Day 2 of The Asylum is entitled “Strength”.
I don’t know about strength. Strength is usually built with low reps, size with 8 to 12 reps, and endurance with high reps. We were doing a lot of reps, and, of course, there was a huge cardio aspect to the routine. This is, after all, a Shaun T program!
But when I question the title, I am picking nits. This is strength building, for sure, compared to the original Insanity program.
So let me drop the nitpicking there, because this is the best Shaun T workout I’ve ever done.
I really enjoyed “Strength”. The moves were challenging and I felt that my body — my whole body, including back, legs, chest, arms, shoulders, abs — were all worked — I will be sore tomorrow. And this was all done in only 50 minutes, including warm-up and cool-down.
The equipment needed is a set of dumbbells, fairly low weight (I used 12.5s, but will probably go to 15s for the next time through), and a mat. Again, as I mentioned in my review of Day 1, I really needed more space to complete this workout, but only for one move toward the end, and I was able to adapt the move to accommodate my smaller space.
This routine is really well constructed, starting right out of the gate with using a single dumbbell during the warmup, and progressing from there.
The best sets of the day consisted of a multi-move piece that involved a curl, a squat, a pushup, two lateral moves, another pushup, and 8 plank runs, with a jump up at the end. Try doing that 8 times fast. Wow!
I cannot wait for the next time this comes around and will definitely be adding it to my hybrid workouts.
Day 3 is called “Back to Core” and I’m thinking, “Right. When has Shaun T ever left the core to need to get back to it?” Looking forward to it!