Fitness Options for the Student Lifestyle

Want to be in better shape, feel the need to de-stress? If so, in this article we will look at the pros and cons of three fitness programs from Beachbody.com and how they can work with your student lifestyle. This article is a follow-up and continuation of my four-part series on my personal lifestyle change using P90X. We will examine 3 different programs from Beachbody and how they can be used to continue P90X or on their own to help bring a greater level of fitness to your life. We will be examining One on One with Tony Horton, P90X+ and the 10 Minute Trainer. As a disclaimer, I have not done the full program for these series but I have done each of the workout videos at least once.

All three of these programs are hosted by International fitness sensation Tony Horton. Last year at one point, P90X and 10 Minute Trainer were both in the 50 top-selling infomercial products; currently P90X is number 1 after 6 years on the market according to industry tracker IMS (Infomercial Monitoring System). Tony has, over the last 20 years, established himself as one of the premier personal training experts. He has worked with such stars as Tom Petty, Billy Idol, Sean Connery, Annie Lennox, Jason Scheff, Rob Lowe and many others. He is a little quirky and a little verbose but his workouts get the job done. The workouts are hard enough that you can get great results, but enjoyable enough that you keep hitting play. At the writing of this, I have hit play over 100 days in a row and worked out with Tony through his DVDs.

One on One With Tony Horton
This is a fantastic series that can be purchased in two different ways. It can either be a subscription service and you get billed and receive a new video each month in the mail, or you can just buy specific workouts that appeal to your personal taste. They started the year Tony Horton turned 50. The advantage of the subscription service is they send out freebies and gifts from time to time such as bonus workouts, a special holiday workout, a jump rope and more. The cost is about the same at about $20 each. The workouts in this series so far are:

Volume 1, Disk 1: Plyo Legs
Volume 1, Disk 2: Power 90® Road Warrior
Volume 1, Disk 3: Killer Abs
Volume 1, Disk 4: Just Arms
Volume 1, Disk 5: 30-15: The Upper-Body Massacre
Volume 1, Disk 6: Fountain of Youth
Volume 1, Disk 7: Super Cardio
Volume 1, Disk 8: Mammoth UML
Volume 1, Disk 9: Bun Shaper
Volume 1, Disk 10: Medicine Ball Core Cardio
Volume 1, Disk 11: Recovery 4 Results
Volume 1, Disk 12: Diamond Delts
Volume 1, Bonus Disk - Holiday Workout
Volume 2, Bonus Disk - Pay It Forward
Volume 2, Disk 1: Cardio Intervals
Volume 2, Disk 2: Core Ball Sandwich
Volume 2, Disk 3: Patience "Hummingbird"
Volume 2, Disk 4: 10-Minute Crusher Pack
Volume 2, Disk 5: Butt & Belly (I Dare You)
Volume 2, Disk 6: Back & Belly
Volume 2, Disk 7: On One Leg

The advantage of this series is you can buy just a few to start and add to your collection over time, or join the subscription service and get a new one each month for less than I spend on coffee in a week. These are heart intense workouts - just Tony in his home gym or on the road, doing the workouts he does to stay in shape. My favorites are the 2 Yoga workouts or Just Arms and Diamond Delts. These advanced workouts are for those already in shape and some require more equipment than P90X. But they are worth it. Most of the workouts come in between 40 and 60 minutes. They are filmed with 2 still cameras and 1 camera man following Tony through his routine and interacting with him. They are a lot of fun and full of new exercises or variations from other exercises in Tony's cannon.

P90X+
To be honest, I was very disappointed in this series. Having graduated from P90X I thought this would be a great way to take it to the next level. It adds 5 more workouts to your collection and they become the core, and the original 12 workouts from P90X supplement this regime. The new workouts are Interval X Plus, Kenpo Cardio Plus, Upper Plus, Total Body Plus, and Abs Core Plus. The problem is you absolutely need a chin-up bar for some of these workouts and for a few exercises you need Beachbody's specific chin-up bar. Nowhere on the product website does it have any information stating this. If you did P90X using exercise bands, you're out of luck or need to figure out the modifications yourself. The other disappointing thing about this series is this: in the original P90X Tony works out with 3 other people in each video and most people are in 2 of the 12 videos. For P90X+ it is the same 2 people for each of the five videos. Where are Pam, Dreya, Joe, or some of the others? My final criticism is the feel of the videos. They feel like infomercials; you are constantly being sold the Tony Horton Power Stands, the Chin-up bar, Bowflex Select Tech dumbbells (which Tiny uses and raves about in this series but in his home gym on the One on Ones he uses traditional dumbbells), and then the supplements. However these are good workouts. They are intense and do take P90X up a notch, but I really think a better continuation of P90X could have been done, by using more workout partners, by offering modifications like in the original P90X and by being less sales oriented.


10 Minute Trainer
After doing P90X these videos seemed a little cheesy, but after doing each of them I have an even greater respect for Tony Horton. He packs a lot of punch into 10 minutes. These videos can either be done alone or stacked. I have met some people online who do one in the morning and one in the evening. If you use the warm-up on the videos you are looking at under 15 minutes. If you do your own you can cut it down a little. Yes you can achieve results in just 10 minutes of hard exercise a day. You basically do 10 exercises for a full minute; most of the exercises are selected to work multiple muscles at a time. The Abs program crushed me my first time through. When you buy the kit it comes with an exercise band and a door attachment so you have everything you need. It also comes with workout cards so you can do the workouts on the go without the videos, rapid results guide, 10-minute meals and more. I have met people in the teambeachbody.com forums and chats who have lost up to 60lbs using this program and the nutrition guide that comes with it. For the extremely busy student this might be a great choice, especially if you cannot squeeze 60 to 90 minutes from your day for P90X. All in all it is a good workout series but not my cup of tea. The other really nice feature is, on Tony's blog every so often, he posts up the exercises to create a new 10 Minute workout.

Tony has created numerous 90 day boot camps that can be done in your home. He is acclaimed as a fitness expert and based on the stars and athletes who have used his programs he is definitely a success. But what matters most is that you make a choice to live a healthier lifestyle, learn to make better choices and start moving with one of the workouts outlined above. It will help give you a start at a lifetime of learning to be healthier and to get fit.

Tony Horton Timeline:
1998 Great Body Guaranteed (with Debbie Siebers)
2001 Power 90 (P90)
2002 Power Half Hour
2003 Tony & the Folks! (with Judi Williams)
2003 Tony & the Kids! (with Judi Williams)
2004 Ho' Ala ke Kino - Awaken the Body (Yoga)
2004 P90X
2005 Power 90 Masters Series
2007 P90X+
2008 10 Minuite Trainer :
2008 Tony Horton - One on One Volume 1
2009 Tony Horton - One on One Volume 2

(First Published in Imprint 2009-11-13 as 'Fitness Options for the Student Lifestyle'.)
P90X Articles in order Phase I, Phase II, Gear, Phase III, Fitness Options.