Friday Fitness: The FIRM Zip Trainer

So for today's Friday Fitness post (which was supposed to be last week's Friday Fitness post lol) I'm going to do a brief review of The FIRM Zip Trainer exercise program.

It's an older program - The FIRM as you used to see in on late night infomercials is no longer a thing. Gaiam bought out the name and all of the old workouts (I believe you can still stream them if you subscribe to Gaia TV) and the FIRM as we knew it went away. Those perky trainers from the south are no longer making "The FIRM" videos - but they did start their own studio and they are still making great workouts. Their new name is BEMax Fitness and you can get their new stuff on TrainerPass.com so check them out now! Same great trainers, awesome new workouts!

But back to The Zip Trainer - the kit comes with a three DVDs, a workout guide, a nutrition guide, a large pink ball (weighs 5 lbs.) that un-zips (hence the ZIP in Zip Trainer) and a small yellow ball (weighs 2 lbs.) that can be used in hand, or placed in side the larger pink ball (for a total of 7 lbs.). The program is also called "Zip" trainer I think because the workouts are 15 minutes each so you "zip" through them. At least, I think that's partly where the name comes from.

http://www.amazon.com/Firm-Zip-Trainer-Medicine-Ball/dp/B00ENXJ128/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1463756666&sr=8-1&keywords=firm+zip+trainer

DVD #1 comes with 4 workouts - A jump start workout that basically introduces you to the equipment and the moves, A cardio workout, a sculpting workout, and an "AMP" workout. AMP stands for "As Many as Possible" and your goal is to do as many reps of the moves as possible with good form in 60 second bursts. DVD #2 is basically the same as the first, but no Jump Start, and the moves are a little more advanced. You're supposed to do the 1st DVD during the 1st 30 days, and then the 2nd DVD during the second 30 days. The third DVD is a bonus core workout called Barefoot Abs.

At one point there was an add-on kit you could purchase that came with 2 more DVDs and a 7 lb. small blue ball that you could zip into the larger pink ball. The kit is no longer available that I could find, but you can get the DVD alone on Amazon (without the 7 lb. ball). One DVD has an upper body workout and a cardio workout. The other DVD has a lower body workout and a cardio workout.

http://www.amazon.com/Trainer-FIRM-Firm-Cardio-Workouts/dp/B00LC9KGTS/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1463756666&sr=8-2&keywords=firm+zip+trainer

Some of the workouts also use dumbbells that don't come with the kit, though you could do the workouts with out them, or use other weighted things around your house like soup cans or water bottles I suppose.

What's great about all of the DVDs in the system is that you can customize a workout from the menu. So you can workout with one, two or all three workouts together. Each workout is actually only 12 minutes - but if you add in the 1:30 warm up and the 1:30 cool down you get a 15 minute workout.

The fitness guide comes with some basic instructions on proper form and how to execute most of the basic moves in the program. It also comes with a calendar to follow that maps out which workouts to do on which days. If you're a beginner exerciser it's great. It starts out with just one 15 minute workout for the first couple of weeks and then builds to two workouts. It also starts out with just 3 days a week and then builds from there as well.

The nutrition guide I didn't follow at all ('cause, you know, Weight Watchers!) but I did try out a few of the recipes and the ones I tried were pretty tasty.

Being more advanced in fitness I didn't follow the calendar that came with the workout. I kind of made up my own. Some days I would do both sculpting workouts or both cardio workouts. Or a sculpt and a cardio. Or an AMP and a cardio. I mixed it up quite a bit. So I can't speak to the effectiveness of the calendar. I also went back and forth between the two DVDs or mixed them on the same day.

I'm not actually done with 60 days of workouts but it's been about 60 days since I've started (some days I choose to do other workouts or I have workout buddies in my school that workout together so I'll do whatever DVD they're doing that day instead). But, here's what I've got so far:

The Pros:

The workouts are fun. After having completed 60 days of Jillian Michaels Body Shred it was a relief to hear Allie say "step, kick, mambo cha-cha"! I like the choreography very much - the workouts are not boring at all.

I've lost about 3 pounds without really trying (remember I'm currently in maintenance mode). The only thing I did differently were these workouts. My diet didn't change at all.

The workouts are short so it's easy to fit them into a busy schedule - even if you decide to do two of them it's still only 30 minutes.

The Cons:

For someone who is an advanced exerciser, I didn't find these to be particularly challenging. Sure you get your heart rate up and if you put your maximum effort into the moves you might feel a little something the next day, but I didn't feel sore at all.

The abs workout wasn't that challenging either. I never felt it the day after. But I can hold a plank for quite a while (definitely over a minute - not sure exactly because I haven't timed myself in a while) so that may be in part due to the fact that I have a pretty strong core to begin with.

The Bottom Line:

If you're a beginner in the world of exercise I would totally recommend these workouts. They are fun, short, and definitely able to take you to the next level and help you to advance.

If you're a more advanced exerciser like me, and if you liked the old FIRM workouts check out BeMax Fitness on TrainerPass.com. Those workouts are great for those, like me, who are more advanced. They're pretty new so there's not too many workouts there, but the ones they do have that I've tried have totally kicked my butt! In a good way ;)  Once I've had a chance to try them all out I'll do a review of those as well!