Whether it be turning your cardio session into a jam session, trying yoga and pilates moves like you’ve never seen them before, or taking on an Ultimate Fighting Champion as your personal trainer, there’s something for everyone in our round up of the hottest fitness trends 2014.
Pound
Dreaming of a lean toned body, but lack the motivation? This fun-centric fitness trend is for you. Described as ‘a full-body cardio jam session’, Pound fuses cardio, pilates, isometric movements, plyometrics and isometric poses into a 45-minute class, all whilst keeping a constant beat with drumsticks. The result is an intense, effective workout that will have you feeling like a rockstar.
Featured on the likes of Dr Oz and The View, Pound has created a real stir, garnering devotees internationally. The technique was created by friends Kirsten Potenza and Cristina Peerenboom, both music enthusiasts, drummers and fitness experts. ‘The great thing about Pound is that it incorporates a lot of different stability challenging exercises, along with cardio,’ says Potenza. ‘But to take it up to the next level we added lightly weight exercise drumsticks called Ripstix™’ Ripstix™, used throughout the entirety of a Pound session, are only twice as heavy as regular drumsticks, but go along way to increase the fun of a workout and disguise the pain.
‘It’s not every day that you get to reap the neurological and physiological benefits of drumming,’ says Peerenboom. ‘so you’ll actually get to lower your cortisone levels, boost your immune system and even lower your cholesterol.’
One of the best things about Pound is its simplicity. Packed with familiar, easy to follow moves, you’ll be focused on the exciting soundtrack of rock, rap, dub-step, pop and old school tunes, and won’t notice the aches and pain until you’ve already burned all of those calories.
Rescu. Recommends: Try a Pound class at Hard Candy Fitness. Internationally popular, Hard Candy Fitness are now in Sydney, and offer a broad and varied range of classes and training – including Pound! Hard Candy Fitness can be found at 48 Druitt Street Sydney and contacted at 02 8088 8888.
Barre Body
If you love yoga and pilates, but want to try something new, we recommend the fluid moves of Australian fitness trend Barre Body. A combination of yoga, pilates and ballet barre conditioning, the unique program focuses on all those lesser used muscles to create a total body toning effect. Barre Body conditions your body from head to toe as well as improving balance, strength and flexibility – just think long and lean like a ballet dancer.
This eclectic mix of conditioning and static exercises is developed by Emma Seibold, a certified yoga and pilates instructor and holistic health & wellness coach, who began to perfect her own personal brand of fitness after the birth of her child. ‘Barre Body was developed by me as a means to get my body back into shape quickly after Xavier was born,’ says Seibold. ‘I started incorporating barre conditioning exercises into my yoga practice to provide the extra toning that yoga often misses and I found my body firming up really quickly.’
In terms of a typical Barre Body class, you can expect variety. ‘Barre Body classes fuse yoga, pilates and barre conditioning, combining interval training with isometric (static) exercises,’ says Seibold. ‘A typical class format would be: dynamic yoga warm up, hand weights (evil but necessary – I liken them to a bikini wax; process is painful, but results are worth it), leg work at the barre, glute work at the barre, core work on the mat and a stretching session to improve flexibility and cool down.’
One of Barre Body’s biggest claims to fame is that students are able to get visible results very quickly, generally in just 10 classes over a 3-4 week period. If you’re looking to transform your physique, 3 – 5 Barre Body classes are recommended per week to achieve best results. Barre Body studios are now open in Sydney and Melbourne, for more information visit barrebody.com.au
UFC FIT
Who better to turn to for fitness tips than an elite athlete? Mike Dolce, creator of UFC FIT, is an ultimate fighting champion and top sports coach, and has packed all of his most effective training methods into this at 12 week at home DVD program. He’ll lead you through the workouts with an infectious enthusiasm and the energy of an ultimate fighting champ – this fitness trend is not for the faint of heart.
FIT stands for Full-Body Intensity Training and the key word is definitely ‘Intensity’. A session of UFC FIT comprises 5 rounds, each made up of eight 30-second periods. For the first four periods you’ll try a different strength, cardio or UFC-style fighting move, and then repeat. The result is a workout that will have you sweating like you’ve never sweated before, but which is varied enough to prevent you from giving up at the first hurdle. As soon as you think you can’t take a particular move any more, you will have moved on to the next.
You might also like…
