What could be a better goal than to complete a 5k this summer for charity?

Entries are still available for the Cancer Research UK’s Race for Life series this June and July. Whether you want to walk for fun alongside girlfriends and family members, or get competitive with your work colleagues, you can improve your own health and fitness whilst also helping to raise money for Cancer Research UK, whose work has saved millions of lives in the UK and across the world.

5k is an achievable distance for most people and women are being encouraged to come together to walk, jog or run to help raise over £60 million to fund Cancer Research UK’s life-saving work into all types of cancer. 5k is also a good distance to attempt if you are beginning starting a fitness program and with a little bit of training through the summer you may be ready for one of Cancer Research UK’s Run 10k events that occur in the Autumn, when the men in your life can also enter.

Cancer Research UK’s Race for Life continues to be the most successful and largest women-only fundraising event series across the UK and has raised a staggering £290 million for the charity’s life-saving research. The 2009 series was the biggest yet with over 730,000 women taking part. This year is Race for Life’s 16^th Birthday and since it began there has been a 15% drop in the death rate from cancer, something that Race for Life has helped to achieve.

If you are looking for something to wear during the event then visit the online shop, where you can buy your fancy dress accessories including fairy wings, bunny ears and pink glitter cowboy hats. If you want to show your support in other more subtle ways there are also socks, sweatbands, caps and key-rings as well as essential T-shirts. These include the new Race for Life 2010 celebrity T-shirts designed by choreographer, Arlene Phillips; girlfriend of Arsenal star Theo Walcott, Melanie Slade; and fashion designer Tracey Boyd.

This year there are over 230 Race for Life events throughout England, Scotland and Wales.  Women from across the UK of all ages and abilities aged are invited to enter, whether you are a cancer survivor, want to test your fitness, celebrate or remember a loved or simply do something positive to raise money for a great cause. Entry fee is only £12.99, although participants are encouraged to also get sponsorship and help is available to set up on an on line fund-raising page. Enter by clicking on the banner below or visiting www.Raceforlife.org.

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I normally walk 3.2miles to work which was clocking around 7,000 steps but one day I was late so had to jog the last mile. As I looked at my bug I was distraught to see I had only added 6,000 steps. I know that the bug only counts steps and as I was jogging my steps would have been longer and fewer, but I was disappointed that putting in more effort meant that I had less recorded steps.

Over the lovely sunny weekend I wore dresses where I couldn’t attach my bug to my waist band so I carried the bug in my shoulder bag but then forgot to put it on my clothes when I got to work. I was annoyed with myself when I realised I missed recording another 2,000 steps, but when I got home found I had the expected number of steps as if I had worn the bug all day. Obviously letting the bug bounce around in my bag wasn’t as accurate as wearing it on my waist so I will have to be careful about accepting the counts if it’s in my bag all day.

Although there are community challenges on the website to record the highest number of step count, ultimately the bug is there as motivation to keep me active and tone up so there is no point in trying to trick the bug as I would only be cheating myself. I will have to experiment this week though to see if jogging with the bug in my bag equals each other out and I end up with the same number of steps if I walked wearing it.

As this was my first week I didn’t have any goals I just had to eat as normal and record everything on the website. Unfortunately I got tonsillitis and for two and a half days I couldn’t swallow or eat or drink anything so I had nothing to update my profile with. Then on Sunday I get a text message saying ‘Don’t be a slug…Update your bug!’.  Looking back it was nice to get the reminder text and know that Fitbug was still supporting and motivating me, although at the time I did want to text back ‘Leave me alone I’M ILL.’

In spite of my incomplete first week profile, Fitbug was able to make some recommendations of:

• Step Target 19,500
• Aerobic Step Target 6,600
• Calories consumed 2,000

I’ll let you know if I manage to reach the targets next week. If you have already a Fitbug member then don’t forget I have set up a league for Strenua’s World and I hope readers will join the league for some friendly rivalry and motivation.

If you wish to join me Fitbug.com are offering a 25% Discount to all new customers, simply enter this promotional code ‘SPRING10’ in the appropriate section which is valid until 30th June 2010.

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The FIRM: Power Half Hour designed to produce maximum results in a minimum amount of time;

5 Day Fit Weight Loss designed to add variety to your routine with 5 different fat burning workouts; and

Trudie Styler’s Cardio Dance Flow designed to help improve balance, endurance and help tone your body.

We’ve teamed up with Gaiam, known for their award winning fitness DVDs to offer readers the opportunity to get their hands on a copy of the Trudie Styler’s Cardio Dance Flow DVD.

