After completing the last day of Insanity: the Asylum Volume 2

Well, I have completed my 30 days of Asylum Volume 2. I will summarize by saying that anyone who enjoyed Volume 1 will love Volume 2. A lot of the workouts build on what Shaun T designed for Volume 1.

For example, in Speed & Agility (Volume 1) Shaun T utilized movements that developed your agility through exercises that demanded fast, coordinated movements with the agility ladder. X-Trainer (Volume 2) builds on this by requiring you to do the same; but with difficult movements. Thankfully, Volume 2 comes with a DVD that is dedicated to explaining all the agility moves so that you can learn them in a slow, steady process…and be ready to kill it during the workout.

Power Legs (Volume 2) is essentially the next level of Vertical Plyo (Volume 1). For those of you who have done Vertical Plyo, you know that its 40 minutes of absolute crazy hard moves that are guaranteed to completely exhaust you if you are continually pushing yourself. My first time through Power Legs I got through the warm up and thought “wow, this is much easier than Vertical Plyo”…..WRONG…..Lets just say the warm up is deceiving compared what happens during the actual workout. I won’t spoil the fun; but what I will say is that Power Legs is longer than Vertical Plyo, has more breaks; but like Vertical Plyo you’ll wake up the next morning with wobbly legs (at least after the first few times you try it). If you don’t feel that way…either you didn’t work hard enough OR you’re in Insanely good shape.

Other workouts in the series are completely different than Volume 1. For example, there is no direct sequel to Volume 1’s ‘Strength’ workout. Instead there is an upper body workout “Upper Elite” and a Back and Core workout, “Back+6 Pack”. Together they present the strength component (along with certain moves in X-Trainer…..Moving Matrix Pushups (ouch!)). I love the Back+6 Pack workout. In P90X and P90X2 I got so used to doing Chest and Back together or Back and biceps together; but doing abs and Pull-ups? Its a surprisingly awesome mixture. The Upper Elite is also an excellent workout and complements all of the programs of Volume 2. I will say that I do miss the ‘rock climber switch’ from Volume 1. Most people hate it because its so hard; but after a year of doing that move in Volume 1, there’s no replacing it….

Ab Shredder. You’d think that after doing Ab Ripper X, X2 Ab Ripper, Insane Abs, Cardio Abs, or Combat’s Core Attack that you have done every core move under the sun and that you can take anything that Shaun T or Tony Horton can dish out. I thought that going into this 20 minute core workout; but I still had to take breaks my first time through. Volume 1 lacked a dedicated Core workout, so I think Shaun T made this one extra hard to make up for it….at least it feels that way.

Finally (not counting the Stretch DVD or ‘Pure Contact’), Championship+Sudden Death OT is the ‘sequel’ to Game Day. Is it Harder or Easier? Like the other workouts in Volume 2, compared to volume 1, its hard to say if its easier or harder. This workout definitely builds on what you get from Volume 1 though. The agility moves are harder and like X-trainer, you have to be more focused and and more agile to prevent yourself from messing up your ladder. Personally, I like Championship better than Game Day. It demands more from you and it will definitely make you a better athlete. The best part (or hardest part depending on the perspective) is that the ‘Fit Test’ comes at the end of this workout. So after 55 minutes of pushing it, you have to max out with the hardest agility/plyo sequence of the Volume 2 series. For this reason, this is one of my favorite workouts of Volume 2.

So in a nutshell…Volume 2 Rocks! If you got Volume 1 and you enjoyed it, then do yourself a favor and start training with Volume 2 for 30 days and then continue with the 60 day ‘complete’ Asylum Hybrid.