Hey everyone! I decided to log my experience of the Chloe Ting 2 Weeks Shred challenge in Oct-Nov 2020 to help anyone deciding whether or not to give it a go come up with their decision, by showing you the kinds of routines that make up the challenge, so that you can see if they are the ones for you! The great thing about this routine is that there are lots of breaks, and you can substitute each exercise or do a low-impact or high-impact version depending on your body type. I will be posting my review and results on my YouTube channel too, and I hope that you enjoy this post!
During 2020 I heard the name 'Chloe Ting' floating around a lot on social media. I knew that she was a fitness influencer and I knew that lots of people claimed that she had some super hard workouts that could make you the fittest you've ever felt.
I had never done a scripted workout routine - let alone a fitness challenge - until two weeks ago. I hadn't visited a gym since February (due to the global pandemic), and my sessions were always very low-intensity (exercise for me was - and is - simply a way to burn excess energy so I could sleep well at night and maintain a happy and healthy body!).
But by October 2020 I felt like now was a really good time to try a fitness routine! I was only doing between 2,000-10,000 steps a day (as I wasn't venturing anywhere beyond my home), so I thought that adding indoor full-body workout routines would be a great benefit to my health. And, like I said, I had heard the name 'Chloe Ting' floating around a lot recently...
So I decided two nights before I began the workout challenge that I would try her 2 Weeks Shred fitness programme (which you can access for free on her website)! Before starting I watched one review video by a YouTuber my age and she made it sound very difficult - she said that she was sick after 3 minutes, and generally struggled over the first few days. I had never seen one of Chloe Ting's workout videos before but I wanted to go in with an open mind, regardless of what other people had said (because everyone's body is different!). Day 1 of the challenge was my first insight into her workout style.
And now here we have my full two-week log of the challenge ...
Day #1: October 22, Thursday
The first thing that I did was take a 'before' video of my abs area. After that I began Day 1! I started with the 'optional' 6 minute warm-up routine, which I believe is super beneficial; without this, my muscles would not have been as warm and ready for exercising (particularly on a cold English morning) and I think it got me in the swing of moving. I followed this with the 15 minute full-body workout, which is mandatory for almost every on-day of the challenge. I found it surprisingly do-able, and it was a great combo of abs and lower-body. I even did the upper-body exercises, although this isn't something I have ever done before. After doing these two routines in the morning, I showered and left the other exercises for the evening, wherein I did the 10 minute 2-weeks abs video and the 12-ish minutes legs and glutes. I found them to be welcomingly do-able for a combination of reasons, including because there a rest periods after each exercise, and because Chloe Ting guides you through each one. I was a little bit sore in my ribs, but other than that I was okay!
Day #2: October 23, Friday
Friday was a bizarre one for me, as I woke up before 4am and couldn't get back to sleep, so I decided to get up at 4.45am and do the 'optional' 6 minute warm-up (which I really like), 15 minute full-body, 10 minutes of abs, and about 3 minutes of the cooldown. At 5.30am I showered and then went back to bed until like 8.30am (I must say, after the workout, I did sleep well!). In the evening I did the 'optional' 6 minute warm-up again, and the 10 minute abs again instead of the core and arms routine, as I noticed that she did a lot of planking-type exercises and, as a traditional artist, I can't put too much pressure on my wrists. I wrapped it up with doing 3 minutes of the warm-up and cool-down exercises (which are 'optional'), to wind down after the workout. I didn't feel too sore this day and felt like this was going at the perfect pace for my body type!
Day #3: October 24, Saturday
On Saturday I did the 'optional' 6 minute warm up, 15 minute all-body, 10 minute abs, and 15 minute legs and booty all in one go in the evening. Due to all of the little rests between the exercises I found it do-able, and you feel super accomplished when you finish a 40+ minute workout. The only changes that I made were swapping most of the plank/wrist-compromising exercises with other core-focused exercises. By supplementing some exercises for other ones I felt like I was still doing the challenge, but tailoring it for my body's needs, which is essential for staying safe and well. Another great thing which stood out for me when I was doing the routines is that Chloe Ting allows her audience to see her also struggling and performing things imperfectly, which I think is very reassuring for beginners to fitness workouts - even the pros don't get 100% all of the time! My legs were a little bit jellyish after this session :)
Day #4: October 25, Sunday
Sunday was an 'active rest-day'. This felt good - the break was well-deserved! Plus, I made amazing garlic bread for lunch and my mum made super vegetabley pizzas for dinner (all homemade so healthy and delicious).
