OPUS - full video
What this video covers
“OPUS” is the bonus workout from Jillian Michaels’ BODYSHRED program (2015) — and per the program’s own materials and reviewer accounts, it is the hardest workout she ever put on disc. Posted to her own YouTube channel in October 2017, the full 36-minute video has drawn nearly 1.9 million views, making it one of the most-watched single workouts in her catalog.
The structure, as described in BODYSHRED package materials and workout reviews: a roughly 3.5-minute warm-up, four circuits that each rotate through strength, cardio, and core work, and a 2-minute cool-down stretch. The circuits are built from advanced compound moves — weighted bird dogs, pistol squats, pike jumps, dragon flags, kipping burpees, shrimp squats, one-arm push-ups, donkey-kick burpees, and plank variations, among others. A companion bonus disc, “Cast & Moves,” exists specifically to teach correct form for the routine, which tells you something about the difficulty level: this is explicitly aimed at advanced exercisers, with reviewers warning that most people will need modified versions of many moves.
BODYSHRED itself is Michaels’ 60-day program built on what she calls the SHRED Method — short, high-intensity circuits (in the main program, 3 minutes strength, 2 minutes cardio, 1 minute core) designed, per the marketing, to maximize metabolic output in about 30 minutes a day. OPUS is the program’s final boss: the “all-out, pedal-to-the-metal challenge,” as one product listing puts it. Included here as the purest artifact of the Michaels fitness brand at its peak — the trainer-as-drill-sergeant, no shortcuts, the workout that even her regulars describe as brutal.
Key points
- OPUS is the bonus workout disc from the 2015 BODYSHRED program, posted in full to Michaels’ channel in 2017.
- The 36-minute routine follows a warm-up, four strength/cardio/core circuits, and a cool-down, per program materials and reviewer breakdowns.
- The move list is advanced-only territory: pistol squats, dragon flags, kipping burpees, shrimp squats, one-arm push-ups, and similar compound exercises.
- A companion disc, “Cast & Moves,” was produced to teach correct form for the OPUS moves — an acknowledgment of the injury risk in the programming.
- The main BODYSHRED program is a 60-day system built on Michaels’ “SHRED Method” of short high-intensity circuits, per its marketing materials.
- At 1.9 million views, it remains one of her most-watched workouts — the flagship of her reputation as the toughest trainer in home fitness.