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As noted a couple of post back it took me some time after moving to Portland to find my fitness flow. Upon further thought the first month or so the days were long, the sky was clear, and the temperatures were warm…warm without humidity- a novel thing for this east coast girl. As a result, after work I just wanted to be outside walking, running, playing with the pup, hiking on the weekends, getting the house in order, or attempting to get a late summer garden started. The last was a fail, but provided a nice introduction into moss, slugs, nutrient poor soil, and roots. Now I have about 3 months to research into these hurdles for more success in the spring.
Once a large grant was in and the rains began in October I was in search for better indoor programs. At the time I looked into Crunch Live, and just like with my ClassPass experience, if you go to a website and then leave without completing your account setup (i.e., payment) you’ll likely be given some kind of discount in an effort to lock you in!
Crunch offered a month free for unlimited access to their catalog of online workouts. When I went to leave after this month I was given another 30 days free. At first I was pretty excited. Many of my New York crunch instructors had available videos and at first glance there were a lot of videos. However, once I started exploring and using the workouts it was clear that I was only interested in the chisel classified workouts. Crunch classes are classified as chisel (strength based, usually with HIIT mixed in), dance rhythms (I think the name speaks for itself), and mind and body (yoga, barre, and pilates-although the last two were also considered chisel). Most of the available online classes were only 30 minutes in length, with a few 45-60 minute classes, and 10-15 minute classes for quick workouts. I used the 10-15 min classes for stretching after working out on my own. The 30-minute programs were too short and given their structure if I combined two back-to-back videos I still wanted more – most workouts are organized such that 5 minutes are warm-up, 10 minutes of intense workout, 10 minutes of ab work, and a 5 minute cool down. Combining two videos would result in 20 minutes of ab work. That might be okay once in a while, but I don’t need that much everyday. To be honest I rarely intentionally workout my abs, your abs should be engaged throughout the day and in just about every exercise so they are already getting stronger. As a result without doing a single crunch I have no problem holding a 5-minute plank.
Additionally, the site boast about new routines added regularly. After 2 months nothing new had been added to the site and I was bored with the available options-so I deactivated my account.
I do think the catalog could be a useful resource for beginners, just about every workout has a modifier, unfortunately the instructor did not always remember to explain the modifications.
Overall, I give Crunch Live a thumb down (but not two 😉 ). There are many better resources for at home workouts include the Beach Body series and the thousands of videos online-granted they take some time to weed through to find the best. I would reconsider trying the site again if they included more 45-60 min workouts and committed to adding a new workout once/week.
What’s your favorite at home resource?
Nicole