The DVD, which is out 14^th June is a fully integrated head–to-toe workout, offering fun, flowing dance and stretch routines, which will improve your balance, endurance and help tone your body.

The DVD offers two workouts; a 25 minute fast paced cardio dance routine and a 25-minute core stretch segment. For those pressed for time an abbreviated 11 minute express workout has been created so you can reap all the same benefits but in less than half the time!

Trudie Styler’s Cardio Dance Flow DVD is out 14^th June 2010

To find out more visit www.clearvision.co.uk/gaiam

UPDATE 21.06.10 The competition has now closed.

Congratulations to our winners, prizes on the way to you soon:
Mary W from Norwich
Cheryl H from Manchester
Sheila R from Leighton Buzzard
Christine C from Lancs
Ruth W from Peterborough

Terms And Conditions.

• Competition open to UK entrants only.
• You may enter by email, Twitter AND Facebook, but must only enter by each method once (i.e three entries in total).
• Closing date for entries is 11:59pm 20th June 2010 and late entries will not be considered.
• Prizes are to be donated by Gaiam and 5 winners will each win one copy of Trudie Styler’s Cardio Dance Flow DVD.
• Prize winners will be chosen at random and notified by method of entry (i.e email, Twitter, Facebook). If after 7 days the entrant has not responded with their contact details the prize will be redrawn.
• Strenua’s World reserves the right to cancel or amend the Competition or these Rules at any time without prior notice.

GOOD LUCK

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With music from Trudie Styler’s husband Sting, this is a good beginners home fitness DVD. The routines performed and narrated by James D’Silva are repetitive and along with a footwork tutorial easy to master the moves. You don’t feel intimidated by Trudie as in spite of her ballet and yoga background, never looks like she is pushing herself and the flowing dance movements look like she is taking part in some expressive dance class rather than a challenging exercise workout. It definitely looks like they are having fun even if you just want to laugh at them and the voice over.

One problem with the DVD that I found was that it was very impersonal and there is no encouragement or personal interaction. The warm up routine just begins with a voice saying ‘..And prance and prance and second position, first position…’ without an introduction or description of what second position entails. I also found it strange having a narrator to the routine rather than an instructor talking you through as they or the class do the workout. I thought this was because French and Greek languages were offered at the start but actually that is just for the menu, the rest of the DVD is only in English. Trudie gives a one sentence introduction to the cardio workout and James the stretch workout but I missed someone to keep telling me to keep going as the routine intensified.

The 25 minute core stretch workout is only with D’Silva and again the unique voice over. This is described as a workout that ‘isolates and works every muscle in the body whilst elongating and aligning the skeletal system’. I would love to have discovered if this was true but the entire work out requires a foam roller, something that is not indicated by the accompanying literature. Unlike other workout videos where substitutions can be made if you don’t have the correct hand weights or step, there is no advice given how to modify the routine if you don’t have a foam roller and I can’t think of what could be used as a suitable substitute.

There is also an 11 minute Express workout which contains much of the extended cardio routine but is much more cardio specific with a lot of the slower moves and stretching missed out. As an added bonus there is music from Stings Album ‘Songs from the Labyrinth’, interviews with Trudi, Sting and James and behind the scenes footage.

Whilst I agree with the DVD claims that ‘it allows you to dance, stretch and improve balance through fun and energetic dance routines’, I’m unsure if the word Cardio should be included in the title. The 22 minute cardio dance segment is not what I would consider fast paced as it contains a lot of yoga stretches and positions.

I wore my heart rate monitor during this segment as you can see here, although my heart rate briefly reached 149bpm (74% of max HR)  it averaged at 126 bpm (63% of max HR). It is generally accepted that 60-70% develops your endurance and is considered the fat burning zone whilst 70-80% is the aerobic zone, which will develop the cardiovascular system improving the delivery of oxygen to the working muscles. So I would consider this may suit someone looking for a fat burning rather than cardio workout.

Overall

If you are a beginner to exercising this is a fun gently introduction and I recommend using the footwork tutorial first to learn the moves. However whilst it is fine as a low intensity fat burning workout I doubt it would get many people into what would be classed as a cardio/aerobic zone. The stretch moves are also described well and repeated slowly so beginners can understand and follow although you would need the added expense of a foam roller whilst the more advanced exerciser who already own one may find the routine too simplified.

