If you haven’t been able to tell from my previous reviews, I’m a HUGE fan of Bob Harper’s new “Inside Out Method” DVDs.  They’re amazingly motivating to me, and it’s a breath of fresh air having a workout just destroy me (I mean that in a good way, of course).

In addition to the Body Rev Cardio, Pure Burn Strength, and Yoga for the Warrior DVDs, Bob put out a DVD called “Bob’s Workout.” Billed as “an exclusive look at the cutting edge routines from Bob’s very own training regime,” this DVD is different from the others.  While the other three feature Bob leading three other workout people, this one is Bob training a single minion…more like a one-on-one training session.  Bob isn’t doing the moves, he’s just directing the action.  It’s split into two 30 minute sessions, nominally broken down into upper and lower body but they each work both.

Upper Body (30 minutes)

The first workout has Stephanie (from the Pure Burn DVD) doing Bob’s workout, and just like in the other DVDs, she kicks butt.  It’s really motivational to watch her push herself, and you can tell she’s really pushing.  Unlike the other DVDs, Bob isn’t doing any of the exercises.  Instead, he’s in pure trainer mode, telling her (and us) what to do.  And it’s fast, fast, fast.

But unlike the other DVDs, he’s using equipment other than dumbells.  Early on, Stephanie goes through a kettlebell series with three different weights.  I don’t have ANY kettlebells, so I just used dumbells (Bob mentions that that’s an okay substitution).  Then she does plank rows with her feet on a really tall workout step.  Like over 12″ high tall.  You could use a chair for this, but I just modified them to have my feet on the ground.

And that’s it for equipment – the rest is body weight and dumbbells and most of the moves should be familiar from his other videos.  There were a couple of moves that I was unable to do because of knee and/or flexibility issues (do a deep squat, then drop to your butt, roll backward, then roll forward and squat back up), but even with modifying the uncomfortable moves this is a butt-kicking workout.

Lower Body (30 minutes)

Bob moves on to Zach for the lower body workout, and the workout starts strong.  We get some cardio, some fast squats, and head into the serious workout.  We’re working chest, back, shoulder, and biceps and it’s REALLY hard.  Bob is really pushing Zach to his limit, and I was definitely feeling it.  Let me just say, plio pushups?  The devil’s work.

And this is kind of my problem with the workout.  Bob pushes Zach to the point of failure, but it doesn’t happen to coincide where my point of failure is.  During a later set of shoulder presses Zach starts fading and taking some breaks, and fades even more (and takes more quick breaks) during bicep curls.  By the time he finishes the kettlebells, he ends up taking an 80 second break, followed by some quad stretches Bob makes him do to get him back in the game.  All in all, it’s probably about 90 seconds in a row where you’re sitting there watching, wondering what to do.

A MINUTE AND A HALF IS A LONG TIME TO TAKE A BREAK ON A DVD!

Don’t get me wrong, Zach isn’t faking it…he’s kicking ass and taking names, but I just didn’t happen to need a break right there and it really threw me out of my rhythm (perhaps because I did the 30 minute workouts on different days?).  I ended up doing jumping jacks just to keep doing something.

Once Zach gets back into it Bob kept things moving, but that minute and a half was a long time.

As with the upper body workout, there is some non-dumbbell equipment: a jumprope, kettlebells, a TALL stepup bench, and heavier weights.  All of these moves can be modified where you’re just using dumbbells on the floor, or pretending to hold a jumprope.  (I did squats instead of bench stepups).  I got a decent workout using my own weights, but a heavier set would really be useful for this section.

Conclusion

These workouts are nominally what Bob does when he works out, and you can tell the exercises are butt-kickers.  Overall the workouts are fantastic, and at “only” 30 minutes, each is a good “short” workout when you don’t have time to do one of Bob’s longer workouts.

However, I have a big problem with the long break in the lower body workout.  I don’t have a problem that Zach needed a break…for goodness’ sake he was working out like a maniac.  But when I do a workout DVD I feel like it should be up to me if I need a break, and I get a little lost when the DVD takes such a long break and I don’t know what to do.  I think they should have either edited most of the break out or lowered Zach’s weights so he didn’t need to take such a long one.

Or, Bob could have done like he does in the other DVDs and use more than one model during the workout.  If one poops out, move on to the next and don’t completely stop the workout.  Plus, no offense to Zach, the women are more interesting to watch.  Hey, am I alone here?  LOL

All that said, these are still great workouts and something you could also do in a “real” gym (or a hotel gym).  But would I get this DVD by itself?  Probably not by itself, but it comes with the complete set (which I recommend wholeheartedly) and I’ll definitely be doing it again.  Just know that you’ll have to fill some time in the lower body workout, and that you’ll either need some additional gear or need to modify some of the exercises as you’re doing them.

See our reviews of all of the Bob Harper Inside Out Method DVDs here:

• Bob Harper’s Inside Out Method: Body Rev (Cardio)
• Bob Harper’s Inside Out Method: Pure Burn Super Strength
• Bob Harper’s Inside Out Method: Yoga for the Warrior
• Bob Harper’s Inside Out Method: Bob’s Workout

[note: I bought my own set DVDs and haven't gotten a thing to rave about them, but THEY ROCK!]