HOW is this CARDIO??

Been getting alot of questions about whether this workout is "cardio" or not. To break this down simply, the answer is "yes." I think everyone equates cardio to being on a treadmill, bike or eliptical and doing a continual motion in which you sweat, and of course those are "cardio" but so is basically any form of exercise. Anytime you challenge yourself, your heart rate goes up. Cardio means you are working, you are working hard which results in your heart rate rising.

A few times I have heard: "But we move so slow how can this be cardio?"At BPP we are always urging you to move "slowly". This confuses people because one major way to raise your heart rate is to move faster. The other way is to make it more intense, which at BPP means slowing down. This forces your body to work harder and gives you full control but makes the move super intense. I recently had a client wear a heart rate monitor during class and it displayed what I already knew, when we hold positions and slow it down, your heart rate goes up. I would equate this to an interval kind of workout because obviously when we transition move to move your HR will drop back down, but raises right back up when we start moving. This is why a quick transition is so important, keep your heart rate up as well as decreases the time for the muscle we are focusing on to get a break. after all if you want those long lean muscles we must reach that muscle fatigue! We like the shaky shaky at BPP!