Today was my third trapeze class. We learned catcher's hang (from higher up), trapeze swings (run and hang on the trapeze) and a few new moves.
We started the class with a review of last week's moves: skater, bowsprits and catchers hang. From a hang like when you first get on, we out one of our feet down (forgot the name of this move). You bring one knee to your nose and then let it hang and arch your back. This move looks really pretty (my partner could touch her feet to her head.)
Dolphin—starts out like the hip balances from last week. Fold yourself over the trapeze and the balance yourself (like a balance) but with hands and feet up. From dolphin, you can fold yourself over into arrow (feet wrapped around the rope, head below the bar, an inverted arrow). From there, you can bring your hips up into catcher's hang.
We also worked on tree frog. You hang on the trapeze, hands closer together, on the trapeze, and bring your feet on the outside, also up the trapeze (butt up too.) This one just feels weird.
The hardest part of these moves is remembering what to do next, where your foot or hand goes. But it's getting easier.
We ended the class with the trapeze swings. You just run with the swing and then hang off of it for a while (with your feet up).
We had a bunch of new people in this class. Three, then four and then a few more trickled in. We'll see how it goes.
For now, I have some calluses that are starting to look impressive.
Today was the first tumbling class of the fall semester. There were so many people in the class. During the summer it was usually 5-6 people. Twelve people was a big class. I think there were 17 people there tonight: some of the regulars, 4-5 acro people, a few cheerleaders, some college dancer/gymnast type people and a few guys who must do acro, parkour cheer or something, because they were flipping impressively.
I had to redo paper work. Then it was stretching and drills (forward rolls, handstands, cartwheels, round offs). We did these in lines three people deep—there were so many there.
When it was time for stations:
I worked on my bridge kick over. I've been stuck on two rainbow mats, or about 3-4 inches for a month. Today, I tried on one mat, about 2 inches and finally got that. Hooray! Progress! I tried a kick over on the ground—and got it twice with a tiny push from Coach Megan. I guess next week, I'll see if I can do it without her. And then I need to work on going back to a bridge instead of coming up from one.
I did some handstand drills.
Then I worked on my front tuck. Robert (one of the new instructors) piled the mats up to my chest and had me practice getting UP and getting my hips over. I think this is exactly what I needed to work on. So I did this, and did it and did it. He wanted to build muscle memory. Hopefully, this is exactly what I need.
Goal: Front tuck by the end of the year, if not sooner.
I was a little overwhelmed by all of the people in the class, but I got to work on what I wanted to work on. I got some time with the coaches (there were 3-4 there).
Tumbling is my favorite class of the week. I wish I could do it a few more times. And I'm thinking about buying a tumbling mat. If only there weren't so expensive. #takinguptumblingat31
I am always on the hunt for cute workout clothes—preferably on sale.
I kept getting Pandora pop-up ads for Fabletics. They were on my radar for cute workout wear, but I could never find the cute capris in the ads actually in stock.
By chance I happened to click on Fabletics on the first of the month when they release new products. And I found some capris that I had to have. I bought them immediately.
I went ahead and signed up for the VIP membership. They're an online subscription retailer where you can buy an outfit every month. If you sign up for the VIP membership, you can get better prices, but the catch is you have to remember to login the first of every month to buy or decline the month. I could live with that, I thought (though I do have huge doubts.)
They also have a new member signup deal where your first outfit is $25. The catch is you have 48 hours from signing up to redeem that deal. So only sign up for their service if you want to buy immediately. I'd signed up a few months ago for their service (not the VIP membership), so I couldn't get the $25 deal. And I didn't really want any outfits. (I have a ton of workout clothes). I just wanted the capris (cute capris that aren't black are hard to find.)
For my first time ordering, I got 20% off the capris. It took a while to get a shipping confirmation, but after that they came in shortly. And they were the wrong size. I'me between a small and an extra-small in workout pants. I opted for the xs, because that's what they said a size 4 was. I'm a 4. I couldn't even fit my thigh in those pants.
I exchanged them. And exchanges are easy enough. You exchange them online. And when you put the return pair in the mail, they'll send out the new pair. (During this time, I was worried that they would sell out of the smalls.) Finally, my capris came in the mail. The smalls fit. They seemed to be a good quality. The exchange was free and I was happy about that.
First capri I ordered from Fabletics.
