4 Weeks of Focus: Review of this Home Workout Program

Looking for an intermediate level workout at-home program that features five days of weights and cardio training a week for four weeks? Well you’re in luck, because here’s my twenty-seventh analysis of BODi workout programs: the much-anticipated “4 Weeks of Focus” review, featuring trainer Kelsey Heenan and actress Shay Mitchell! This article has a twist ending, because I started off hating the program — but once I realized something, it became one of my favorite ones in years.

“4 Weeks of Focus” Overview

As an overview, “4 Weeks of Focus” features 20 videos — five workouts a week for four weeks — that last approximately thirty minutes each, though their run time is often longer due to cast interviews. The program was created in 2021 on the Openfit platform, and became available in the BODi online library and app in September of 2024. (See my BODi review for more on that platform.)

Note: Some links here are affiliates that provide a commission upon purchase at no additional cost to you.

How to Access “4 Weeks of Focus”

There are two ways to get access to the workouts in “4 Weeks of Focus.” The first is to grab a subscription to the entire BODi platform (click here to see the latest deals and discounts for it), which is nice because there’s a free trial, and membership also lets you into over 130 other full fitness programs. Use the sale code LILLIEFIT25 for 25% off the price of full subscriptions!

The second method of access is to purchase “4 Weeks of Focus” its own, without a subscription. Click here to see deals for this, and use the code LILLIEFIT15 at checkout for a 15% discount off the price.

Why Trust this Workout Review?

As I explained in my “Sure Thing” review, to create my workout reviews, I actually DO every single video in a program, taking copious notes along the way. This article is steeped in first-hand experience — and lots of sweat!

(Well, except for the funny photos my cousin took with me to illustrate this article, which we decided to do in the snow in rural New York State near Bash Bish Falls. That day was less sweaty, and more cold.)

Now, an important disclaimer: Before starting any new exercise regimen, make sure to use wise judgment to keep yourself safe, consulting a medical professional if necessary, and listening to your body as you go in order to avoid injury — as I found out the hard way with “30 Day Breakaway.” If you’re a 43-year old mother of two like me, there may be some modifications you’ll need to add!

Equipment Needed for “4WoF”

There’s pretty minimal equipment needed for “4 Weeks of Focus” — just a few sets of dumbbells, and a mat to cushion you for floor moves. For a mat, I use both a yoga mat like this, and then a thicker mat like this since I have bony knees.

The range of weights I used ran from 8s to 25 pounders (I have these vinyl-covered ones), but you could do well with heavier, too. The cast ended up even using a 50-pounder, and I actually wished I had heavier weights! To protect your home gym area, I recommend covered ones like these 10-pound dumbbells, since the coating cushions impact.

Finally, this is optional, but there’s a lot of joking in the program about how using lifting gloves like these makes Shay and Steph feel hip. In fact, I do think there’s a lot of wisdom in using them beyond just aesthetics — lifting gloves help improve grip for safety and also guard against callouses and palm discomfort, especially in a program that does as much dumbbell work as this one.

The Cast of “4 Weeks of Focus”

The concept of “4WoF” is that it was built for the actress Shay Mitchell, who is best known for her role as Emily Fields in the show “Pretty Little Liars.” Fun fact for those of us who love Broadway musicals: Shay is the first cousin once removed of the revered singer, Lea Salonga!

The trainer who leads “4 Weeks of Focus” is Kelsey Heenan, also known for the fitness program, “Get Strong.” The other cast member is Shay’s friend Steph Shepherd, who is known for being Kim Kardashian’s personal assistant, and now runs an environmental nonprofit.

“4 Weeks of Focus” Review

Time to dive into the actual review of “4 Weeks of Focus!” What makes it good, and what’s problematic about it? We’ll start with a tip that changes everything…

Do this Tip and it’s a MUCH Better Program!

Ok, this is the most important thing to know about “4 Weeks of Focus,” and was what finally made me shift from hating the program to loving it: there is a LOT of chit-chat and wasted time in the first two weeks, but at the start of Week 3, Kelsey directs everyone to jog during that talking time — and all of a sudden, the wasted time turned into a fabulous cardio boost. Further, the moves in the program start overly repetitive, but get better as the days go on, so stick with it.

Therefore, here’s my top tip to optimize this program: from Day 1, if your body can handle it, make sure you’re jogging or marching or dancing (like in “Let’s Get Up!”) during the talking pauses in the workout. With that tweak, even the first two weeks of “4WoF” are a full-body cardio and strength symphony of effectiveness! Now on to the positives of the program.

