Posted in: Workouts / Workout Programs

FB Bodyweight Round 2 (and some comparisons with Round 1)

Hi all!

I completed Bodyweight R2 several days ago and since then have felt compelled to put together some kind of a review as usual. But… seems that FB has spoiled me rotten! This was the 10th program I did (two of them twice) and I’ve got nothing but praise for every single one, so it has become expected, they’re all fantastic, smart, challenging, fun, effective, and the main differences between them are already given in program descriptions. I’ve got nothing new to report :)

Still, some personal impressions that come to mind:

In comparison with Round 1 (from how I remember it, I did it about a year ago), I liked Round 2 better, can’t say exactly why. Kind of felt better tailor-made for me. With both I noticed improvements in my performance and definition. I think also both felt a bit more challenging than I expected. Besides overall total body focus, R1 felt a bit more upper body oriented, and R2 a bit more core oriented. I remember being overwhelmed with the amount of push ups in R1, not so (thankfully) in R2. I also remember adding my own extra credits on lower body days in R1 and this time didn’t feel the need to add anything. Round 2 felt like it has more cardio/HIIT, more of an endurance challenge while R1 more of a strength/stamina challenge… I’m not entirely sure if all this is really true or how it felt to me because of my own fitness levels at the time(s). I just remembered, in Round 1 they had several videos where they used dumbbells (saying it’s also good without) while I don’t remember it happening in Round 2.

All in all, both are great but Round 2 is my favorite of the two.

On to some more factual stuff (about R2):

- It has 42 videos ranging from July 2013 to March 2017 (3 from 2013, 10 from 2014, 9 from 2015, 16 from 2016, 4 from 2017). 10 videos are separate warm ups or cool downs or recovery videos, so 32 “proper” workout videos (all further stats refer only to them)

- 11 videos are HIIT (and 10 days – per 2 in first and last week, per 3 in middle weeks). 2 of them are, by my rating (in July I started making my own database of FB videos with more detailed filters and notes), “pure cardio/HIIT”, 3 are “mostly cardio” (meaning they have just a few non-jumpy exercises, in this case most often push ups or plank-ish stuff), and 6 are a mix of more clearly separated cardio (HIIT) and strength training (here for ST part most often core)

- 8 videos are cardio but not HIIT. 2 of them are kickboxing. One I wouldn’t call cardio (it’s that type of strength training that ends up feeling cardio + pilates). Those 3 are marked as “low impact”, plus one more (of the 8 non-hiit-cardio) but that last one I disagree about it being low impact

- other low impacts are of course the videos without cardio, 13 of them, either strength training or toning or pilates

- pilates: in those daily descriptions in the calendar pilates is mentioned only once (“Day XY: HIIT + Pilates” :)) but there are 2 more videos marked as “pilates” in type (by FB), and 5 more that aren’t but definitely have some pilates exercises included

- “toning” is an interesting notation don’t you think? :D (interesting as in confusing, I mean, what workout isn’t toning?) – so that’s exactly what I checked – of the 32, only 5 aren’t “toning” and I see no rule to it. One is pure pilates (the mother of toning!), two are cardio/HIIT, two are (bodyweight) strength training. I did find some sense in turning it around and searching “toning but not cardio nor strength” – there are 6 of those, all level 3, short (10-ish minutes) extra credit type of videos.

- difficulty: three level 5 videos, 13 level 4s, 15 level 3s, one level 2 (that one follows a hiit video, no wo day is as easy as level 2)

- body focus: strictly upper – 4 videos (77 minutes), upper + core – 4 videos (104 minutes), upper + total – one 49min video. Strictly lower – 8 videos (159 minutes), lower + core – 2 videos (73 minutes). Strictly core – 5 videos (92 minutes), core + total – 2 videos (29 minutes). And 6 videos (209 minutes) of total (without any extra) focus.

Alright, gonna stop now before I start meandering all over the place (I know, too late for that)… I hope some of it was useful to you. I kept note of exercises too, if there was ever any doubt about my nerdiness, ha! :D but I won’t bore you with that except a little fun fact: there are altogether 251 different exercises in the program (not counting warmups, cooldowns, recovery days)

And to finish off with again some subjective impressions – instead of favorite/ not favorite, I’ve made a system of rating (of liking) from 1 to 7. My average personal rating for the entire program turned out to be 5,5! That’s a lot of great, enjoyable, fun, challenging, lovable workouts! Highly recommend!

Cheers