The next month, I wanted a pair of printed capris and it took forever to find an outfit I liked. (The site sells workout wear in terms on outfits. See image at top.)I like the bottoms and the tops, but never in the combinations they pick out. And when an outfit is $50 and the pants are $40 it makes sense to go ahead and buy the outfit. I found two outfits with the tops and bottoms I liked—and when I went to order that night, a lot of the styles that were there that morning were already sold out. I picked an outfit, added a top in the sale section and they offered me another top for $10 so I added that for my August outfit.
The outfit came in the mail. The capris (now that I know what size I am) are adorable and I wore them right away. The sale top was a lot cheaper than it looked online, but was okay. The top that came with the outfit and the $10 add-on tops were extremely cheap. I took one look at them and knew they were going back. They were also huge. I went ahead and ordered a small—after having to order up in the capris, but the small was way too big.
This top was cheaper than it looked, but for $20 it was okay. TjMaxx has the same kind of stuff for the same price, and you can try their clothes on.
This top runs big, is super cheap and I had to call to return it.
I tried to send these tops back online, like I did last month. Only I couldn't. It said I had to call their 800 number and talk to someone weekdays between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. It was 8:50 p.m. when they sent me this message so I called them the next day. I was only hold for about 4 minutes before getting a girl who called herself O'Hara (what Indian girl calls themself O'Hara? And clearly she was at an overseas call center. Very thick accent.) It took five minutes for her to understand that I wanted to exchange two tops for a pair of capris. And then she returned one top for the capris and gave me a refund for the other top. It took her a while to figure out that I wanted the RIO RUN CAPRI IN BLUE LAVA. I said that like 10 times. Why I had to talk to her to do this, I don't know. It was annoying. I'd rather do this online. But no language barrier.
But a least she let me return the items. I was worried, I was going to have to dispute the charge on my credit card and/or cancel my Fab membership. I was fully prepared for this conversation.
Then, the return label she promised me took forever to get to me. I expected it to be in my inbox when I hung up the phone—that's the speed of email. But after our 9:30 a.m. conversation I got the return label at 6 p.m. After the post office closed. So much for having that taken care of that day.
Verdict: Would I recommend this service? Maybe.
I HATE that you have to buy in outfits. I never like two of the pieces that come together. I like some of the tops and some of the bottoms, but not in the combinations they choose. I just have a lot of workout tanks and don't need their tanks.
Their tops are EXTREMELY CHEAP. I might never buy another tank from them again. I like dry-fit performance tanks—not cheap see-through cotton.
That said, they do have a good variety of workout wear, that other ladies at the gym probably won't be wearing.
Sizing: I think their pants run small and their tops run big.
Annoyances: Their wish list feature currently isn't working. Their search is also not user-friendly. You can search by products by name (desio, flourish, but can't search for "blue tank" or "pink lava capri". VIP membership. I'm very way of this. I don't mind checking in on the first of the month. That's easy enough to remember, but I worry it will be a pain in the ass to cancel in a few months when I'm tired of this service (when my husband yells at me for having too many workout clothes. It's probably deserved. It's an addiction.)
Today I tried a Skyfitness class at skyzone. The kind you might have seen on Keeping up With the Kardashians (the episode where Khloe has some camel toe, but still wears tight pants and short tops.)
Granted, I've been taking trampoline cardio classes for a year, but I wanted to try another gym and see what their classes were like.
Atlanta traffic is unpredictable so we left very early. It took an hour to get there and we were super early. The manager signed us in and printed out our tickets (to jump afterwards). I signed up and paid online the night before.
Your first Skyfitness class is $5, and after that $10 each. Or you can buy a monthly membership for $20. Classes are offered at 9 a.m. Monday through Saturday.
There were 13 people in our class. There was a high school aged guy, 3-4 older couples, and a lot of 30-something women, maybe teachers. Most people came in pairs.
The instructor, Josh, was a beefy guy who I guessed played high school football. The class started with some light stretching, balancing on one foot, stretching shoulders, ankles, legs etc. The warm-up was 10+ minutes of running mans, jump up and touch your knees, side-to-side jumps, lunges, pulses, jumping front to back, tracing all the corners, butt drops, There were pushups, plank holds (where my feet slipped because of the socks), butt drops (but no spins), jumping jacks, donkey kicks, jumping really high for a minute—to get your heart rate up. I was definitely ready for a water break when it came.
