Not enough flexibility
I'll start by saying that I think that Abbie offers great options when it comes to training programs and that I prefer the layout (mostly) of her 'members area' dashboard and workout schedule more than most other fitness influencers' apps that I've tried. I've really been enjoying the workouts I have been able to complete, but have been finding I've been coming across a lot of issues and have to contact customer service quite often, most of the time without a very satisfying resolution and a sort of "sorry, it is what it is" attitude instead of a feeling that they value user feedback (and maybe they don't, that's a shame, but of course okay - everyone gets to choose how they run their own business and I always respect that).
But as someone paying £19.99 (or ~£240 for the year), there are some aspects of the program and functionality of the members area that I'm just not sure are worth the cost.
For example, at the beginning of the program you input your training goals (i.e. do you want a hybrid program with running and strength workouts? Do you want all strength training? Do you want to work out at home? At the gym? etc). Based on this, you get a 'personalised' workout plan. However, once you've chosen your plan you are LOCKED IN (unless of course you take the time out to reach out to customer service and then wait the few days it takes them to get back to you). So I originally chose a hybrid training program but found that I wasn't able to get to the gym as often as I would have liked. So it would have been more convenient for me to have options for both home and gym workouts. NO DICE. You're either committed to at home or committed to at-gym. Customer services says to 'look at the list of alternate exercises' if you want to adapt gym exercises to at-home, but this involves navigating to a different part of the dashboard and basically cobbling together your own workout. You can't record your reps, sets and weight the way you can if it's part of your workout and it takes a lot of time to go create your own list of alternate exercises for it to be worth it (and, again, considering I'm paying £20/month to have you make it easy for me. I'm not paying £20/month to do what I could have done myself and create my own training program off the internet).
Secondly, I similarly found that I wasn't able to do the running training sessions of my hybrid training program because of a small hamstring pull I got at the beginning of the program. No problem, I thought, I'll pick them back up once I'm better.
NOPE. 4 weeks into your training program you get a notification telling you that it's time to update your program. So you go ahead and do it (because you've got no reason not to) and now you're in your 'second training period'. I only know this because I reached out to customer service who explained it to me. I didn't find any information about this anywhere else. In the second training period, all the running workouts were harder because they think you've done all the running workouts in training period one, which I hadn't.
When I asked (again, had to email customer service) about being able to re-access the running sessions from training block one while continuing the strength training from training block two, I was told it wasn't possible.
So now the running workouts are useless/too advanced for me so instead of getting relevant running and strength training days for me, I'm now only getting 3 x strength training days (for £19.99/month).
All quite strange, convoluted, not intuitive and a shame because this program has so much going for it! It's functionality and flexibility just needs work to make it really valuable and worth the price.
Hope this helps folks who are thinking about purchasing! I'm not saying don't, I'm just saying you need to be sure you can commit to whatever program you're signing up for before you do because it is not a self-paced program, it is very much a do-it-or-lose-it kind of situation.