Day #5: October 26, Monday
Monday's workout was structured as a longer one, with a core and arms workout, and a plank challenge workout included in the package. To save injuring my wrists I knew that I would not be doing these two so I swapped them out for the 15 minute legs and booty, and I did the 'optional' 6 minute warm-up and 2 minutes of the 'optional' cooldown - the logic behind this was to equal up time-wise the workouts that I couldn't do with those that I could, so that I was still working out for the right amount of time :) This day also comprised of 15 minutes full body (I really like this routine! It is in 4 different sets, and I tend to swap the exercises in set 3 because they are plank exercises, but other than that it is a great full-body workout!) and 10 minutes on abs. I had eaten a big lunch and gave myself an hour and a half before I did the set in the afternoon, but I started off feeling pretty queasy because I must have been so full of food - so word to the wise: it's much better to do your workout on a more empty stomach!
Day #6: October 27, Tuesday
Tuesday's routine looked like a long one with four mandatory workouts - one full body, one abs, and two legs/glutes - but my left glute was aching when I began, so I decided to split day 6's workout between days 6 and 7, seeing as day 7 was supposed to be a 'rest day' anyway (aka a day without workouts). On day 6 I did the 'optional' 6 minute warm-up, the 15 minute full-body, and the 10 minute abs, saving the butt workouts for a day when my glute was not in pain. As much as I wanted to do all of the exercises, I thought it would be more dangerous to my body to keep going if there was already an ache. Nevertheless, post-workout I had a look at my body to see if it had 'changed' over the 6 days so far and I do think that there have been developments! When I began (as you can see on my YouTube video), I naturally had the '11' line ab definition, but by day 6 I could see that the flat section in between the '11' lines had began to tone into four more defined ab shapes, which I see as a sign of getting a bit fitter and a bit stronger, which can only be a good thing :)
Day #7: October 28, Wednesday
The end of day 7 / the first week is another 'active rest day', meaning that there are no set exercises but, as there were 19 mandatory minutes that I hadn't done on day 6, I made these up on the morning of 'rest day' day 7 by doing 3 minutes of the warm-up routine, followed by day 6's 10 minute side-booty routine (which I did in its totality, not swapping or substituting any of the exercises, which I was very proud of, as most of these were balancing on your wrists!) and then I did 2 x the 3 minute Ariana Grande abs workout. All of these routines felt really good and natural for my body type which was amazing! After I did the exercises I took a video clip of my one-week's progress and some natural stills (by this I mean that this was my 'natural' body state and I did not suck my stomach in, et cetera). For a natural state, I think that the workouts have worked well at keeping me fit and healthy so far!
Day #8: October 29, Thursday
For my workout on day 8 I started by doing 3 minutes of the 'optional' warm up routine, and then I did the 25 minute full body burn. My favourite exercises in the 25 minute routine were the jumping ones because I could really feel these in my core! I swapped some of the ones that were heavy on the wrists for the lower impact versions, or for a different core/glute exercise. 25 minutes can seem like a long time and lots of the rests were 10 seconds, so I fast-forwarded through these, and for the last couple of minutes I played the video at x 1.25 speed, because I thought a more high intensity version would be just as good as a slower one, and I didn't want to feel bored, or as if I was wasting my time on exercises that might not have much impact. Then I did 1 minute of the prescribed ab routine, and I followed this with 3 x the more HIIT 3 minute ab workout - the 3 minute Ariana Grande routine is much more HIIT in style as there are no breaks and the exercises are ones that I can really feel and enjoy! This felt like a good swap for some of the routines which were recommended for the day. Every body is different and, since I found Chloe's more HIIT ab routine, I thought I would keep doing it since I was having a blast when I did so!
Body update: generally speaking, my ab lines are more defined already, even throughout the day, including after eating and also during time-of-the-month bloating (which is me during the course of this programme! The fact that I have not bloated during these particular times is a happily surprising outcome from doing the programme). Additionally my glutes feel newly hard now, which must mean that the muscles are gaining strength with the training :)
Day #9: October 30, Friday
I did pretty much the whole of Friday's routine exactly as it's laid out on the programme page, including half of the optional routine, which I was very proud of! The only adjustments I made was missing the 3ish minutes of planking during the 15 minute full body workout, and changing some of the plank positions in the abs and booty workouts so that I didn't hurt my wrists. So, in totality, I did 3 minutes of the 'optional' warm up, 11-12 minutes of the full body workout, the 10 minute abs routine, and the 15 minute booty and legs workout! My legs were a bit jellyish after this one and, from doing some of the planks in the abs routine, I could tell that these really work my abs! Overall, a great session.