The third part of the class was cardio. 60 seconds of laps around the trampoline, 60 seconds of curls with a band, or 30 seconds of lunges and 30 seconds of tricep dips on the floor. Then it was back on the trampoline, where we raced up and down the lanes for 30 seconds, while our partners did a sidestep with the band. We took the bands back to the trampoline and did some leg extensions, push ups, planks etc. There was also popcorn (back bounces), V-ups and butt-ups for abs. The class ended with 7 minutes of stretching.
After the class, we stayed to jump. We went to the foam pit and flipped until some 10-year-old boys showed up. Then we tried the basketball court and attempted to dunk the basketballs. We went back to the main trampoline to jump. I wanted to flip, but wasn't rotating enough and it wasn't happening. Kids also kept jumping across our pads (though the trampoline was pretty empty.) We went back to the foam pit and tried to flip some more. I kept under rotating. And Matt finally figured out how to dunk! And that was our 30 minutes.
I liked that there was a clock on the wall that counted down the seconds. We need that at my gym.
Socks: I would prefer to jump barefoot. I really hate socks. (I'm a Southern girl and would rather be barefoot or in flip-flops.) The Skyzone socks didn't bother me for the most part. The didn't bother me at all while I was jumping. They did make holding planks harder in the class (I kept slipping on the sock) and the foam pit foam tends to stick to them.
Quick Guide:
Verdict: Fun way to burn a lot of calories. You will get your heart rate up.
Thoughts: It was a good class. It got my heart rate up. There was nothing too confusing for me. Most of it was super easy. I rather thought I killed the class—jumping higher than most of the pros, etc. But there was no high-five from the instructor after class. The participants filed out and he put up the equipment. I missed the personal touch from the instructor, or maybe I just wanted to be told awesome job.
And overall, an Aerofit class is more fun. (Skyfitness also didn't use the walls at all). Alex's classes are brutal, but when he's singing Britney Spears off key it just makes the class more fun.
Atmosphere: Standard workout class. The attendees seemed very quiet. The instructor seemed to be a no-nonsense trainer.
Intensity: The first 10 minutes are the hardest. It will get your heart rate up. If you're new to working out, just take it easy. Do as much as you can and watch the others. If you're a pro, you won't have trouble with the class. It isn't too hard. And there were two water breaks built-in.
Price: $5 for a first class and $10 afterwards is pretty good.
What to wear: Workout clothes and the socks they sell there. I wouldn't wear anything too baggy. I like to wear capris and a tank.
If you go: Ladies, make sure you pee before you jump. Trampolines do weird things to bladders.
Would I do it again: Aerofit doesn't offer Friday or Saturday cardio classes anymore. (There is a noon class I can't make, but no Friday evenings or Saturday noon.) If gas wasn't $15 a trip, I'd consider it. Until then I'll wait until Aerofit expands. I've heard rumors of a basketball court, tumble track, climbing wall and foam pit.
The rope climb is a one of the stereotypical enemies of nerds in gym classes everywhere. Rope climb is for jocks. Not stringy, pale people in glasses.
Ppp-shhaaw I say to that.
We have a climbing rope in our gym. It took me months to learn to climb it. Well, kind of. We'd do pull-ups on the rope and I couldn't strong-arm my way up the ropes like the guys can. I tried and tried to climb the rope, and could get a few feet up. In frustration I googled "how to climb a rope" and it was all over. The next time I went to the gym, I climbed 3/4 of the way up. And shortly after that, all the way up. (This is the video I found most helpful. I watched it several times: http://youtu.be/uKGy8EsN0VI)
The key is a foot wrapping technique.
1) Jump up on the rope. If there's a knot you can base your feet on, use that. Grab as high up on the rope as you can and then stand up.
2) Wrap your foot (I use my right) around the rope.(With the rope on the inside of your leg, wrap your leg outside and then tuck your foot back inside the rope. So part of the rope will be on your leg. It will go across your ankle or top of your foot and then under your foot again.)
3) Step on the wrapped foot with your other foot and pull yourself up.
4) Repeat. Keep wrapping and rewrapping. (Watch the video. She explains so much better then me.)
5) And then come down from the climb. Just watch out for rope burn! (And the knot at the bottom. That can hurt if you come down too fast and hit the rope with your crotch.)
