Beachbody’s PiYo Starts Today!

**CRACK!**

That’s the sound my lower back decided to make when I was washing my face last week. You read that right: Washing. My. Face! I mean, I knew once I turned 30 that things would start to fall apart. Limbs would hurt more. Running would require lots of stretching afterwards. My body would require more TLC. But for heaven’s sake, washing my face is not a strenuous activity! In truth, I think the intensity of a weekend filled with hiking put some strain on my lower back, and washing my face was just the straw that broke my back… *sigh*. Of course, my right knee has been a nuisance and my upper back has tweaked more than I’d like. The status quo for me these days includes an injured [insert injury location here]. Clearly something had to be done! But what??

I realized then and there that the yoga and stretching I did last year and throughout my P90X3 fitness challenge earlier this year would need to take centre stage once again. When I made flexibility a priority, I had fewer injuries. Lately I have been working through Beachbody’s Body Beast program with great results and I recently started running again, but along the way, yoga and stretching were tossed to the side. I blame my injuries on increased muscle strain and a lack of stretching.

Well all that changed today! I’ve decided to start PiYo.

What is PiYo?

Today was Day 1 of Beachbody’s newest program. PiYo is a program from Chalene Johnson, creator of the Turbofire series, and focuses on a combination of “Pilates” and “Yoga”. There are no weights or high impact jumping, but what you can expect are great, core-strengthing, fat-burning, flexibility-enhancing, body-sculpting results. Sign me up! I think this program will be the perfect one for me to improve my strength and flexibility while getting a cardio workout without the impact to my knees. Over the next 60 days, there will be 8 workouts ranging from 25 to 45 minutes each:

• Align: The Fundamentals
• Define: Lower Body
• Define: Upper Body
• Sweat
• Core
• Strength Intervals
• Drench
• Sculpt

Since today was day one, I have only completed Align: The Fundamentals, which focuses on posture and basic yoga moves like warrior pose and downward dog. But according to the promo video, it’s going to be quite the sweat-inducing 2 months… and I can’t wait! Want to see what it’s all about? Take a look at the promo video yourself :)…