Pros of “4 Weeks of Focus”

1. I got great “4 Weeks of Focus” results.

Check out the photo above of my “4 Weeks of Focus” results (kindly and hilariously photographed by my cousin near a farm in Upstate NY in the thick of winter): In this photo, I see more-defined-than-usual abs! I also see some newly-toned arm definition that hasn’t been there since #mbfa! Yessss!

Additionally, I got good glute definition from this program, providing the much-desired trifecta of “Arms, Abs, and A**” popularized by “80 Day Obsession.” For just twenty videos, “4 Weeks of Focus” provides surprisingly effective, targeted sculpting for muscles that are both aesthetically pleasing, and functionally useful. It felt great to see my strength and endurance increasing, lifting heavier and doing more reps.

2. There are weights, cardio, and full-body work every video.

I looooove weightlifting, I love cardio, and I love full-body workouts — but it’s rare to find a program that hits all three of those things every single video. Happily, “4 Weeks of Focus” does.

Yes, that’s right: each and every workout in this program uses dumbbells: a fact that makes me smile. Most moves hit both upper and lower body, and your heart rate does go up, even during weights-only moves, due to the speed and continuous nature of the exercises.

3. Four weeks, five days a week, for 30 minutes a day provides nice timing.

As we found in “Tough Mudder T-Minus 30,” one month is a delightful “easy win” workout program length, as is five days a week with two full rest days. Moreover, while the videos in “4WoF” run up to 40 minutes long, the actual workouts are thirty minutes or shorter — the rest being just interviews and reflections. This gives “4 Weeks of Focus” a very satisfying and doable scope, as a program.

4. Kelsey Heenan is a clear, effective trainer.

If you want a straightforward trainer who gives clear cues and positive motivation, Kelsey Heenan is a fit. She reminds me of Megan Davies of “Muscle Burns Fat #mbf” fame in that her simple style is easy to watch and like — in contrast to trainers who have a very strong or niche personality.

Other aspects I appreciated about Kelsey are her mantra, “This is hard but I know you can do it,” plus her emphasis on fitness for function as well as aesthetics, her useful cueing about form and breath work (replete with audible breathing), and the way that she showers praise on each improvement and milestone. If you like Andrea Rogers of “XB Pilates,” you might also like Kelsey.

5. Exercises are relatively simple, but there’s variety, and a focus on functional fitness.

“4 Weeks of Focus” is a truly Intermediate program (unlike the more complex “BODi LAVA“), meaning the moves featured in it are very straightforward and easy to follow, even when more unilateral and balance-based exercises are added in as it goes on (like the one pictured below). Despite this simplicity, there is a nice variety in how the moves are put together and added-to.

For example, unlike “LIIFT MORE” which just has 12 reps of everything over and over, “4WoF” has a combination of rep numbers, 30-second work times, EMOMs, AMRAPs, “Fire Finishers,” Fit Tests, and more. This yields an excellent combo of relaxation from structure, and excitement from novelty.

I also loved the emphasis in the program on functional fitness: exercises that help us age strong, and “do life” more easily — from carrying shopping bags and kids, to catching ourselves from a fall. Kelsey also does some delicious mobility work with stretching the back, like the “Open Book” exercise. These two elements are a big contrast to programs like “LIIFT4,” which, as you can see in that review, greatly concerned me in not being functional or mobility-focused enough.

6. Brilliantly sneaky ramp-up structure is ideal if feeling lazy.

“4 Weeks of Focus” is a nice program to do if you’re feeling lazy or unmotivated, because it has a brilliantly sneaky ramp-up structure — both for individual videos, and for the program as a whole. This helps kind of trick you into a trajectory from languid to intense work, and makes the program particularly well-suited for the morning hours when you’re still waking up.

In terms of the individual workouts’ ramp-up, each “4WoF” video starts with some verbal banter, then slow stretches (like “645” on BODi), which ease into a “Power Primer” (a more active warm-up), then two or three blocks of work and a finisher. By the time you get to the finisher, you’ve lifted more than you imagined you could!

As for the program as a whole, by Week 3, you’re doing literally double the amount of work as Week 1. I found my dumbbell amount gains exceeded even “Dig Deeper” because I was more motivated by the structure of “4WoF.”

7. “4 Weeks of Focus” features continuous work that leaves you feeling “cleansed.”

