FITNESS ZONE
REVIEW: 645
Despite the last few months being a dystopian nightmare ( remember, I’m Canadian ), you can thank Mrs. Parrot for putting a boot to my hind quarters and getting me back to reviewing. It’s been a tough slog folks, which makes Beachbody’s new workout series, 645, all the more relevant.
When last I saw our trainer Amoila Cesar, he was trash talking so much I pondered whether he was trying out for a Beverly Hills Cop reboot. 6 Weeks of the Work was as intense at fitness as it was at stockpiling our swear jars. But you can put those concerns aside as somewhere between then and now, his mother told him to knock that verbal sh-t off and be a good boy.
645, as the name implies, is 45 minutes of training, 6 days a week. And each of the six workouts repeats for 13 weeks. But as you have no doubt figured out by now, what starts off easy picks up steam. By week 13 you’ll be amazed at your progress, or utterly ashamed at what a weak bag of rat hair you used to be. Kinda depends on your pre-existing self-esteem and how you view yourself.
What You Need
Resistance loops and dumbbells are the toys of choice here. While initially dumbbells will be light, expect some serious steel to be lifted the closer to week 13 you get. This will give you enough time to buy lighter weights, get a few paychecks, and later impress the hot blond at the fitness supply store when you go in to buy some manly metal.
Workout Structure
Each workout is technically a total body workout that has a higher focus on one particular body part. Every week will have the following schedule:
Lower Body Strength
Total Body Power
Mobility and Stability
Upper Body Strength
Cardio 45
The first three weeks are really just a primer. Something to make sure you don’t hurt yourself as the heat gets turned up. And by Week 7, it gets particularly savage to the point it would be hard to consider it the same workout you have been doing for the last several weeks.
But lets break it down further, shall we?
Goals
645 lands smack dab in the middle of the fitness intensity meter; making it very much an intermediate to advanced workout series. It’s broken down into 4 stages:
Stage 1: Week 1-4
Stage 2: Week 4-8
Stage 3: Week 8-12
Stage 4: Week 13
At each stage, there will be an adjustment to the overall difficulty. This often means moves become increasingly compound, so something like a simple barbell curl may incorporate a balance component.
If you’ve gone through Beachbody programs, are a grad of all the big workouts, and in good physical condition, then Stage 1 is going to be painful. As in painfully boring. So you have my full approval to skip to Phase 2 and stop screwing around. Sorry. That’s my take.
Trainer
Amoila is clearly getting the big push from BB as they try to expand their roster. And from what I can see, he’s a good fit. True, I wasn’t exactly a big fan of 6 Weeks of the Work on the grounds it came off as verbally trashy. But I can see how the executive team is molding him into the next big thing. He’s everything one would expect in a new trainer but you can also see incredible potential. 6 Weeks of the Work used profanity as a poorly chosen crutch/gimmick. Here, Amoila has become something more. Trainer personality is a tricky thing to quantify. Tony Horton was the joke guy. Shaun T always talked about Shaun T in the third person. And Leondro Carvalho was a pervert you could work out with. The point is…Amoila is coming into his own and has potential to lead the pack.
Production
You know, when Beachbody is great, they’re just amazing. But sometimes they can really half-ass it. For example, they actually have a music track for 645 and it is decent. BUT, once again they have no timer bar. Even worse…SOMETIMES they have a timer for a particular exercise. And sometimes not. The Hell, Beachbody? Are you paying your post-production staff by the minute? Was it easier to render a timer bar into a video back in 2004 on a Pentium III?
The set is nice, and the cast is… Ok. I’m going to be blunt for a moment here. Bear with me, please.
I liked the old days where the cast didn’t talk. Because when they do, it is invariably something stupid, pointless, or both. Kind of like my brother-in-law at family gatherings. 645 is like that at times. Amoila will chat with a cast member and bla bla blah…would you look at the time… I get it, it has always been a thing ever since Katie told us in P90X that she did 10 friggin’ reps. But it bugged me then and it bugs me now because it happens even more. I don’t know the cast and I don’t want to. They’re Hollywood extras, and that makes them avocado toast loving, vacuous meat puppets. This attitude is also why I have no friends and work out to videos, alone in my basement.