Day #10: October 31 (Halloween!) Saturday
First of all, happy Halloween! I hope everyone has had a great time celebrating - for me, I made vampire pancakes for breakfast and helped carve our pumpkin before lunch :) On day 10 my house was having an autumnal refresh, so my workout space wasn't accessible - this meant that if I wanted to exercise I would have to do it in my upstairs bedroom (meaning no jumping etc). So I decided to partially swap day 10 and day 11. Day 10 was meant to be 1 x full body and 2 x abs, whereas Day 11 was a rest day; I reordered the routine around my circumstances so I would do 1 x abs (or, in my case 3 x 3 minute abs!) on day 10, and then 1 x full body and 1 x abs on day 11. I had to work the programme around my life and this is okay, as the whole point of the programme is the upgrade your life, not hassle it!
Day #11: November 1, Sunday
I used the day 11 'rest day' to catch up on day 10's workouts, so I got up at 7am and did 1 minute of the 'optional' warm-up, 12 minutes of the full-body routine (out of the 15 minutes, I skipped the 3 minute planking set, as I don't want to damage my wrists), and the 10 minute abs routine. I fast-forwarded through the rest periods because I didn't find them necessary and I didn't want to spend 30 minutes on the routine if only 25 minutes of it was doing the exercises! I found the routines simple as I have been doing them for over a week now, and my abs are definitely more defined!
Day #12: November 2, Monday
I had some unfriendly pms symptoms on day 12 so I decided to take full liberties with the day's routine in order to do a workout that was right for how I was feeling at the time (being intuitive with workouts is a beneficial and important thing to do!). Chloe Ting's routine was 1 x full body, 1 x abs, and 1 x legs - I knew that I didn't want to do the full body routine as I found it to be very low-impact and very long (25 mins, but with 10-20 second rest breaks), so it wouldn't really benefit me at all - I felt like doing it would just infuriate me! I decided to do 1 minute of the 'optional' warm-up, the 10 minute abs routine, and the 3 minute ab routine three times, as I love how HIIT the 3 minute one is.
Day #13: November 4, Tuesday
The final two days of workouts looked like this - day 13: 1 x full body, 2 x abs; and day 14: 1 x full body, 2 x abs, 1 x bum. On the actual day 13 (Nov 3rd) my pms symptoms were not as bad as the day before, but they were there, and I didn't feel like working out, potentially because I had worked out on pretty much all of the rest days, I think I needed a break from it (not physically, but mentally I was feeling a bit drained). So I decided to use Nov 4th (the actual day 14) as my day 13, even though my mc had arrived. I was going to work out in my bedroom which meant no jumping, so I decided to focus on ab routines. Day 13 was meant to be 1 x full body and 2 x abs, but I missed off the jumpy full-body (the full body ones aren't my favourites anyway!), meaning that on Nov 4th I did the 10 minute abs routine, and the 10 minute lower abs routine. The good thing about day 13 was that the lower abs routine was a new one that hadn't been in the rest of the programme's days, so it was novel to do it. As I skipped through the rests I really enjoyed these two! My abs felt like they had done a nice workout when I finished :)
And then I had to stop! I did 13 out of the programme's 14 days of workouts, and I had to stop because it was a certain *time of my month* which made working out much less of a priority. (Basically I hadn't thought about the timing of the 2 weeks shred, so I should have started a week earlier - this might be something to keep in mind if you choose to do it!) Over the days when I didn't work out I did actually miss it, mostly because the workouts made me fall asleep so easily. So in summary...
Pros:
- You feel more fit and healthy
- I didn't feel sore or in pain
- You do gain abs and body definition
- The workouts aid a great night's sleep
- I would do the 3 minute no-rest workout again, as part of my daily exercise
Cons:
- There are a lot of unnecessary breaks
- Some of the exercises don't feel like they have much effect (but every body is different)
- A lot of planking / wrist-heavy exercises
- Some of the videos seemed to be unnecessarily long workouts that could have been shorter/more HIIT style
So would I recommend doing the 2 weeks shred? Yes - why not! But I don't think you need to do it identically to how it's prescribed. Some workouts may not work for you or you may not like and that is fine! Do what is best for you. You might love it!
Let me know if you have tried it in the comments below, or over on my Instagram ♡
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The cover photo is by Eternal Happiness from Pexels.
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