Beachbody: A Bizarrely In-Depth Review

I think everyone knows at least one person who is a Beachbody "coach". (Yes, "coach" not coach. It takes no training or expertise to be a "coach". You literally just a sign a paper. No shade, just truth. More on that later.) Over the years, I've known a few people who posted photos of their shakes and post-workout selfies on Facebook from time to time. A couple months ago a friend of mine started posting every day about how she was working out; she was taking the time stuck in quarantine to start tackling some fitness goal. I finally decided to send her a message and ask what program she was using.

I have heard the Beachbody pitch before. As a woman of a certain age (and above a certain size,) people have definitely seen me as a potential client and tried to sell me on it. And, honestly, I'm kind of a pushover. A few years ago a friend of mine was selling jewelry from one of those jewelry party MLMs, and I am now the proud owner of several necklaces. My sister used to sell Tupperware, and guess who now has a cabinet full of Tupperware? A few years later, my sister started selling handbags and organizational home items. I signed up as a consultant.

via Giphy

Here's the thing: while I'm not a huge fan of MLMs, I like to support my friends. And I really like the items that I've bought. I still wear my home party necklaces, I use my Tupperware every day, and my handbags and home organizational items are practical and adorable. So, I'll always give people a shot when they have something to sell. As long as it's not stupid expensive (I'm looking at you, decorative wicker baskets), I'll at least listen to the pitch. For a while, that's what I did for Beachbody as well; I listened but was never interested enough to sign up.

A real product from Longaberger

My friend seemed to really enjoy what she was doing in her posts, and she walked me through the different options for signing up without trying to guilt or shame me into acquiescence. I really like that she didn't push all of the supplement or the extras; she basically found the cheapest possible way for me to sign up (and for her to get whatever credit coaches get for getting people to sign up.) My previous experience with Beachbody was buying the P90X DVD's off of Amazon several years ago. They were fairly pricey, but I did use them quite a bit- at least for a little while.

How the app looks on my phone

Beachbody on Demand lets you stream pretty much every Beachbody release for one yearly fee of $99. The fee is actually less than P90X by itself used to sell for (it was over $100, which I why I bought it on sale on Amazon.) The streaming service is a pretty good deal, as long as you use it. (That's the hard part.) I got a "Challenge Pack" that included Beachbody on Demand, a month of Shakeology, and a set of resistance bands for the workouts. It also had early access to one of their new programs online, although that wasn't really the selling feature for me. All in all, it was $160 plus shipping and handling. I signed up to be a "coach" because it was free to sign up, and I figured I could keep it if I liked the supplements and wanted a discount on them. (This is the later from "more on that later." I'm literally a coach.) I've had the streaming service for a few weeks now, although I just got the Shakeology and resistance bands a few days ago.


Here's what I thought of my first few weeks:

BeachBody on Demand:

21 Day Fix- The first, and so far only, program I tried was 21 Day Fix Real Time. I really enjoyed this program. That's not to say I could actually do all of it. I definitely followed the modifier for most of the moves. What I really liked about this program with that it was done in real time. Everyone in the video was actually completing the work out as one class. They didn't cut away or splice together several different takes, making sure that everyone look perfect in all of the footage. People were laughing at stuff, losing their balance and falling over; at one point somebody just walked across the room, totally not caring that there was a class going on. (I think it was the CEO.)

Promotional image for Beachbody.com

The real time videos are a completely different vibe than traditional workout DVD's. They give you a sense of camaraderie, even though these are paid fitness professionals. The instructor for this program is Autumn Calabrese. She has a rah-rah, "you can do it!" kind of spirit throughout the workouts. She's constantly giving motivation and advice. And it actually comes off as very sincere, which is tough to do in a workout video. At least from I've seen in the many workout DVD's I've tried over the years.

It's also nice to have a difference video for each day of the 21 days. A lot of times, you get programs in a DVD set where you just keep repeating DVDs every few days, switching between several workouts. Even when cycling workouts, the jokes get old and the routines get boring.

There is also a nutrition aspect to the program. My friend gave me a set of the little portion containers, but I honestly couldn't add it in. I should say that I am also on Weight Watchers (which is a whole different review) so I'm already tracking my eating pretty well. The containers are very handy for portioning out food, and I think I would have used them a lot more if I was taking lunches to work.

What were my results? After 21 days, I lost 4 pounds. That may not seem like a lot for 21 days of workouts (Technically, I took 22 days. I skipped one day altogether due to a migraine, and postponed one day after I wasted too much time on TikTok.)

