The fitness rat of yesterday hardly had the choice like the one we enjoy nowadays. He would lift weights, do some cardio on a bike or track, and maybe even stretch some. Programs were designed by professional bodybuilders, and weight lifting was pretty much all of the landscape. The term holistic fitness, needless to say, had yet to be invented.
Fitness, in whatever form it existed, was associated mostly with the gym, thus ruling out many potential enthusiasts.
Then a revolution started and fitness has slowly penetrated the homes of the average Joe and Jane. Beachbody, having a vision, decided that home fitness workouts should be more diversified, holistic, and tackle areas of fitness like performance as well. From that day forward, nothing remained the same.
This article is an attempt to showcase the popularity of different Beachbody workouts on the net and, in doing so, provide insight on the fitness revolution. Who started it, when, and what program made us take a leap forward.
The programs, as you will notice, each tackle a different set of goals or a specific way to get there. Some include equipment, others a set of books and a calendar, and all of them a nutrition program included in the package which you can combine with some of your own supplements, if you’re using one, like Fit Tea. They are meant to transform your body, but your lifestyle as well.
The workouts
The workouts all tackle a different goal, and differ in many respects. While some are designed to make you lose weight fast, making your lungs feel like sandpaper (gotta love these brutal routines, right?), others follow a somewhat less crazy path, providing structure, modifications, a step-by-step approach.
The coaches leading you along the journey have their distinct way of motivating, and most share the type of charm that will keep you engaged.
Insanity workout
A bird of another feather, the Insanity workout changes the way we approach exercising. Shaun T had a hunch that if pushed enough, even the average Joe can become a fitness machine. Millions of copies sold, and hundredths of thousands success stories only prove that he was right. This was for a long time the hardest workout in the world.
P90X
If you haven’t heard about P90X by now you probably live under a rock. A short intro would be this – a 90 day program that uses muscle confusion in order to avoid plateaus, making you progress in the course of three differently structured months; a step-by-step program that will transform your body for good, while you are having the time of your life. Tony Horton will make sure that you do.
Focus T25
Another program from Shaun T, only entirely different from his Insanity workout – with sessions lasting for 25 minutes, this is a very engaging and pragmatic approach to losing weight and strengthening the muscles. For those that cannot seem to find the time for workout, Focus T25 is an hour’s worth of effort packed in 25 minutes only.
Insanity Max 30
Beachbody calls Insanity Max:30 the hardest workout in the world. A new method of training called maxing out, where you go as hard as you can for as long as you can, delivering crazy results in two months and all done with 30 minutes of workout per day.
21 Day Fix
Whereas most Beachbody workouts subscribe to the policy of taking it slow, this one wants to achieve results in a hurry. And it does, very effectively in fact. With a revolutionary idea behind meal planning and portion control, it is as much of a nutritional program as it is a fitness one. The results are amazing, and demand even higher. It seems as though Autumn has found a secret formula that can trigger the fastest progress ever.
PIYo
Watch what the muscle sculpting power of Pilates can do in combination with the flexibility of Yoga and non-stop fluid movements. No equipment and no cardio, this makes PIYO very innovative and fun. The method is quite revolutionary and effective. Read more in the comprehensive Piyo review.
BodyBeast
The single Pump-up workout released by Beachbody, and one that packs muscle more than anything else. Through the dynamic set training method, in 90 days flat, Sagi Kalev will make you pack more muscle than you would anytime on your own. And if you like MMA you can try the Core de Force MMA workout. Read more about it in this Core de Force review.
Insanity Asylum
Asylum is, for me, the hardest workout ever invented. In 30 days only, it will transform the way you look at working out. With six routines of athletic training, it is the closest you will ever come to being an athlete. You will perform and feel like an athlete, and look like one too. Making you a ‘fricking fitness machine.
10 Minute Trainer
Yup, a 10 minute workout each day for great results in two months. Tony Horton listened to the feedback, and figured out that the number one reason for people not working out is time. So he invented the super stacking method of training, where he makes you engage more muscle groups with a single exercise at a time.
Brazil Butt Lift
Leandro Carvalho originally designed his workout for Brazilian supermodel Alessandra Ambrosio- a 60 day program that will tighten your bum while you are having so much fun you will forget you are working your butt off.
Hip Hop Abs
Hip Hop Abs is a dance sculpting routine designed specifically for targeting your core. You will never do a single crunch on the floor, and the moves are very engaging and fun. Short and intensive workouts, with a lot of dance moves, this is Shaun T’s first hit.
The numbers, finally
The graphs are only a scroll away, and a couple of introductory words after. We decided that there are few metrics that showcase popularity among workouts on the net, and gathered the numbers for comparison.
See the numbers and decide for yourself. There is still the math we did at the end of this article – and Lifestyle Updated’s rankings.
Youtube search results
The place where fitness junkies gather, some would say. Reviews, rants about specific workouts and moves, interviews and whatnot… The number of videos created about each workout says volumes about its popularity. So…
Google comparison
Google+ followers
Whereas G+ is less active than Facebook, it is still more active than all those other platforms; especially when it comes to brands and fan pages. Let’s take a look.
Google searches
When judging popularity on the net, this number should be taken very seriously. The reason why I say this is because Google searches convey much intent. For someone to type in a query of a given workout, his intent must be rather strong. Luckily for us, Google allows access to these numbers, and so we did our homework.
Facebook comparison
Facebook page likes
This is a metric that tells a lot about a certain product. Some gather their likes using ads only, while others tend to go viral by a word of mouth association. Nonetheless, we are counting eyeballs here.
Facebook posts likes on average
Now here is the trick- and this is how you evaluate whether most of the likes are gathered by ads only. The popular program, the one who’s content is being actively consumed, by a rule of thumb has more likes on each post, picture and status update. Here is the fun part – we picked month January (the most active in the year for the fitness industry – at least in e-commerce), and took a sample of ten random updates on their Facebook page. We added and then divided these numbers and here is the average.
Twitter followers comparison
Twitter is the unlikely platform for brands such as workout programs to make a following. However, people who religiously follow these programs would beg to differ. Let us see which program has the most birds up and flying.
Lifestyle Updated’s top 5 workouts
It wasn’t easy figuring out an equation that will rank these workout programs in the right order. Transparent as the graphs are, it is still hard to evaluate which metric is more relevant to the task of ranking them, and moreover how to set scores.
This is how we approached it…
In each vertical, be that a number of YouTube search results or Facebook fan page likes, we were going to assign points – from zero to ten, easy. But, whereas 10 would be the one with the highest number, all others would score differently in relation to it. So we figure out the value of one point, by dividing the biggest number by 10. All others are later divided with it, and we assign points in each vertical.
What happens then is we add these points to a name as a sum X, divide 60 (maximum overall points) by sum X and multiply by 10. Now we have a ranking from 0-10 for every workout.
Each vertical is valued equally, for each represents a unique measure of popularity, that is hard to compare (how on earth would you compare what is more important – Facebook likes or YouTube views) it can only be subjective. So we value them equally.
The formula:
z = points from zero to 10 for every vertical for every workout.
x = the sum of all z for every workout.
c = 60 (maximum overall points)
So, the final formula is = c/x*10 (We multiply by 10 in order to get a 0-10 ranking.)
Most popular Beachbody workouts on the net:
The Insanity workout by Shaun T is the clear winner at the end.