One of my favorite aspects of the workout program, “9 Week Control Freak” was that it has swaths of nonstop continuous movement that leaves the body feeling fully “worked out” and cleansed by the end, combining cardio and strength for minutes on end. This dynamic has been difficult for me to find again in another program… until I discovered “4 Weeks of Focus!”

Though Kelsey takes her time explaining each move in “4WoF,” once you get started on a block of work, it’s pretty nonstop, with short breaks that Kelsey forces you to push right through to get to the end of the moves. I found the EMOMs (“Every Minute on the Minute”) in this program to be particularly good for this — and much more smartly timed than other programs that attempted them and left too long of a lag between sets.

The “Fire Finisher” at the end also helped me feel like I’d fully worked out. I felt a lot more satisfied after “4 Weeks of Focus” videos than I did after, for example, “Job 1.”

8. The “working out with friends” cast dynamics can be motivating.

A central feature of “4 Weeks of Focus” is that, due to the cast dynamics with Shay and Steph, you’re supposed to feel like you’re simultaneously watching a reality TV show and working out with friends. Indeed, I found this both motivating and entertaining — similar to the hilarious cast dynamics of “6 Weeks of The Work” with Amoila Cesar.

For example, watching Shay and Steph moan about how they didn’t want to do the exercises helped spur me to work even harder! Hearing their clarifying questions, modifications and corrections, and interview reflections was helpful, too — versus the silent cast of “Xtend Barre.”

It was also very cool to see the women’s concrete fitness gains. For example, Shay and Steph would periodically state what weight amount they were using, and though they were well below my dumbbell amount at the start of the program, they actually ended up being able to lift giant weights by the end — enough that I am inclined to go out and buy more to keep up!

The cast’s Fit Test results from beginning to end were also phenomenal (and satisfying, like finally getting to the complete flow at the end of “Chop Wood, Carry Water“). Oh — and nothing beats the feeling of watching them cross off each day of the four weeks of workouts! They weren’t kidding that the program felt like it flew buy due to the entertaining structure; I totally agree.

9. There is music, and on-screen timer sporadically appears.

It’s always nice to have a program that has background music, even if it’s sort of awkward synthesized beats like “4WoF.” There were certainly times when those notes motivated me to keep the movement flow going.

As for an on-screen timer, there wasn’t one for most of the program (more of that in the “Cons” section), but there was one for certain timed exercises which I did appreciate. Timers help me “leave it all on the mat.”

10. “4 Weeks of Focus” made me feel great!

With its combination of strength, cardio, functional mobility, and motivational pep talks, I finished each workout in “4 Weeks of Focus” feeling strong and cleansed! Like “Fire and Flow,” on the days I missed or fell behind in the program, I severely missed it, noticing how much lower my energy levels and mood were.

Then there were the strength gains. I’ve done a LOT of at-home workout programs, but I truly think “4 Weeks of Focus” gave me the most strength and motivation to lift heavier and heavier weights of any of them. Woo hoo!

Cons of “4 Weeks of Focus”

Though I really loved this home workout program, there are some distinct downsides to it that are important to know if you’re assessing whether it might be a fit for your fitness background and goals. Here they are…

A. Modifications are shown at a delay, or not at all.

Because there is not a professional cast that has rehearsed the moves before and has a designated modifier like “21 Day Fix,” Kelsey has to show or state the mods at a delay (after she’s shown the main move), and they don’t remain on the screen. If you know how to add your own modifications, this won’t be an issue, but if you’re looking for a low-impact, beginner-to-intermediate program, this will cause problems. Speaking of which…

B. Difficulty and higher impact aren’t ideal for beginners.

Though the moves in “4 Weeks of Focus” are relatively straightforward, there is a lot of jumping, and there are some challenging moves like “Kick-Throughs.” Further, adequate modifications to this are not always offered.

For example, in the warm-up of several videos (the warm-up, no less!) there are jumping scissor jacks with no alternatives presented, and in Week 3, Day 2, there is a move where you go from kneeling to a squat, and there’s no acknowledgement that some of us with knee issues need something different. Try “4 Weeks for Everybody” instead if you want low impact and high modifications!

For this reason, and because the pace and intensity of the program get quite intense by the end, I would hesitate to add “4 Weeks of Focus” to my list of best BODi workout programs for beginners. I would also advise people to do at least one or two other programs first, before embarking on this one.