More impressive than the weight loss, was that I lost a few inches off my waist and hips. Usually a four pound loss doesn't register with actual body measurement changes, but this workout also focused on building muscle and increasing flexibility. I took my measurements on day 6 of workouts because I didn't think to do it at the start of the program.

Clueless via Giphy

By day 21, I had lost an inch around my waist and and inch and half around my hips. I think that's pretty impressive!

Supplements:

Shakeology- Beachbody is famous for Shakeology, an expensive meal replacement/dietary supplement shake.

I'm an artist!

I got the Vegan multi-flavor pack to start.  It tastes like a standard protein powder shake. As a long-term vegetarian, I am very familiar with protein powders. Most of them taste a little bit chalky and need to be blended with water or milk, ice, and frozen fruit to taste their best.  I blended the chocolate flavor with water ice and frozen blueberries and it tasted like a basic protein shake; kind of chocolaty and helped immensely by adding frozen fruit to make it creamier. It was pretty much on par with any other protein shake that I have tried. The strawberry mixed in with fruit was much better- it had much less of an artificial taste and it was less gritty. The point where this differs from other protein supplements is in the additional wellness ingredients. Beachbody is very proud of their formulation, and this is their flagship nutritional supplement. Clocking in at over $4 per serving, it's also a very pricey supplement so they do their best to market it as a groundbreaking advancement in nutrition.

Reviews I've seen from dietitians basically say that this isn't a bad products and has some great ingredients that actually do make it a better choice than some standard protein powders. But the claim that this can replace a grocery cart of whole fruits and vegetables is overblown. If you're someone who habitually picks up a smoothie or a blended coffee every morning, you may already have the $4 to $5 a serving budgeted for this, and it would probably be a more nutritionally sound swap.

The regular, whey-based ingredients are here.
Vegan Ingredients: 
Proprietary Superfood Blend:  Vegan Protein Blend (Pea protein, Flax (seed), Rice protein, Quinoa (seed)), Cocoa powder (processed with alkali), Pea fiber (seed), Rose hips (fruit), Chlorella, Pomegranate juice powder (fruit), Yacon (root), Acerola juice powder (fruit), Astragalus (root), Bilberry juice powder (fruit), Blueberry (fruit), Chicory fiber (root), Camu-Camu (fruit), Bacillus coagulans, Organic cordyceps (fungi), Lycium juice powder (fruit), Ashwagandha (root), Organic chaga (fungi), Organic maitake (fungi), Organic reishi (fungi), Spinach (leaf), Enzyme Blend (Amylase, Cellulase, Lactase, Glucoamylase, Alpha-Galactosidase, Invertase), Kale (Brassica oleracea L. var. acephala) (leaf), Schisandra (fruit), Matcha green tea (leaf), Maca (root), Cinnamon (bark), Luo Han Guo extract (fruit).
OTHER INGREDIENTS: Organic cane sugar, Natural flavors, Xanthan gum, Himalayan pink salt, Stevia leaf extract, Mixed tocopherols (to maintain freshness)

So, that's a lot of ingredients, but the superfood blend has some really good ingredients. On the flip side, sugar is the first ingredient in the "other ingredients" and, since they're listed separately, there's way to tell from the label where exactly each part of the formula falls in the percentage of ingredients. (Ingredients are listed from most to least on the label.) Is the "superfood blend" less than the sugar? Is there more protein than sugar, but less pomegranate juice powder than xanthan gum? Who knows! They list "organic cane sugar" but make few other notations of organic ingredients.

Final thoughts:
This has some impressive ingredients, but the cost is fairly inflated. Since the company has switched from charging per workout program on DVD to a (really affordable) yearly membership, they are probably betting on keeping loyal supplement users to keep making a profit.  It's currently $130 for 30 packets (or $98 with a coach discount. Coaches are charged a $15/month fee.) That makes it $4.33 a serving ($3.77 with the coach discount, including the $15/month fee.)

Recover & Recharge- I'm putting these together because they're almost identical in the ingredient lists. Recharge has a vanilla flavor option and no vegan formula, at least as of today on the website. Recover has chocolate and orange flavor options, and a vegan chocolate option. The "muscle recovery blend" ingredients in Recharge are: micellar casein, branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs): L-leucine, valine, isoleucine (2:1:1), L-glutamine

Beachbody has their
own Giphy channel and I can't
believe I just found it now.

For the chocolate dairy Recover, the "muscle recovery blend" ingredients add a couple more forms of protein to the micellar casein of the Recharge formula, whey protein isolate and pea protein isolate, and then includes the micellar casein and amino acids from the Recharge.  Vegan Recover just has pea protein, no whey or casein. Recharge also includes sour cherry in the ingredients, and Recover includes pomegranate extract.