Some of the cast are also not, in what I would consider to be, all that good of shape. And that’s fine, maybe even ideal. It breaks the illusion that this is an elite athlete series. And for some, that may be a selling feature.
Workout Structure
Warmups are a decent 10-15 minutes. Good. Too many programs in the past have advertised smaller runtimes by simply gouging the warmup. 645 plays it honest.
Most moves have 3 sets and every now and then a bonus 4th. It works, but I wish there was more variety. By the time that 3rd set comes around I’m starting to lose interest. And a 4th? I’ve likely checked out and am seeing how well my crypto-investments are doing.
The breakdown of Stages makes it easier for a novice to enter in, or an intermediate to skip ahead. Resistance adds weight and complexity, while cardio adds a bit more zip. The cardio never reaches anything close to Max 30 levels, so your knee joints should do fine. Think of it more along the lines of T25 or P90X3 levels. The important think to remember is that it is very doable for the average bloke.
You get two rest days; one in the middle of the week with Mobility and Stability, and the other a full day off.
CONCLUSION
As an intermediate workout program, 645 is tops. Yes, I have some complaints such as generic coaching, no timer bars and cast members who talk too much…but those are minor gripes that pale in comparison to the big picture. 645 really is a winner overall. The slow progression will be welcome to those new to fitness, and advanced viewers can simply skip to a stage of their liking.
The main advantage to 645 is that it is a complete solution. It has mobility, stretching, resistance, cardio, and functional movements. If you were to do nothing else, this would be enough to get most people where they want to be. For me, I was impressed because as many of you can relate, its possible I put on a few extra pounds when the unspecified virus of unknown origin brought about a disruption in our fitness schedules. To be honest, 645 was the kickstart I needed to get back in the swing of things.
Matt
May 28, 2023 at
This has got to be my favorite Beachbody routine. For one reason: this program makes you feel so good and healthy. All the mobility and stretching moves will help you to just start feeling fresh and younger. And basically all the moves focus on functional fitness.
I was doing p90x2 before this. X2 is amazing but i was overtraining and in constant pain. Now I’m doing a second round of 645 with two weeks of the Prep in between blocks. This second round of 645 is even better, because now i’m able to start really challenging myself with heavier weights, without sacrificing that healthy feeling. If you get bored easily, i don’t recommend this. My wife thinks its too boring. But if you are patient and and also have aches and pains, then this is the best. There’s also a lot of bonus stuff to help repair injuries or target building specific muscles. I did nothing but yoga for 6 weeks last year and honestly i feel better now than i did then.
Jessica
October 9, 2022 at
I’m about to start week 12 of 645 and while I love Amoila, I’ll be glad when I’m done with it. After doing 6 Weeks (which DID have a non-explicit option, which I chose, so you didn’t HAVE to hear all the cussing if you didn’t want to), Insanity, Body Beast, Turbofire, etc, this seemed really tame. I often felt I hadn’t done enough.
And I agree with the cast talking. It’s incredibly annoying. Like, INCREDIBLY.
I don’t think it’s cool to downtalk people because of their size, though. Especially since there are those like myself that like seeing people with relatable physiques in these casts. But regardless, still. (Especially since all of the cast members are in rather good shape).
Olafb
April 1, 2022 at
You really really really must do the Power of Four by Tony Horton.
I mean, you always say “I am not paid by BeachBody” so show us!
Because my wife and I started January 1st and we are in month 3 now and it is the best extreme home fitness programm ever!!!
Not 12 work-outs repeated for 13 weeks, but 24 (!!!) and everything feels like P90X but a level up.
So this is really P90X4, the one we all waited for, and we love it!
And it works.
Tony is 63 years old now, he still has his humor, his impressions and his crew like the awesome Bobby Stephenson and Shane for instance.
But the whole programm is so unbelievably balanced, and thougth over.
It is a shame Tony has no Beach Body funds to advertise, but his fans really love this.
This is what everybody was waiting for.
You really need to make a review about this one!
Daniel
January 29, 2022 at
If the cast talks in this one, it can’t be worse than 80 Day Obsession, right? Where she scolds the cast for not saying enough, then we can’t hear what they are saying. Do you have a review of that one?
