Jillian Michaels Killler Buns and Thighs - Workout 1 Review.

Hey guys! I tried Level 1 of Killer Buns and Thighs the other day and did it for a week straight. I haven’t done level 2 or 3 yet, but I thought I’d talk about Level 1 while it’s on my mind and I have time! 

So far, I love love love this workout and am really looking forward to doing level 2 and 3 when I get a good and stable chair, which is something you need for those two levels. I really enjoy all lower body/leg workouts and I think that’s because they remind me of dance just with all the plyometric moves that Jillian has in her lower body workouts. Plus this one has Natalie and Anita in them, and since my very first Jillian DVD was the 30 Day Shred with them, I loved seeing them on the screen! 

So as always, you start with a warm up. This particular warm up has jump rope, deep lunges in plank (you’re in plank and you bring your foot up by your hands), side lunges, military march, and a pivoting crescent pose. So, I really loved the pivoting crescent pose and here’s why: (WARNING, NERD  ALERT!!!) It reminded me of Hurricane Helms. Yeah. The wrestler. I giggled while doing it! A little bit of nostalgia for me. I used to be a huge wrestling fan. Still am a fan of the old stuff. Okay! Back on the workout!

Circuit one has squat into a lunge, static sumo calf raises, goddess jumps, single leg chair pose pose, and stiff leg deadlifts. Oh Jillian, you are so terrible with those single leg chair poses. My legs are burning just thinking about them!! 

Circuit two has butt kicks, judo bridge, mountain climbers, swimmers, and then plank pose jumping into squat. I actually really liked this circuit and I thought I would hate the plank into squat, but it wasn’t too bad! I’m going to call this a non-scale victory because things like that (plank into squat, burpees and the like) I know I could NOT do before Jillian! 

Circuit three had fire hydrants, donkey kick, side plank leg raises, a leg raise where you lay on your side and bring your leg in front of you 90 degrees (not sure the technical name) and hamstring curls. I was laughing so hard during this circuit. Fire hydrants. Just like you imagine. Jillian even made jokes about her dog. “I can’t remember the last time my dog peed on a fire hydrant, maybe because he’s peeing on everything in the house!” Jillian totally gets it. A dog is a dog whether it’s human is a celebrity or not! Jillian is human too! Those side plank leg raises though were tough even though they looked easy. 

In circuit four there are high knees, front kick back kick combo, a lunge to warrior 3, a super fun move where you squat and then do a front kick, squat again and do a side kick, and then squat for a back kick, and then curtsy lunges. After that, you do your cool down. 

And that concluded one of my all time favorite Jillian workouts. ;) Really, I love this workout. It’s fun. It is a little bit longer than the other Jillian DVD’s that I have and it runs right at 40 minutes, but really those extra five to ten minutes I have never noticed because this is probably my favorite workout, except for the Lower Body workout on Killer Body. What’s also fun about this DVD is that it include bloopers. How cool is that? So far, I can say that I absolutely recommend this DVD! If you're interested in buying, you can check it out on Amazon by clicking here. It is such an amusing workout!

Killer Body by Jillian Michaels - Lower Body

The lower body workout for Killer Body is by far my favorite. This one is just like the other two; she has two girls, one doing more advanced moves and the other doing modified versions. One is Natalie from 30DS. She also has Golden, who is 25. Jillian makes jokes that she’s going to enjoy “beating up” the 25-year-old. ;) 

Circuit one had a three-way pendulum lunge with front raise, lateral raise, and a hammer curl. Then she has weighted good mornings with an overhead press. Then she squat jacks into a star jump, which I loved. Then the fourth move is called, Statue of Liberty, which is basically a single leg squat while holding weights in one hand. She has you repeat these, and then your minute cardio interval is a long jump, and then running back twice, and then zigzag jumps upwards and backwards. 

In circuit two, she has you get into static chair pose for 30 seconds. Next is sumo scissor hops, which I was familiar with from RI30. I can totally tell a difference in my endurance! Then she has you doing curtsy lunges with an overhead press, and then lunges on a straight line with weights in one hand. The cardio was standing donkey kick into a rockstar jump. The cardio interval for this circuit was a lot of fun, and boy did it sure get my heart rate up!

I think circuit three is the one I enjoyed the most. It had standing donkey kicks, Supermans (first time without weights, and the second time with weights) and then into Warrior 2 post and reverse warrior from yoga, and then Warrior 3, also from yoga. The cardio with split jumps where you bring one knee up like a high knee, and the other leg would go back like a butt kick. 