Again, it's very similar in taste to any other protein powder. It's a little chalky, a little gritty, and is helped immeasurably by blending not only with milk, but also with a little ice and some frozen fruit. Similar to Shakeology, the ingredient list looks really beneficial. BCAA's -branched chain amino acids- help repair muscle and have to be obtained from food, and this has L-glutamine (which helps the body repair itself and may help gut function and nutrition) thrown in for good measure.  I'm not a dietitian, but here's a study showing BCAAs causing a reduction in soreness following exercise. The label says it's a 2:1:1 ratio, which is supposed to be good, according to Dr. Google. Since Shakeology has been around longer, there are many more reviews online for it. I didn't see any for Recover or Recharge that weren't on beach body coach's blogs. (I guess this is also a "coach's blog" technically, but I just joined this month I'm not sure I'm going to keep the coaching part of the subscription. It only makes sense if you want the discount on the nutritional supplements.)

Energize- Why does this taste so bad? It's supposed to be lemon flavor, and it kind of is, but lemon with a hint of . . . I don't know, vinegar? The ingredients are straightforward enough: Organic cane sugar, citric acid, stevia leaf extract, green tea leaf extract, natural lemon flavor (with other natural flavors), and silica. This formulation has changed in the past few years, at least since this 2015 review. 

When I first read this I thought silica, like sand? or like those little packets that say "not food" when you open up a bottle of vitamins? A quick Google search shows that Silicon dioxide is a naturally occurring compound and is found in pretty much every living thing on the planet, and even in the Earth's crust. Silica dust is very dangerous, and that's what I had heard about. Since it's a mineral, people take it as a dietary supplements and they claim to have good results from it. But, we don't really know exactly how it effects the human body, according to Google. In any case, it's the very last ingredient so it's probably not worth worrying about.

The very first ingredient is sugar! Which only adds to my confusion as to why this tastes so very bad. Maybe it's the citric acid? Two of the top three ingredients are sweeteners. The supplement has 15 calories, which I'm guessing come mostly from the sugar. The other main ingredient, and probably where the caffeine comes from, is green tea leaf extract. I actually really enjoy green tea, and I wish this supplement stuck to a more natural flavor. With sugar and stevia, this should have a pretty enjoyable taste. And yet . . .

Via Giphy

 You're supposed to take this within 30 minutes of starting your workout. I noticed after downing my 8 ounces of water with one packet mixed in, I definitely had a boost in energy. I think this actually has a more muted effect than some other energy drinks I've tried, but more of a jolt that you get from nursing a hot coffee for a half an hour. I used to have an opening shift at work and had to be there to open the place at 5:45 AM, so I got to be well-acquainted with energy drinks. I can be sensitive to caffeine, so I would generally get the canned option and drink over the course of the morning or afternoon. Although, I once felt like I needed a little pick-me-up in the afternoon and drank a 5 Hour Energy. I stayed up all night.

I painted my bathroom.


Final thoughts:
Do you get a boost of energy from this?
Yes.
Would you probably get a similar boosting energy from any other energy drink?
Yes.
Is it less jarring to the nervous system that other energy shots?
Yes. But who will repaint my bathroom?

Will I reorder?
Surprisingly enough, I think I may reorder the Energize. While I'm not a huge fan of the taste, it does give a quick boost of caffeine, and there's a fruit flavor available.  I guess I could just brew myself some green tea, but, that's just not likely. Other packets like the sugar-free Arizona Green Tea are much cheaper, but hard to find and made with sucrolose, which some studies show may be harmful to a wide range of human function. For now, it seems that Stevia is the better option.

I haven't tried any of the other supplements. I have a box of Shakeology that I finally received in the mail, so I have a few week's worth in my cabinet. Since it took almost three weeks to get here, I don't have enough experience with it to see if it's really that much better than my other (completely organic and much cheaper) usual protein supplement. I hadn't really heard of BCAAs and their role in exercise recovery before now, so thank you BeachBody. I'm going to have to look into other options to see if this is really the most cost-effective supplement. Where BeachBody shines is convenience. I can get vegan formulations of protein powder and BCAA's delivered directly to my door on a monthly subscription through this website. The question is, how much is that convenience worth?

