This Is What It Takes To Bring A New Sweat Program To Life

Strength with Kayla is the brand-new program the Sweat Community have been WAITING for, and we’re so excited that all six weeks of this incredible new program are now available in the Sweat app. 

This program is exactly how our head trainer and co-founder Kayla Itsines has been training over the last few years and she’s never felt stronger. 

No HIIT. No jumping. No burpees. Just pure strength training in the gym. 

We’ve loved sharing little snippets of just what (and who!) it took to bring this program to life over the last few weeks and months, and want to show you even more of what went on behind the scenes to create Strength with Kayla.

Writing the program 

“Like any woman, you want to change up your training over time,” Kayla says. “I’m a different woman at 34 to who I was when I started out as a personal trainer.” 

“I’ve had two kids, two postpartum journeys, endo surgeries, sickness, personal loss, my own setbacks and now I’m in my 30s, strength training is such a big part of my training mix.” 

Strength with Kayla isn’t just the program Kayla wishes she had when she began to dial up her strength workouts. It’s the program that helped her get stronger and she can’t wait for you to try it. 

“These are the strength workouts I’ve been following and I’ve never felt so strong, confident and empowered,” she shares. “I want you to have that exact same feeling and have spent the last few months perfecting this program.”

“I’ve been so excited to bring Strength with Kayla to the Sweat Community because I know so many of our members have been looking for a program like this,” says Kayla. “Whether it’s in my DMs, through Sweat’s surveys or on the Forum, we know women are enjoying strength training more than ever.”

Your insights are a guiding light for the Sweat team and trainers, who use feedback from our community to help decide on everything from workout length to the equipment the program features to how frequently you want to work out.

Testing Strength with Kayla 

Once a new program has been written, it’s time to make sure it actually works. Before we released it to you, Strength with Kayla had been roadtested by everyone from Kayla and her husband Jae to members of Sweat’s Exercise Science team, who work together to review everything from workout structure to exercise splits and audio cues. 

“Testing can take a couple of months as we go through every workout in the program,” shares Megan from Sweat’s Exercise Science team. “Kayla and our team go through every session, making detailed notes and checking everything from timing to rest breaks and whether reps need adjusting to make sure the workout flows well.”

Capturing the in-app content 

“We plan out production days in detail,” says Megan. “That includes creating a run sheet with every single exercise, making sure every single piece of equipment is ready, and assigning a unique code to each movement that is used during filming and then again when we record the audio.” 

After kicking things off with hair and makeup (and those all important coffee orders), filming starts at around 9 am and the team aims to shoot up to 250 exercises a day. Throughout the day, the music is blasting, snacks are always on hand, we have plenty of rest breaks and make sure we keep the vibes high. 

“On set, the trainers perform each exercise five times to capture the looped video you see in the app. Filming usually takes between two and four days which can mean over 3,500 reps per shoot!”  

After capturing the video content, it’s into the studio to record the in-app audio for each exercise.

The marketing campaign shoot 

Once the in-app content has been captured, all eyes turn to Sweat’s creative team to plan the marketing campaign. Our Creative Director Dee, Creative Manager Loz and Production Coordinator Liz work with Kayla to lock in dates, finalise shoot locations and decide on Kayla’s styling while reaching out to the trusted partner suppliers who help bring our programs to life. Meanwhile in the background, the rest of the creative, social and marketing team are busy diving into current content trends and brainstorming how we can take this campaign to the next level. 

“There are countless hours (and the occasional 2 am note-taking session) that go into the creative ideation, brainstorming and brief writing phase of campaign planning,” shares Dee. “We’re so lucky to have so many incredible creative minds and social experts to feed in.” 

The Strength with Kayla shoot was an epic one, with two days of filming at locations on the Gold Coast and PLENTY of cameos from the Sweat team, with everyone from our Senior Product Manager Vic to Senior Copywriter Erin flying in for the occasion. The day began with hair and make-up at Kayla’s house as the Sweat team and suppliers arrived on set at 9 am to kick off the behind the scenes content capture and make sure everything was ready to go for the day, from Kayla’s styling for seamless outfit changes to playlist selections and an abundance of snacks and coffees to keep everyone fuelled. 

“Having so many of our team on set made this shoot an incredible experience - the girl gang vibes were on. We all can’t wait for the Sweat Community to get their hands on this program and get a taste of how fun and empowering it is to strength train like this with Kayla,” says Erin.

The first half of the day is dedicated to photography, with imagery captured for the Sweat app and all of our channels from emails to Sweat’s blog. After lunch our photographer and videographer switch places and the second half of the day is all about capturing awesome video content and all the fun that goes on behind the scenes. 

“The marketing shoot is the highlight of the entire process for me,” shares Kayla. “I love seeing our vision come to life, and it was awesome to have so many members of the Sweat team up in the Gold Coast for the occasion.” 

The undisputed MVP of shoot days? Trevor the Trolley, who helps our team cart the equipment around, making sure everything runs smoothly.

Getting everything in the Sweat app 

Once Kayla and the in-app content team are happy with how the program is looking, it’s time to get the program built in the Sweat app and into the staging version of the app. 

Our team builds out each week of workouts with the visuals and audio from the in-app content capture day, adds the program descriptions and imagery from the campaign shoot, and takes the program from a spreadsheet to the final product you get to see on launch day. And you know what that means. Yep. More testing! 

Kayla and the Sweat team use the staging version of the app to test out the sessions (who needs to sneak a workout in on their lunch break when their job is testing workouts?) and make any last-minute changes. 

“Before we hit go, we test everything again (and again!) to make sure it’s just right,” says Megan. 

Meetings, meetings, meetings

In the lead up to launch, Kayla and the Sweat team catch up regularly to go through where everything is at, with our Marketing Operations Lead Alice ensuring everyone is up to date with where the project is at and keeping everything (and everyone!) on track so we don’t miss a deadline. 

From last-minute workout tweaks to what the launch emails will look like to selecting the final campaign imagery (with some iconic Google Meet cameos from Arna and Jax along the way), these meetings cover anything and everything. 

We know that Sweat is so much more than just your workouts, so our teams work together to figure out how we’re going to keep you motivated on your Strength with Kayla journey. Everything from the blog content to level up your training to the final social posts and in-app messages are discussed and planned out in detail to help you get even more out of your training with Kayla.

Planning for what’s next… 

For every member of the Sweat Community who loves strength training in the gym and using big pieces of equipment, we know there’s another woman who is all about her at-home workouts. Don’t worry, Kayla’s got you. Strength with Kayla At Home is coming VERY soon.