Cathe Live Review: Lower Body Hiit with Abs
Lower Body Hiit with Abs is a cardio and strength workout from Cathe Live. I absolutely loved this routine! It is an excellent workout that alternates rounds of hiit intervals and standing lower body strength exercises. This is very reminiscent of Cathe's DVD Ripped With Hiit - Lift It Hiit it Legs, which I also love. The workout then ends with a comprehensive core section. I found it gave me a good cardio and lower body / core workout that I really enjoyed!
The workout moves at a good pace – not too frantic - but fast enough to keep the heart rate pretty elevated throughout. The rest periods are also not too long but just enough to catch your breath and be able to give your all to the next exercise or interval. The cardio hiits are all straight forward – just one move that is then repeated for the set number of repetitions. Where relevant they are then repeated on the other side of the body but the intervals themselves are not repeated. The lower body moves are also traditional strength moves and straight forward rep patterns with only one exercise using low ends (the second set of static lunges), the rest are straight forward 2/2 counts or 3/1 counts. The moves are also not too high rep so you can go heavier, if you wish to, although some of them move quite quickly. I did increase my weights on a few of the exercises and I have included the weights I used, if different from Cathe’s, in the breakdown below.
The abdominal work is lifted straight from Cathe’s new LITE (Low Impact Training Extreme) workout series (for a full review of the series and each of the individual workouts – check out my blog post HERE or visit my recent posts page HERE for your Ultimate Guide to Cathe’s New LITE Workout Series). The moves are a combination of the moves in 6-Pack Abs #1 & 2 – so that was great to see!
My only slight complaint is that the workout is so short – just 43 minutes and only 30 minutes of the hiit and lower body combinations. I would have loved it to be twice that length but that’s just a personal preference! I was having so much fun that I could have go on much longer…
(In case you are not familiar with Cathe Live - it is a streaming service from veteran fitness professional Cathe Friedrich, where she provides access to her live classes filmed at her gym in Jersey. Currently, there are over 200 workouts available in the archive, which you can access at any time and a new class is recorded nearly every week. More details are provided at the end of this article).
The workout
Lower Body Hiit with Abs consists of 8 rounds of 1 hiit interval and 1 lower body strength moves. It ends with a good core section using no equipment. The strength exercises are all standing, using dumbbells to increase the intensity.
What You Need to Know
(Rating scale – 1= lowest & 5 = highest).
The Moves
Lower Body Hiit with Abs is 43 minutes long and originally aired on 24th January 2019. The workout starts with a 5 minute warm-up then a quick water break before moving into the first cardio blast.
Cardio moves are shown in bold & italics below.
Ground & Pound – 16 reps each side
Squat’s – two 15# dbs (I used 20’s) – 32 reps
Plie jacks – 24, 16 & 12 reps
Static lunges – two 15# dbs - 24 reps each side
Split jumps – 16 reps each side
Side lunges – putting down & picking up the dumbbell – one 10# db (I used 12#) – 10 reps each side (so total of 20 each side as putting down & picking db counts as one rep!)
Pop squats – 32 & 16 reps
Crossback lunge (each side) then 1 squat in the middle. Ends with just crossback lunges – two 12# dbs
Lean back, volley forward, air jack & jump rope – 10 reps
Static lunges – two 12# dbs – 8 singles, 4x 1 low end, 2x 3 low ends, 4 singles (repeat on other side)
Power circle scissors – 32 reps
Deadlifts – two 15# dbs (I used 20’s) – 16 reps (2/2 & 3/1 counts)
Snow boards – 24 & 32 reps
Single leg deadlifts – two 10# dbs (I used 12’s) – 4x 2/2 & 4x 3/1 counts
Jump forward & back, quarter turn – 12 reps alternating sides
Alternating step out sumo squats – one 15# db
At 30 minutes - Quick 2 minute stretch for the lower body before Cathe gets out a mat and moves to the floor for the core work.
Long leg lift crunches (crunches lifting one leg then the other. Starts with hands behind head then changes to straight arms out)
Roll ups (leaning back with arms out, hold for 4 counts then roll back 2 counts & up 2 counts)
Long reach butterfly sit-ups (lying on back with feet together in frog-style, 1 arm behind the head & the other straight out, do sit-ups)
Wide knee swings (lying back with arms out / palms facing the sky, sit-up bringing one knee in and tapping side of hands (pinkies) together under the knee)
Guard block crunches (lying on back with hands in guard position, crunch up & slip to one side then down & repeat to other side)
Body shot sit ups (lying on back then sit up & body shot one side, lie back down & repeat on other side)
Triangle choke reverse lift (lying on back with one leg hooked behind the other lift up the hips)
W planks (in straight arm plank, tap one foot to outside of hand & back, then same foot taps straight in & out, then other foot taps straight in & out then taps to outside of other hand)
The workout ends with a quick 2 minute stretch for the abdominals (as you have already stretched out the lower body earlier).
Take Action
Try it today! Cathe Live is a streaming service available from Cathe.com – you can subscribe to monthly ($9.99 pm), six monthly or yearly plans and has over 200 live workouts in the archive for you to access at any time.
If you liked this workout, check out my review of Toby Massenburg's Ignite - a 30 minute calorie scorching workout HERE or Cathe Live: Twenty Five - a feel-good workout that is packed with variety HERE.
If you enjoyed this review, please share it with your friends using the links below.