Don't believe me? That's cool, read it yourself:

BCAAs:

• https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/when-to-take-bcaa
• https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6212987/
• https://www.shape.com/healthy-eating/diet-tips/surprising-way-vegetarians-may-be-ruining-their-workouts (If you can read around all the ads. Come on, Shape. )

Glutamine:

• https://www.webmd.com/vitamins/ai/ingredientmono-878/glutamine

Old Energize review:

• https://bestpreworkoutforwomen.com/BeachBody-Performance-Energize-Reviews.html

Shakeology reviews:

• https://abbylangernutrition.com/ask-the-dietitian-is-shakeology-a-good-meal-replacement/
• https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/shakeology-review#eat
• https://www.verywellfit.com/what-is-shakeology-4109078

Not buying stuff

I started this blog with the hopes that it would help me declutter and stop buying so much stuff I don’t need. With quarantine and stay at home orders in full effect, there have been so many sales online.  Right now it’s Memorial Day weekend, and I guess that means we commemorate those we have lost by having barbecues and going shopping. It’s a very bizarre tradition. But we live in a consumer culture, so I guess it all makes sense (?)
Today I saw a sale at Ulta, which is always tough to resist. In particular, there were a couple of eyeshadow palettes from Juvia’s Place. This is a brand that I have listed in my palette-palooza a couple of times, and they are *amazing*. They released a few mini palettes in monochromatic color schemes, and a couple really caught my eye. There’s a palette of beautiful berry shades and one of cool toned purples. I very nearly bought them both, but thank goodness for shipping fees. I just hate paying for shipping! I left them in my cart and decided to sift through my current eyeshadows because, with such a ridiculous amount, there must be something that will match.
This is the palette I almost bought:

From Juviasplace.com

Instagram has taught me that berry shades bring out green eyes. Who am I to argue?

Instead, I looked through my palettes and, unsurprisingly, found about a dozen similar shades. At first, I thought I use the Huda Mauves mini-palette, but that’s too obvious. I chose the BH Cosmetics Royal Affair palette. I had used this twice and decided I didn’t like it, but then I read some reviews that conceded that a couple shades were patchy, but most were great. I used the berry and coral shades here:

I thought about using the tan shades in lower left corner, but I thought they looked too yellow next to the pink shades. I also used the top left shade- Reign- to blend the colors up to my brow bone.

The final result:
 

The darker lighting is in my kitchen, the lighter is next to my window. I think it turned out well! If not "well", at least "as expected". I’m glad to use this palette again, but I’m a bit on the fence on whether to keep it. I don’t think there are any really unique shades. I had said originally that was going to declutter it, so maybe it’s like a standardized test and I should stick with my first instinct.

Palette-Palooza: Week 5

Turns out I never finished this. This is, finally, the last of my eye shadow palettes:

1. Bad Habit After Party: Another Bad Habit dupe! This one was for the Huda Beauty Obsessions Eye shadow Palette in Smokey. These are very pretty, if not basic, colors. Compared to the mauve Obsessions I have from Huda, the formula is pretty similar, but this cost less than $5 in the ShopHush site-closing sale. I super love the shimmers in here. This has mid to deep matte tones so - as the name suggests - this gets smokey in a hurry.



2. Tarte Rainforest of the Sea Vol. III: Another neutral shimmer palette. Not to hate on a brand for doing something well, but this is a basic Tarte palette. Neutral tones and pretty shimmers. This is meant to be a shadow and highlight palette, so I guess you could use this for a variety of mostly gold-toned highlights. The pink shimmer is very pretty, and I think I might have preferred the "Sizzle" palette which has more pinks. But this is the one Boxycharm sent me, so there you have it.




3. Lorac Pro: Love this. LOVE this. By now, this palette is ancient, but it still works just as well. The Smashbox palette I have is dusty, and the Too Faced palettes I have from just last year or the year before already got hard pan, but this guy keeps trucking along like champ. I would love to get all the Pro palettes, but I already have more than enough eye shadow. Like Cher, I would like to turn back time and buy only Lorac Pro palettes.



4. Bad Habit Artistry: This was a dupe for ABH Master Palette by Mario. I've read that the shimmers are more subtle and glowy in the ABH and this had standard glittery shimmers, but I'm more than fine with it. These colors are beautiful (which, I guess, thanks ABH?) and the formula is fantastic. These are well pigmented and blend like nobody's business. Bad Habit is no longer around, but Alter Ego is supposed to have similar quality with a new crop of dupe palettes.

5. Juvia's Place The Nubian Mini: Gorgeous. The rare subscription box palette that is actually worthwhile. The colors are beautiful, and blend well. I usually grab a more ivory shade to blend out a crease shade since the are more mid-toned than my skin, but it's really lovely.



