By: Nicole Nichols, SparkPeople Blogger
9/30/2008 6:55 AM   :  48 comments

See More: fitness, workout video, DVD, home workouts, cardio, dancing, product review,

I am a huge fan on ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars” TV show! So when I heard about their first cardio dance DVD (back in 2007), I was so excited. But sadly, it got some poor reviews, so I didn’t bother buying it. Fortunately for me, a new one just came out a matter of days ago, so I jumped on the chance to try it out, hoping that the producers might learn from the mistakes of the first one and make a better workout the second time around. I tried it out at home last week, along with my best friend. Want to hear what I thought about it?

Dancing with the Stars: Latin Cardio Dance ($11.99 from amazon.com) features a 3-minute warm-up and five separate sections, which you can do all at once, or one-at-a-time. There are four 10-minute dancing sessions: the meringue, cha-cha, samba and mambo, and a 15-minute “dancer’s toning workout.” You don’t need a partner at all—everyone just dances on their own on the DVD. We opted to do all the segments at once, which took us just under an hour to complete.

I’m no ballroom expert, but I didn’t see a ton of variation among all of the dances. Despite that, I didn’t think it was boring at all. As simple as it was, this workout was actually kind of fun! Each 10-minute segment really flew by and was over before I knew it. The choreography was fairly simple and easy to follow for the most part, which is hard to come by in a lot of other dancing DVDs I’ve seen. The pace was comfortable. I felt like I could keep up with it pretty well in terms of following the basic steps, but the idiosyncrasies of each dance are more difficult to master—I have even more respect for the celebrities who go on this show and make it look as good as they do!

PROS:

• The workout is fun and you don’t really feel like you’re exercising.
  
  
• The movements are small enough that you can follow along in your living room.
  
  
• It’s pretty fun to watch the dancers in their costumes simply because their technique is so amazing. Certainly, my own technique doesn’t compare, but I still had a good time trying!
  
  
• The “dancer’s toning” at the end included some challenging squats, lunges, balancing and core moves (like the plank), and pushups, so it was pretty well-rounded for being so short.

CONS:

• In terms of “cardio” this workout was not challenging for me. I wore my heart rate monitor and my heart rate was pretty low (around 52%) the whole time. There are a few quicker bursts in some of the dances that got my heart rate up above 60%, but it didn’t go much higher than that. Actually, the most challenging part was the toning at the end, which elevated my heart rate close to 70%. Overall, I’d compare the intensity to light walking.
  
  
• The dancers are amazing, but it’s clear that they are dancers and not fitness instructors. They didn’t give a ton of “cues” or explanations in terms of form or safety. Also, there weren’t any modifications to make dancing and toning moves easier. The toning segments were somewhat challenging, so those might be too difficult for some people to follow safely.
  
  
• There was no cool down and very little stretching. Each dancing segment ends abruptly, which is OK if you’re doing to just do all of them anyway, but even after the final toning segment, there is no real cool down. I also would have expected more stretching from a dancing workout.
  
  
• In terms of safety and alignment, there’s a lot of turning, twisting and rotating at the ankles, knees, hips and spine, yet very little attention paid to how to stay safe while doing that. Also, the dancers wear high-heeled shoes but don’t say anything about what you should wear at home. (I’d recommend regular exercise shoes.) And because of all the twisting and directional changes, this workout could potentially be unsafe for people with previous hip, knee or ankle injuries, and those who might be prone to such injuries.

Overall, if you’re a fan of the show and enjoy dancing, you might want to give this DVD a try. I’d recommend it for beginners since the overall exercise intensity is low, but it’d also be good for people who want a dancing workout that’s less complex and easier to follow. Seasoned exercisers won’t get much out of this in terms of fitness benefits, but like me, you might enjoy it on days that you don’t really feel like workout out but still want to do something.

Are you a big enough fan of the show to try this DVD?