B. LOTS of talking, so video timing is deceptive.

For those of us who have very tight schedules, it’s important to know how long a workout actually is. Unfortunately, though the actual workout portion of “4 Weeks of Focus” is around 25-30 minutes, some of the videos run around 40 minutes because of lengthy cast chit-chat — some of which is at the end, so could technically be skipped, but it’s not always clear which ones have that option.

Further, each move is shown and explained in depth before we even start to do it. If you’re doing some sort of independent movement like marching during that time then it’s more palatable, but I tend to prefer programs where you’re shown the move very quickly, or while doing it, so time is maximized — but I know not everyone prefers this.

C. DRASTIC ramp-up halfway through the program.

The first two weeks of “4 Weeks of Focus” are almost a totally different program than the last two weeks, and I wish there had either been a more steady ramp-up, or the modifications up (ex: jogging during chit-chat) had been presented earlier than Week 3.

In Weeks 1 and 2, for example, there was sometimes so much idle chit-chat that there was only about 15 minutes of actual working out per video. This was annoying because I left the workouts “still having a lot of energy in the tank” and thus needing an additional workout.

Then Week 3 came along, and the workouts got HARD — like the transition from “4 Weeks of The Prep” to “The Work!” I was shocked to hear Kelsey reveal in Week 3, Day 3 that during one video, we actually did DOUBLE the amount of volume as the same workout format as Week 1, Day 3! Your preferences may vary, but that was a pretty vast jump in my book.

D. Tons of repetition, and focus on basic moves like squats.

There is a whole lot of repetition in “4 Weeks of Focus.” For example, the first two weeks of the program do squats over and over, day after day, and towards the end of the program, the EMOMs (“Every Minute on the Minute”) are EIGHT rounds long! You may even need to add in extra rest days since the same muscles are hit on back-to-back days.

Expect to repeat basic moves like push presses, squats, and squat jumps. Ultimately, I didn’t mind this repetition as much as I thought I would (I sort of got into a trance flow state which helped me get into a cardio zone) but it’s not for everyone — and is especially frustrating in the beginning. Again, the second half of the program is better and more varied than the first.

E. No bonus content or extras.

This may be a “Pro” for you if you prefer a simple, clean calendar, but there are zero bonus workouts in “4 Weeks of Focus” beyond the 20 from the four week program. I felt this as a missing during days I had limited time and wanted the option of a 15-20 minute version.

F. Weight amounts not always stated, and few on-screen timers.

Though there are several moments in “4 Weeks of Focus” where Shay and Steph proudly declare their weight amount because they’ve gone up, the program is pretty unreliable in terms of giving dumbbell poundage suggestions. This can be frustrating when you’re trying to decide how much to lift for a good challenge. Further, I very much missed having an on-screen timer for each full workout so I could plan my exertion fully.

G. Cool-downs need more.

Like nearly all BODi programs I’ve done, and like the Caroline Girvan “IRON Series” on YouTube as well, the cool-down stretches at the end of each video of “4WoF” aren’t adequate, so you’ll need to add more of your own moves. For example, in some workouts where we do a lot of glute moves, there are no glute cool-downs like Figure 4s.

H. Cast dynamics can be distracting.

Shay and Steph joke around a lot during “4 Weeks of Focus,” and complain, lament, and groan in agony during the lifts. They also try to stall Kelsey from moving forward, and Kelsey has to use all of her tactics to get everyone to start the exercise! (In contrast, the cast of “XB Sweat + Sculpt” is almost totally silent.)

This “4WoF” cast dynamic can either be distracting and annoying, or it can be motivating (to try to be a “better student” than the cast!) depending on your temperament. Where the cast dynamic gets problematic, however, is when Shay and Steph lose form or mess up. Though it’s fun to work out with “regular people” instead of fitness professionals, what you miss out on is seeing consistently high quality exemplars on the screen to follow.

“4 Weeks of Focus” Review, in Sum

In Weeks One and Two, I was certain that this “4 Weeks of Focus” review would be a scathing one, griping about the slow pace and wasted time — but knowing how everything shifts in Week 3 (and how you can bring that intensity to the first half of the program if you know to expect it), and seeing my results from the program… I have to say that “4WoF” is going to end up high on my ranking of best BODi workouts!

To try this fascinating program, click here to see current deals to check it out. If you’ve done “4 Weeks of Focus,” what was your experience? If you haven’t done it yet but are considering doing so, what questions do you have? Do share!