Strong Curves

osualex

Is anyone doing this program and is it recommended? I'm leaning this way because it can be done with dumbbells and out of the 3 gyms I have access to, 2 don't have the equipment for squat bars and racks and such. I haven't lifted in years so I'd be happy to transition to a bar/rack routine once I get into a routine - the 2 most convenient gyms are in my apartment building and in my office so I don't want to give myself any reason to skip workouts.

Anyone done this?

ssbbg

I tried it and hated it. I picked it for the similar reasons as you- I thought I could do it with dumbbells and the equipment in the gym I had (also apt gym). However, there was still equipment I needed that I didn't have access to (in first month of BB program. I have not tried the other two programs. Also looking at the last two months of the BB program I was also missing equipment for several exercises).

I also found it horribly tedious. The book is badly indexed (at least the kindle version) and some times the names of the exercises in the program chapter and the exercise guide weren't the same. I spent so much time flipping around trying to figure out what I was doing. I finally found a youtube playlist with all the exercises. Some people like the variety. I did not. I found it confusing and difficult to remember what I was supposed to be doing.

The recommended warm-up is something like 20 exercises and took me at least 45 minutes to do, if not more. The actual weight training (I did the BB program) was more reasonable- 8-10 exercises. They were generally 3 sets of 8-13 reps, though the bodyweight exercises were higher reps. That usually took me 45 mins to an hour as well. On top of that, you are supposed to do activation exercises daily (for some unspecified number of reps).

I'm not a huge fan of weightlifting, and the tedium of spending ~2 hours a time doing the routine basically completely derailed me. It was recommended to do 3-4X per week. I managed that for 2 weeks? 3 weeks? Then I tried cutting the warm up exercises. When I went back to the machine circuit in my gym, I found I was weaker across the board, despite spending more time working out.