This way you use your legs AND your arms to get up. The foot wrapping technique gets easier with practice. The first few times I tried it, I had to really think about it, and concentrate on rewrapping my foot. (I miss my footing once in the video.)
Don't worry, you still get an arm workout. (It really burns my arms out. I can climb 1 time to the top max.)
This is one of my tricks that I'm proud of—because climbing a rope is awesome. And you do have to be strong to do it. Maybe it looks impressive? #Beastmode.
With Youtube, maybe there's not an excuse not to be able to climb a rope? Except for maybe rope burn….On your thighs. That totally sucks.
Today was my first day of aerial Trapeze class. Everyone in Athens raves about Canopy and I was ready for something different so I decided to give it a try.
It was as first classes are. Go around the room and say your name, stretch, learn about the equipment, and do some tricks but not too many.
The class was a diverse mix of people—all women. A few were younger. I'd say most were 30s and 40s. There were 14 people in all.
After stretches we partnered up to work on the trapezes. First, they showed us how to lower a trapeze from the wall, take it off the caribiner and adjust the height. It was all complicated and will definitely take me a few classes.
We had partners and we took turns practicing all of the skills like getting on the trapeze. You don't simply sit on it. (My logical brain was so confused.) You start on the floor and bring your knees over and pull yourself up. We practiced sitting on the trapeze and swinging playground style. We did knee hangs—both from a low trapeze with your back on the floor and then later from a higher trapeze when you could actually hang. We practiced laying back on the trapeze, standing on the trapeze (It was shakier than I thought it would be) and something that might have been called star pose—with one foot and hand on the rope, and the other two out. We tried leaning back from standing and getting down from that (think one footed squat, while balancing on a bar) and then doing a skin the cat to get down from the trapeze. The end. That was class.
Trapeze seems complicated—there are a lot steps, and placements to remember (grip your thumb around the bar, keep your thumbs up like in thumbs up, pike this way etc.) It doesn't seem overly difficult though. I wasn't tired or winded afterwards. And perhaps I was expecting it to be more fun? (Like trampoline, acro or gymnastics. All super fun for the first class.) I guess it could be more fun later. For my first class, I wasn't wowed. But then again a good foundation is important. We'll see how the next class though.
Clockwise from top right: TRX at Aerofit, cardio at Aerofit, acro yoga and tumbling at Bishop Park.
My usual workout routine is just going to Aerofit. I do some cardio. I do TRX. I like to mix it up.
To add some variety, I've been going to Wednesday night tumbling. This summer and added in the occasional Sunday night acro yoga. I signed up for Monday night aerial trapeze classes starting this week. There's also Tuesday night tumbling in Oconee that I want to try. And when I can afford it, I want to try Leap, the flying trapeze. And that's a lot. And probably how I hurt my knee to begin with—overuse.
So, if you need me, I'll be at a gym….somewhere…..hopefully not being bored.
I've tried since February to take classes at Canopy studio, which is a local aerial arts facility. They teach trapeze classes, silks and more.
I've know about them since college. Their classes are pretty popular in my liberal little college town.
My neighbor talked about wanting to take classes. I thought it sounded fun enough and I said I was happy to tag along. After a pretty lengthy delay, they told her they had no openings when classes resumed March 17, but she could take expensive private lessons.
This happened again with their new session of classes months later.
Finally, their fall session has openings. I email the day the newsletter comes out—asking if I can take a class (new people have to get permission to take the classes. A popup tells you this when you try to sign up.) And I don't hear anything back.Nothing. After about two weeks I email them again. I keep running into Canopy people, who all say it's so fun.
I'm pretty mad at Canopy at this point and give up on taking the class. They have awful customer service and must not need new customers. (A coworker tells me she once stopped by for more info and they wouldn't help her.) I decide there's an acro yoga class on Monday, I'd probably rather take.
The Friday before classes start they email me to go ahead and sign up. !!!
I wasn't going to sign up. But then I thought it was this hard to get a spot, when am I going to get the chance again? So I signup. It's$153 for a 9-week class. That comes out to $17 a class, which is kind of pricey. But I am looking for something different. We'll see…...
I've wanted to go to Skyzone since I heard about it a year or so ago. A giant trampoline gym? Yes please.
The closest one, however, is more than an hour away. Friday I was in Gwinnett to have my car looked at. On a whim, I typed in Skyzone on my iPhone map to see how far away it was. Five miles. I really needed to get home to feed my cats, walk my job, and let my friend get something she'd store in my garage out. I was tempted though.
