We’re used to hearing about Helen Mirren on red carpets and at award shows, but it’s her 12-minute that’s got everyone talking this week.
If you’re looking to boost your cardiovascular health in 2025, there’s no need to go out on hours-long walks and runs or spend all your time in the gym. Exercise snacking (short bursts of physical activity throughout the day) and shorter strength training workouts can be the way forward.
Helen Mirren, who turns 80 later this year, may be inclined to agree. She told Women’s Weekly that “[exercise] doesn’t mean joining expensive gyms” and that she was a “big believer in the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) women’s exercise regime, which is 12 minutes”.
Dr Bill Orban created the program – called XBX (ten basic exercises) – in the 1950s to help women in the Air Force improve their fitness. Over 600 women and girls, including civilians, helped create the program, according to the XBX booklet.
This 12-minute workout follows four charts of ten exercises arranged in order of difficulty. The plan’s aim is to boost muscle strength, endurance, flexibility, and efficiency of the heart, with a set of exercises dedicated to each.
“It’s an exercise regime that starts from very low and easy, then if you follow it through, it can become quite difficult,” says Helen Mirren. “I’ve never gotten past the second level, but it’s a nice exercise program.”
Helen Mirren’s 12-minute workout
The booklet lists 10 exercises with the number of repetitions to be done in a limited amount of time just below it. In the booklet, you’ll find descriptions and pictures on how to complete each one – or, you can follow the video of the workout on Lorraine (above).
Starting at level one, you move through the levels until you can do the last one “without excessive strain or fatigue”. The time you need to do the exercise stays the same. As the level increases, so do the repetitions, making the exercise harder.
As Helen says she’s not progressed past the second level, she’ll finish her workouts on chart two – page 13 of the booklet.
Try it for yourself
- CHART ONE:
- Exercises 1 to 6: toe touches, knee raises, lateral (side) raises, arm circles
- Exercise 5: Partial sit-ups
- Exercise 6: Chest and leg raises
- Exercise 7: Side leg raises
- Exercise 8: Knee push-ups
- Exercise 9: Leg lifts
- Exercise 10: Run and hop
- CHART TWO:
- Chart two is the same as chart one – with some substitutions.
- Exercise 5: rocking sit-ups
- Exercise 9: Leg overs (side rotation back stretch)
- Exercise 10: Run and stride jumps
What do each of the exercises mean?
You can find a detailed explanation and diagram of each exercise in the booklet, but each exercise focuses on one of the program’s goals (muscle strength, endurance, flexibility, and efficiency of the heart).
All four charts follow the same format:
- Exercises 1 to 6: Flexibility and mobility, warm-up
- Time: 2 minutes (30 seconds for each exercise)
- Exercise 5: Strengthening “the abdominal region and the muscles at the front of the thighs”
- Exercise 6: Strengthening the muscles in the “back, the buttocks, and the backs of the thighs”.
- Exercise 7: Concentrates on the “muscles of the sides of the thighs”.
- Exercise 8: For the “arms, shoulders, and chest”.
- Exercise 9: For “flexibility in the waist and for strengthening the muscles of the hips and sides”.
- Exercise 10: Concentrates on the “conditioning of the heart and lungs”, i.e. cardiovascular or aerobic fitness.
While this workout has plenty of benefits, being one of the many types of strength training you can do, it’s not an easy workout. The booklet specifies – and we agree – that you should not complete “fast, vigorous, or highly competitive physical activity, without gradually developing and continually maintaining, an adequate level of physical fitness”.
