobics, but I can't recall them off the top of my head.) HSC -- High Step Challenge is more of a cardio and weight workout in my opinion -- as my heartrate doesn't climb up there like it does in the IMAX's.
I know this may sound confusing -- it was to me at first, too -- but I started with knowing that the IMAX's were anaerobics -- the weight workouts were weight workouts -- the step workouts are cardio -- and then made my own decisions about the circuit workouts.
Does this help at all? I hope I haven't confused you more. With the Cathe workouts, you don't have to worry about plyometrics, as almost all of her workouts are plyometric. It's just that Phil Campbell is using sprinting for anaerobics, and sprinting is not plyometric, and so he has to have a special day for plyometrics in order to get it in.
Usually I try to do one of the IMAX's for anaerobics and the 2nd anaerobic day I usually sprint outside if weather premits. For Cardio, I either do a Cathe cardio workout or run outside for 30 minutes -- the weight workouts -- depending on what I'm trying to do -- are either her weight workouts (ME, MuscleMax, Power Hour -- or Pyramid upper and lower body, etc) and I love her stretching workouts.
Again, I really hope this helps. Do let me know how you're doing, okay?
Have a great workout.:7
