8 Minutes in the Morning: A Simple Way to Shed up to 2 Pounds a Week Guaranteed
8 Minutes in the Morning: A Simple Way to Shed up to 2 Pounds a Week Guaranteed
Fitness trainer Jorge Cruise has helped 3 million cyberspace clients lose weight, and now he’s headed for your bookshelf with the same goal in mind. In just eight minutes a day, says Cruise, you can drop two pounds of fat per week, change your shape, and gain muscle and energy. His secret formula: an inspirational “wake-up talk,” followed by strength training two muscle groups per day, eating according to his “eating card” program, and keeping a journal. For exercise, Cruise presents a varied, 28-day program of illustrated exercises using dumbbells. Why the emphasis on strength training? While aerobics burns calories while you’re exercising, adding muscle revs up fat burning at rest by increasing your metabolic rate. Every pound of muscle you gain burns an extra 50 calories per day. You’ll look better and feel younger and more energetic, resulting in more activity, burning more calories, he says. Cruise’s eating plan emphasizes “good” (omega) fats, complex carbohydrates, high-quality protein (low in saturated fat), and vegetables, with dairy, fruits, and “treats and cravings” in moderation. His “Eating Card System” gives you an allotment of portions from each of the food groups. If you’re the kind who likes the regimentation of following a specific program every day, Cruise will get you moving, eating better, and losing weight. –Joan Price With 8 Minutes in the Morning you will:
NOT do aerobics, NOT spend hours in the gym,
and NOT be on a starvation diet.
What’s Jorge’s get-slim secret? Just 8 minutes of his unique strength-training moves done in the privacy of your home. A few minutes each morning is all you need to lose up to 2 pounds a week. Add the cutting-edge eating program that teaches you how to eat the right fats to satiate your hunger and cut your calories, plus a daily dose of motivational support from Jorge, and weight loss has never been easier!
Jorge’s fat-burning program includes:
- Two super-quick moves a day
- A delicious eating plan where you don’t count calories and you must eat fat
- Daily pep “talks” to help you hit the ground running
- Access to Jorge’s online community that will help keep you encouraged and connected
- Plus, you’ll find Jorge’s brand-new “On-the-Go” Weight-Loss Travel Cards inside.
So get ready to look slimmer, sexier, stronger in just 8 minutes!
User Ratings and Reviews
2 Stars A solid concept with a poor plan of execution.
Let me first state that the central idea of 8 Minutes In The Morning, raising metabolism through daily strength training, is a very solid concept, though certainly not original to this author. Basically, you start every day with two rapid pace strength training exercises (push ups, dips, lateral raises, squats, etc) with the intention of firing up your metabolism for extra calorie burning throughout the day. I personally think this is a great idea…but it is not the Holy Grail of weight loss quick fixes the author advertises.
There are two hidden catches with Jorge’s plan that are not suggested by the title and initial information, power-walking and diet. The author advises incorporating a walking plan into your regiment to burn extra calories, thus raising total time spent exercising to around…oh… thirty-eight minutes a day…which of course is more realistic. Throw in the very calorie restrictive diet essential to success, and you quickly find that it is a little more taxing of a plan than a breezy eight minutes lifting a dumbbell before work.
This book is not about “burning” fat, in the way cardio exercise does. Rather, this book is about raising metabolism, which is of course a good thing. Strength training exercises are picked because they raise metabolism for longer periods than cardio. However, the author is misleading, as many cardio exercises, particularly running, cycling and heavy bag boxing, have strength training aspects to them which will have the same effect on your metabolism.
The book includes a vaguely complicated eating system that has since been abandoned by the author in favor of his 3-Hour Diet book, and thus should be considered relatively worthless. In the 3-Hour Diet, the author suggests incorporating the 8 Minutes in the Morning plan in the diet…thus if you really want to follow Jorge, you should also read that book, which has a much better explained and comprehensive diet plan.
However, the diet in this book and the 3 Hour Diet are both seemingly for people around 150lbs or less and do not take into consideration the extra nutritional needs of larger people.
That being said, with power walking included, the exercise plan detailed in the book, while simplistic, probably is a good plan for a number of people with limited experience with exercise, or for whatever reason simply hate to exercise. If you have any experience with sports or exercise in the past, or are currently active, you will probably find nothing of value in the exercise plan.
Two other notes: I found the author’s personal history to be extremely annoying. The author portrays himself as having nearly eaten himself to death as a child, showing a vaguely chubby childhood picture and providing anecdotal evidence of having two grandmothers who frequently fed him while he avoided exercise and was never picked first for sports at school. It is a lame attempt to portray his in-shape self as “one of us” in the battle of the bulge.
Finally…I am not entirely sure the author’s claims that you can build muscle mass on this exercise and diet plan are feasible. First, some exercises are repeated only once a month in the plan, or 12 times a year. Nearly all strength training programs recommend doing exercises 2-3 times a week to build muscle. With the very low calorie (I’d estimate at around 1400 per day) diet plan, it simply isn’t possible to build muscle. Building muscle requires extra calories to rebuild tissue. If you are feeding your body less calories than its resting metabolic rate AND power walking and lifting weights…there simply isn’t the calories available to build muscle. It’s a shaky claim that most muscle building experts would refute.
So there you have it. If you are looking for a means to get your body doing at least some kind of exercise and looking for the minimum….well this is the minimum, but you’ll be better off doing much more if you can.
5 Stars AWESOME!
This is a practical GET IT DONE motivating tool. It is an easy step by step process in which it not only works your body but your thinking as well. I used the book as a workbook, journal in it everyday and followed the process. I lost over 10 pounds the first month and more importantly felt that I had changed my thinking in regard to exercise and food.
4 Stars Great for beginners!
I first discovered 8 Minutes in the Morning about 7 or 8 years ago. I was overweight, unhealthy, and did little to no exercise. I found an article on the internet that described the basic philosophy and provided a week’s worth of exercises. I started out by doing this for several weeks. It was simple and very doable for me. I’m not a morning person so it was nice that it only took 8 minutes. I also started noticing that I felt stronger and more toned. This plan helped me get into the habit of working out and helped me get more physically fit so that I could take on more strenuous exercise. I soon added aerobics and started eating healthier. Eventually, I started doing aerobics 3 days a week and full body strength training twice a week. I think this book is an excellent way for people to get started in fitness but after a while I think you would have to make a change or you may reach a plateau. Over the course of the past couple of years, I unfortunately gained the weight back (totally my fault) so I’m trying to lose it again. I have always gone back to this workout so this time I bought the book. The book provides some motivational tips and encourages journaling which I think is good for some people but it also seemed like an advertisement for Jorge’s other products and services. It seemed there were references to his website on almost every page which got old. But, overall, I do like this book and I’m glad I purchased it. It is helping me get back on track again!
4 Stars Practical Advice
Practical advice, easy to follow thru strength training routine. I am a weight consultant & I recommend this book to all my client! I don’t agree 100% with Jorge when it comes to nutrition advice, nevertheless this is a great book.
3 Stars Disappointing
The content of the book is nothing new. I am disappointed in myself for spending the $12.00 knowing there probably wouldn’t be any earth-shaking revelations. Buy this book used if you can. It wasn’t worth it to me at full price. This book will be another donation to the public library.
Filed under: Weight Loss Book Reviews
