Why is dance so awesome for fitness?


Let’s talk about dance and why it’s such an amazing form of exercise!

We all like dancing don’t we. It’s been around since man started to create rhythm. Babies do it as soon as they hear rhythm the toes start to wiggle. I know with my my nieces i’ve watched them move their bodies as soon as they’ve heard music and i think it’s inherently in a lot of us.

One of the great things about dance is that we generally do it with other people, so there’s a massive sociability aspect to dancing. We know this because we go out clubbing we go out down the pub we’ve always found sociability within dance.

Another thing that has been found recently is that dance is really good for the brain. It creates neural pathways between brain and body.
It creates new neural pathways within the brain.
There’s been some evidence in certain studies that show that dance is even better at looking after the brain than many puzzles like crosswords or sudoku, because we believe in the brain and body connection.
There does seem to be quite a lot of evidence that dance can help stave off things like dementia and alzheimer’s.
This would make sense we’re constantly using the neural pathways in our brain between the pathways in the brain and our body.

We’ve all known at some point whether we needed a drink to help us get there but when we were dancing that it feels good. It releases endorphins that make us feel great.

One of the other things that’s quite great about dance is the challenge. Whenever we learn new routines, whether it’s in a zumba class, whether it’s in clubbersize, or any other like body jam, shabam or any other dance based program like Disco fit as we have at Club-K.

Initially there’s quite a lot of challenge to the class in learning the new moves. One of the challenges is it can take up to 140 repetitions create the neural pathways between the brain and body.
But when we finally get those moves there’s that real fist bump moment of yes i’ve got it! It’s amazing i finally got it. It’s going really well.
Then there’s a moment of freedom. The freedom to express yourself through dance.

I don’t think there’s a class that i teach that people laugh so much as in a dance class. It’s one of those things that can go wrong.
We all move in our own different way and it’s one of those moments that we can laugh at ourselves. Especially when we’re trying new moves it doesn’t necessarily happen the way we envisage in our brain.

One of the cool things we have at Club-K is not many mirrors so you rarely see yourself. You can just let go and have that freedom to dance. Have that freedom to just enjoy the music and move how you want to move

The endorphins that are released feel so good and you can buzz for a long time after doing it. We know this from going out clubbing. and dance has been around for such a long time.
The great thing about dance is it takes our bodies through ranges of motion that we might not necessarily have in other classes. We have more freedom of expression. Our arms can go through larger ranges of motion as can our legs sometimes. It’s a great all-round workout.

Nike created a dance program many years ago called the Nike rockstar workout and they had one of the most amazing advertising campaigns that went with it which was “tell me i’m not an athlete”

We’ve certainly learned that dancing burns a lot of calories and we seem to burn more calories when we’re having fun and having a good time, and dance is one of those great ways of doing that.

So whether you’re into zumba, whether you’re into clubbercise, body jam, shaban any of those wonderful dance-based classes like disco fit, salsasize, jazzercise enjoy them. Go for it!

It’s one of the times that you can have fun on your own with your friends led by an instructor.

At club k we turn the lights out put the disco lights on nobody can really see what you’re doing and you’re having a great time burning calories and it can be one of those things that you look forward to doing.

That’s one of the great things about any exercise class, but specifically dance, is that you really look forward to that moment of doing a class but here’s one of the really good things about it dance has this amazing ability to take you away from everyday life. Not only is it that you’re enjoying yourself and having a good time, but certainly if you’re being given new choreography you have no time to think about what else is going on in the class. you need to focus on each movement that is being given to you there and then.

Not all dance is free, some dance is more contained ballet for instance definitely has poise definitely has control and execution of the movement. Barre has become quite an exciting new way of training in the fitness industry. It may have been around a long time but it seems to have exploded recently with many different variations on the ballet principle.

Whether you are a dancer or not, we all tap our feet when we hear a bit of music. It’s a great way of having friends, sociability, burning calories and having a great time.

Try a class soon. Let me know how you get on.

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