Release Date: 14th June 2010
Running Time: 1Hr 18Mins

Also read our reviews of other recent fitness DVD releases:

The FIRM: Power Half Hour designed to produce maximum results in a minimum amount of time

5 Day Fit Weight Loss designed to add variety to your routine with 5 different fat burning workouts

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The following workouts are included:

Budokon for Weight Loss with Cameron Shayne uses a combination of yoga, martial arts and meditation to raise your metabolism. What I liked about this session is that instead of demonstrating the poses himself, the workout feels like yoga and martial arts expert Cameron is taking a class and the 6 other people in the video are students. So instead of just telling you to lengthen your spine you can see how he corrects someone’s bad posture. The routine is slow but provides you with a good description and learning experience of yoga poses used in many other workouts.

Walking for Weight Loss with Debbie Rocker is a routine that just revolves around walking. I was a bit sceptical how you can just walk 30minutes but as you start marching on the spot listening to Debbie’s motivational talking you increase the exercise intensity by lifting your legs higher or speeding up or incorporating your arms. Although it is a routine very suitable for beginners, one thing I really liked was that it was great if you had little room to exercise in you could easily do this workout without worrying you didn’t have enough space.

Dancer’s Body Workout with Patricia Moreno is a dance routine that will help you burn calories and sculpt a more lean body. As someone who has no co-ordination when it comes to dancing I liked the slow repetitive development of the movements, slowly moving to the complete routine. Also Patricia described the movement before you did it not during so you already knew what was coming up next.

Cardio Burn Yoga with Patricia Moreno claims to use yoga to rid the body of excess fat. Patricia talks you through the movements describing exactly what to concentrate on. I found it useful that unlike some yoga workouts where the instructor expects you to know what a downward dog is Patricia talks you exactly through what your arms should be doing when you can’t look at the TV as your head is looking at the ceiling or what legs should be doing when you are staring at the floor.

Cardio Burn Sculpt with Tanja Djelevic uses a mixture of cardio and sculpting to not only lead to weight loss but also flatten abs, slim legs and tone the upper body. As it was described as a cardio workout I wore my heart rate monitor during the routine and the results can be seen here. Although it was easy to follow I felt I still benefited from the routine with the first 15 minutes clearly being a cardio workout. Exercising at 70-80% of your maximum heart rate is considered the aerobic zone, which will develop your cardiovascular system and improve the delivery of oxygen to your working muscles. After the initial warm up my heart rate was predominately within this range peaking at 170bpm (85% max), with the final 15 minutes a slower sculpting session.

Overall Review

A fitness DVD suitable for beginners and intermediate levels. Instructors comprehensively talk you through each routine and overall the DVD provides enough variety to maintain your exercise motivation, working all muscle groups through cardio and stretches.

Release Date: 10th May 2010

Running Time: 2 hours 41 mins

Also read our reviews of other recent fitness DVD releases:

The FIRM: Power Half Hour designed to produce maximum results in a minimum amount of time

Trudie Styler’s Cardio Dance Flow designed to help improve balance, endurance and help tone your body

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I admit that although I am physically fit to keep up with the routines and I know the names of a few yoga positions I am not an aerobics expert. Having said that, I think that this DVD is definitely aimed at the high intermediate or experienced aerobic class participant.

Whilst it gave me a good cardio work and I certainly felt the effects the next morning, I did find it confusing at times due to the speed in which Emily speaks and the number of different moves included in each repetition. I doubt I will ever learn the fast, ever changing routine, even if after 10 sessions. A criticism I do have with the DVD however, has to be the screen shots which sometimes just show Emily’s upper body when I would rather be watching what her legs are doing during new complicated leg combinations

Kelsey is there to provide the beginners modification. Although, instead of just showing how to do the workout without free weights or not including the optional jumps, I wish she put in more effort or enthusiasm into her movements as she should be motivating you to do the same.

With the total DVD only lasting 30 minutes it is not something you will be returning to everyday if you want variety, but if you are a hardcore aerobics fiend and one day you miss your regular class this could be a perfect substitute.  There is no chance to rest during the half hour routine and when wearing a heart rate monitor my average heart rate was around 72% of my maximum, reaching as high as 172 beats per minute. So clearly within the zone considered as an aerobic exercise. My heart rate throughout the workout can be seen here.

Overall

An intensive body firming and cardio routine that works the entire body. Fast paced, probably most suitable for more experienced exercisers. At only 30 minutes this DVD lacks variety to be repeated everyday but excellent as a one off workout or part of a varied exercise regime.

Released Date: April 2010

Running Time: 32 minutes

Also read our reviews of other recent fitness DVD releases:

5 Day Fit Weight Loss designed to add variety to your routine with 5 different fat burning workouts

Trudie Styler’s Cardio Dance Flow designed to help improve balance, endurance and help tone your body

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