Circuit four had sissy squats, surrender lunges, sumo hops on toes, and then weighted deadlifts. For the surrender lunges, she had Golden (the advanced girl) going from being on her knees to hopping up from her knees to her feet. I can’t see myself ever being able to do that without breaking my neck, so I followed Natalie. The last cardio interval is a jumping squat into a jumping lunge. Phew! After a full minute of that one, my poor legs were really cooking!

With that said though, I LOVE the lower body workout. It doesn’t have any mat work, and that might be why I like it so much. DDR is mostly on your legs, and obviously I love that, so that could be why I love this lower body work out. But I really do adore it. By far my favorite workout on the DVD and probably my favorite Jillian workout I’ve come across on all the DVD’s I have. And while it’s fun and my favorite and I love it, by the end, I’m a total sweaty mess! It’s still tough! 

Coolest thing? I remember how I couldn’t do jumping lunges with the 30 Day Shred. I SURE CAN NOW! Woo hoo!

Interested buying a copy? Follow the link to buy on Amazon.

Killer Body by Jillian Michael's DVD

I’ve had Killer Body by Jillian Michael’s for a little over three weeks now and have done each workout six times. I’m going to review the DVD as a whole here, and then link to my opinions on each workout below. If you're interested in picking up this DVD, click here to check it out on Amazon.

In whole, I really like the DVD. It’s super tough (especially that core workout - UGH!! Core day is my least favorite day!) and when I’m finished for the day I’m a sweaty mess, but man, do I feel accomplished. I will say that the DVD seems fuzzy at times and that the camera angles seem a bit weird and off at times. But once I get a rhythm down, I hardly notice that. Before I bought the DVD, I read reviews on Amazon that said the same thing and some reviews were low because of that. I can see where it might be distracting, but often times, I turn around and am not completely watching/facing the TV to watch the DVD, I’m more listening to Jillian as I work out. So if I were to knock off points for that, I’d maybe knock off a half star. Beyond that, I really do like Killer Body, as much as you can like doing a Jillian Michael’s DVD! She’s so tough! 

What I like about this one is that with it switching every day rather than the same workout for so many days in a row, I find myself getting less bored and I like the mixup. I did Ripped In 30 for two months or so (going through it all in order) and by the time I was done with RI30 and had bought a new DVD, I was ready for a break from it. So that’s pretty cool about this particular workout program. A change every day! 

The Lower Body workout is by far my favorite, and I like the Upper Body workout fairly well. The Core Workout is TOUGH. Phew. Now that I’ve gotten it under my belt several times, I like it a bit better but in the beginning, there were days it would have been easy for me to skip, just because it’s super tough. I’m taking the fact that I’m doing it and noticing major changes in my endurance with that particular workout a non-scale victory! Woo hoo! 

Click below to see in depth reviews of each workout on the DVD.

Upper Body

Core

Lower Body

So with all that said, I really do like this workout and totally recommend it. I did take measurements and haven’t checked to see if there have been any changes measurements wise. There isn’t any drastic changes with the scale either (still have that darn one pound to lose until I hit the big 100 pound loss! Come on, one pound!) but I feel stronger and this weekend I went shopping and had a great time. I bought four skirts and I really and noticing major changes from when I started this journey. Some days I see it plain as day and then other days I feel like nothing has changed at all. I think that might come with the territory, but seeing the changes more often than not seeing them is a step in the right direction! :)

Thanks for reading!

I've bought Jillian Michael's Killer Body DVD!

Yesterday I picked up Jillian Michael's Killer Body DVD. I've decided to blog about it and give my review!

This Jillian DVD is a bit different than the other two I've owned and completed. This one has three workouts, but instead of having levels where you go up once a week or whatever, you do one workout one day, the next workout the next day, and then the next one on the third day, rinse and repeat. Jillian recommends you do each workout twice a week and take one day off. One workout focuses on your upper body, one focuses on your core, and the other focuses on your lower body. I did the upper body workout today and watched the core workout so I know what to expect for tomorrow. I plan on watching the lower body one tonight.

I can say that the upper body workout is pretty tough but doable, and the core workout looks super tough, so I imagine the lower body will be tough as well! But so far so good! As I get these workouts under my belt and see how things go, I will blog about them further with more details! I'm thinking that switching off be a different way to go about things and might help. I was starting to get a bit bored with RI30 - but it was my second go around with it back to back and I think that had something to do with it.

This is a fairly new Jillian Michael's DVD. Have you tried it? :)