~Andy
I’ve been admittedly tardy with this review, had planned to get it available to the public sooner, but I realized an essential ingredient was missing from a valid and honest review: the actual testing of the program Gold Medal Bodies Parallettes One program (from now on referred to as P1).
I tried every exercise, did the flows, the warm-ups and cool-downs. I must admit, I have already participated in two live seminars provided by Jarlo and Ryan in the past year and thus had an optimistic expectation to this downloadable product. Their seminars I wholeheartedly suggest to others to experience. You receive a lot of intelligently designed information that makes the use of gymnastic props and exercises into a cohesive program that addresses so many different fitness and health goals.
I appreciate that from the get go they caveat that P1 is not a program that’ll make one an Olympic-level gymnast, but is a gymnastics’ exercise program that will give one obvious physical fitness and strength; we all admire Olympic gymnasts and their incredible body mastery which obviously comes from their dedicated practice and uniqueness of exercise creating the athletic strength and agility that makes them “one-in-a-thousand” athletes.
From both the seminars and from previously purchased programs (Rings One and Prasara Primer), I am totally confident with their knowledge base and backgrounds. As they state in the P1 program manual:
“What makes our system unique compared to the various other programs out there? First is the background of the authors. With a diverse and detailed laundry list of gymnastic, martial-art, rehabilitative, performance enhancement, and health qualifications, our experience lends itself to a different approach to training from your average program. As such, we have different goals and expectations for results when we develop our curriculum.“
This is no average follow-along fitness program. First, the P1 manual, an Adobe PDF-download 69 pages in length, though simple in format design, contains all the information and program design necessary for successful implementation of the program. I appreciate that the manual is accurately linked to the videos of the program and that the authors emphasize continual returning and referral to the manual while doing the program. The manual starts off with the all-important, underlying philosophy of the authors and the P1 program. From there it moves into the actual program itself, the design and scheduling of the exercises/flows. Incremental progression is the key to this program, which for me who has practiced CST (Circular Strength Training) since 2006, is a very familiar concept with successful completion goals woven into the fabric of the system. The program is designed so that progress through the program can be successfully achieved by simply following the course through its natural, incremental progression from the basics to the more advanced movements into the flows, themselves.
Also, warm-ups and cool-downs (usually yogic in nature) are emphasized and are as integral to the program as the ‘meat and potatoes’ of the actual parallettes exercises and flows. What I really appreciate is that they didn’t just slap together some movements to ornament this program, but wisely chose prehab and compensatory exercises that actually complement the stress one places on the body while doing P1. They obviously thought out these movements and poses with foresight towards P1’s goals. Prehabbing and active recovery days are integral to the course design. Therefore, instead of potential injury from a difficult (and new to the body’s intelligence) training modality, the necessary compensations for successful progress through the program are timely integrated in your schedule.
As for the videos themselves, I must say that you guys have down a wonderful job. Most of us our visually-oriented in our learning processes. We need a video to highlight what we read in words. The exercise videos have been professionally shot. I love the onscreen text, the different angle shots in the video, the detailed instruction of each and every exercise and then the flows, themselves.
The instruction is so thorough and understandable that I had no problems when I was using the parallettes and following the program. It was as if you guys were beside me coaching correctness out of me.
Though mostly an upper-body emphasized program, P1 also includes leg exercises by the inclusion of a P1 Leg Module with three incrementally progressive levels of exercise. In my testing of the Leg Module, I see how one could get very strong and mobile legs with the training. Also, I love the location of where the Leg Module was videoed.
Like the seminars I’ve attended, both of which was a rewarding experience (I shall return to the next available GMB seminar, I promise), P1 is an excellent and unique program. Unique in comparison to other conventional fitness programs, but obviously typical of the GMB brand. I wholeheartedly endorse P1 and would be excited to see others try it out. In fact, I’m already enthusiastically awaiting the next GMB program release.
Great review!