6. Juvias Place The Warrior: After getting the previous one in a sub box, I grabbed this one when it went on sale at Ulta. Just as gorgeous and easy to work with, and this has giant pans. I will never use up all this shadow, but if you are on a budget and want to get just one palette to use everyday- get a Juvia's Place one. The pans will last forever and they are super affordable even when they're not on sale. This has gorgeous foiled golden shades that look metallic on the eyes. They also stick around all day, so you don't get that weird ghost-of-shimmer that sometimes gets left behind from other shimmer shades. I love this.

7. Bad Habit Arabesque: This is actually the second dupe of Soft Glam I own. I bought the Makeup Revolution one not realizing it was the exact same palette as this one. I saw it, I thought, "Such pretty colors!" not for a moment realizing that I thought it so pretty because I already loved this one. With the exact same colors.

via GIPHY

Palettes I have but didn't use this week: 

  

Ipsy Tetris (novelty make-up) Laura Sanchez Moods (cute, but not for me) and Bad Habit Mystere.
I like really like Mystere, and it's the only one of these I actually bought on purpose, not in a subscription box. It's a dupe for the Pat McGrath Subversive palette. It beautiful, but a little . . . much. Not really for everyday wear. I wish I could have caught the beautiful shift in the white shade. It doesn't go on as a solid, opaque color - it's a soft iridescent pink that turns into a shimmery pink when the light hits it. Well done, Bad Habit. We all miss you. I'm sure it's no where near Pat McGrath quality, and has sensible cardboard packaging instead of the luxurious lacquered-box look with a beveled mirror inside, but it was like $4 on clearance, so  . . .

The last two are also subscription box palettes, Ace Beaute Grandiose and Pur Midnight Masquerade.

 

 I was actually excited for both of these because I heard great things about these brands. I used the Ace Beaute palette for a holiday party, and it really is very nice. I never used to like the orange, reds, and golds, but now I've come around. The foil shades are intense and really pretty; I used the copper and gold for my holiday look and they blended beautifully together. I'm not a fan of the Pur Midnight Masquerade, which was disappointing because the pans are generous and it looked like a great colors for me. It smells like vanilla, which is lovely, but I just don't like the color selection in person. it's tough to find shades to create a cohesive look.  It can work better if you use the blushes as shadows, and I did since these blush colors don't work well with my skin tone, but it's just not as enjoyable to use as other palettes I own. I ended up using the light peach blush for a transition shade, the peachy highlighter for a lid shade and the dark brown eye shadow in the outer corner, which was extremely hard to blend and just looked way too dark. I also tried the green shimmer for more color, and it just didn't have the pay off I wanted. I can see a couple ways to combine a few of the shades, but, ugh, too much work. The quality was just . . . fine. Just OK. If I had no other makeup, I guess it would do, but we've established that I have plenty. And what is UP with that tiny mirror? It's like, don't even bother with a mirror if it's going to look like the poster for the 2014 revival of Cabaret.

But I do appreciate a dramatic liner look

And that's it! I did it! That's all my palettes! I will go pass out now.

Not Posting for Months

I guess not posting for months is something I like now, since that's what I did! I have found more stuff I like now, so I have a bunch of ideas for new posts.

Procrastinating is one of the worst habits I have. I think the first post I ever saw from Hyperbole and a Half was "This is Why I'll Never be an Adult" and I felt it in my soul. But today, let's take a look at the best illustration of procrastination that has ever existed.

Hyperbole and Half knows my life

Once I crash, it's so incredibly hard to then come back and do something. I trick myself into thinking "It'll be OK to put this off. Just for today."

Valerie also knows my life. 

(The Princess Bride via Giphy)

Once enough time has gone by, I think, "Well, it's too late now. I should just give up." But now I'm trying to break bad habits and make better ones. So, here I am.

New habits:

1. Take my vitamins. Yes, every day.
2. Exercise. I'm paying for BeachBody on Demand, which is not ridiculous. If I don't use it, then it's ridiculous. 
3. Do my skincare routine every day. Even when I'm tired and would rather face plant onto my bed and pass out. 
4. Inbox 0. This is a big one. I was able to do this for months, but now that everything has gone online, I'm overwhelmed with emails. This is a goal for me to get back to. 

I'm not going to list old habits to break because I just want to replace them with new ones. You can't both leave emails to run rampant and get to inbox 0. So, I'm going to focus what I can do and get it done. 

Hopefully.

PS: I don't own the images used. Also, Allie Brosh is hilarious and you should buy her book. That's not a monetized link, I just love her book.