Jay
January 5, 2022 at
Good review. I too was completely turned off by the language in “The Work”. Are we gearing up to rob a liquor store perhaps? Or maybe a smash & grab? Amateurish at best. I’m through Stage 1 of 645 and my overall thought has been “EASY”. I’m frankly missing the old days of Tony Hortoni and the original P90. And I agree with the review by James above…I’m tiring of Beachbody in general. Their production has gone downhill with small studios, no clock, and worthless coaches and DJs off to the side that I just want to punch in the face. Also, enough with the token fat slob in the workouts. Sorry Lacey, you are not working out, you are pretending to work out. And you are fat and disgusting. Please get off of my screen.
MarcoBuddha
June 18, 2023 at
I actually enjoyed the explicit language of the work. It removed it from the line up of vanilla mass-produced, fitness programs and made it more rough and raw and in-your-face.
But hey, if a few swear words is all it takes to offend you, you can stick to vanilla.
It is way better than the Shaun T philosophizing in his overly dramatic motivation speaker monologues, or Tony Horton’s dad jokes and witless banter throughout. And I don’t find it gratuitious. It’s more, drop the excuses, grab your sh!t, and let’s go f@&king get this!!
Elchupinazo
January 4, 2022 at
I don’t understand all the grief stage 1 gets here and elsewhere. Yes the moves are less complex but that just means you can pick up heavier weights.
James
January 4, 2022 at
I think I’m just done with Beach Body. They used to be right on the cutting edge ten years ago (heck, they were offering many current trends way back then), but now they seem to be mainly a lifestyle/light fitness company aimed at millennial girls/women. Saying ‘f***’ in a workout does not make it useful, or even fun or entertaining. Done with Tony Horton, too. His much awaited independent offering seems to have him thinking he is Jesus (I really don’t need his advice on meditation. That actually goes for yoga, too. I may be in error, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen an actual Indian person teaching Yoga in a Beach Body video) and that his P90X fans are made of solid gold. I have moved on.
Pudricion
August 4, 2022 at
Right on!!!
Jim Pratt
January 3, 2022 at
Glad you are doing reviews again! I love the reviews.
I’m glad to see a program that has a warm up again. I usually stick with the older programs as many of the newer ones just seem very niche and putting moves together to make it seem hard.
Rob
January 2, 2022 at
As a 39-year old male looking to get in seriously good shape before I turn 40 this year, which program would you recommend to get started: 645, 80 Day Obsession, or the recently revamped P90? My goal is to do a round or 2 of something good but less intense, before diving headfirst back into my old favorite P90X. I’ve done many rounds of P90X, Body Beast, LIIFT4, etc. over the years. I need to re-start my fitness somewhere slightly less extreme but not too easy that I get bored.
Thanks for this review! Glad to see you’re still at it, I always enjoyed your honest feedback on Beachbody programs!
Elchupinazo
January 4, 2022 at
This is the perfect place to jump back in because it’s EXCELLENT for injury prevention ahead of something else. The strength element is definitely there, but more importantly your core and stabilizing muscles will be as rock-solid as they’ve ever been.
Brian Ayson
December 25, 2021 at
I took a long break from lifting and plan to do Body Beast but I’m worried that I might not be ready to jump back in cold. Would you do this or P90 first? Or jump right into BB? FWIW I am not a fan of resistance bands with door attachments.
Elchupinazo
January 4, 2022 at
This is perfect for that.
Brian
December 23, 2021 at
I’m a little out of shape. I’ve been running mostly (did a half marathon in October and doing another next month) but I’ve done almost zero strength training in six months. Would you do this before jumping into body beast? Or can you just jump into BB cold and start with lighter weights?
Phyl
December 16, 2021 at
Hey I’m in Canada too! So totally share the same feelings (let’s not forget the election that spit out the same exact results we had before…).
Do you think this is better calorie burn to 6WOTW? I plan to skip the first month because I’ve heard the same from other people. But I was wondering if it was worth the leap to? I’m debating dropping my GoodLife membership and wanted to see what’s around. Love your reviews!
Bonnie
December 8, 2021 at
Do you feel you can lose significant weight with this routine?