I was leaving the service center and the guy told me not to take my usual route home. He said there was a bad wreck. I took that as a sign I needed to try Skyzone. (So I called and had my neighbor take care of my pets and to tell my friend I'd be home later.)
I drive to Skyzone. It's in a giant warehouse in a business park. There was plenty of parking. You go in and fill out a waiver on their computers, then wait in line to be checked in at the front desk. I signed up for a 30 minute jump. It was $10 + $2 for some orange grippy socks. (I thought the socks would be annoying. I barely noticed them). They give you a sticker to put on and then you go jump for your allotted time. Mine was 6:30-7 p.m.
There were some quarter-opereated lockers to put your stuff in. There's also a concession stand. There were a ton of trampolines. I didn't know where to go. There were some trampolines near a foam pit. (The lines looked long.) There were two dodge-ball courts with 8-12 year-olds jumping madly over pads. And there was the giant trampoline court. It had vertical trampolines on three sides and was probably 3x the size of Aerofit. These trampolines had a lot of little kids (toddlers with their parents) and some 5-8 year-olds, but not a lot of older kids. That's where I went. An employee in an orange polo shirt gave a group in front of me directions, and I followed on the trampoline. I went to a relatively unused corner and tried to figure out what to do. There were kids just running and jumping. No one was doing tricks really.
I jumped across the trampolines. I think they were a tad bigger than the Aerofit trampolines, and there were some narrow tumble track looking trampolines. The trampolines felt different than the ones at Aerofit. They weren't sprung as tightly. I tried a butt drop and had to really concentrate to get it because the spring wasn't the same. I saw a kid flipping over the pads so I tried a cartwheel. And it's actually easier to flip here—because of the spring in the trampoline. I tried some round-offs and one-armed round-offs. I ventured over to the wall—which isn't lined up exactly. One vertical trampoline might be behind two regular trampolines. I tried some back bounces and supermans. They still felt different so they weren't as effortless and but totally doable. One other kids tried a back bounce into the wall, but I was mostly the one one doing tricks. (I couldn't do a backdrop hand stand. The trampolines weren't tight enough to get my arms under me.)
A16-year-old employee with a whistle in his mouth came over to my area. I bounced over and asked him what his best trick was.
"Probably that," he said to my butt drop. I was disappointed. The employees at Aerofit are the ones with the best tricks. They're also more enthusiastic than these kids who just give the little jumpers dirty looks. (Teach them a new trick!)
I jumped around some more and worked on some toe touches, back drops, flagpoles, whatever I could remember. I was having fun. By myself. No one ever comes to the trampoline park by themselves, but why not?
Finally a different employee (with whistle and orange polo shirt came over) and asked if I was doing a workout. I told him I was just playing. I asked him what his best trick was and he said a full. I was much more impressed with that, though he did not demonstrate. Apparently, he's a competition cheerleader. And we chatted about me not being able to flip. He suggested the foam pit. I decided to brave the lines and give it a try.
I stood in line with 4-year-olds who just dove into the foam pit. It was mostly really little kids. There was a 6-7 year-old who looked a little lost who was giving me weird looks. And there was a 12-year-old girl who seemed to be there with her toddler brother. They dove, I worked on my front tuck. I didn't have anyone to give me pointers on form, but I tried. And had a blast.
I'm just a big kid at heart. Skyzone was super fun to visit. I'm glad I went. I'd go back again (especially with a friend)—if only my car was working…..
This week I've been resting my knee—which has translated to more arm work at the gym.
I've been doing circuit training this week and avoid the circuits with jumping. My knee doesn't need the added strain. And the teacher has been giving me arms to do.
Skip TRX shootouts. Climb the rope instead. 4x. Skip cardio step-ups, do TRX I-holds instead.
Tonight my workout included rope climbs. Four of them. I got all the way up the first time. The second and third times I got about half-way up and the last time I got 3/4 the way up. The next station had 60-second TRX X-holds. And then 60-second intervals of battle ropes. The burnout was 4-straight minutes of plank holds with your feet in the TRX straps. There were some pendulum swings and bringing your knee to your chest and back, but it was a murderous workout. I was dead afterwards. So so dead.
The instructor said he was glad he wasn't doing it with us. Thanks.
