If you’ve kept up with F&F, you know that last weekend I attended Boston Mania, an awesome three-day fitness convention put on by SCW Fitness Education in Danvers, MA.

“SCW Fitness Education’s Boston MANIA® Fitness Convention offers a vast array of workshops on every fitness topic imaginable, ranging from Personal Training to Pilates, from Yoga to Pregnancy, and from Aquatics to Aging.  Additionally, specialty areas such as Kids Programming, Biomechanics, Nutrition, and Sales & Management are offered.  MANIA® is widely considered to be the One-Stop convention by many Fitness Professionals!”

If you’ve kept up with F&F, you also know that I had so much fun at Mania.  I was in my happy place.  I took thirteen total classes all weekend, and I want to write about them all!  That would be a really long post, so I’m going to intersperse my class recaps throughout my regular blog posts over the next couple weeks.

First up?  Piloxing.

Boston Mania 2012:  Piloxing

The first class I took at Mania was Piloxing on Friday morning from 7:30am-9am.  Have you guys heard of Piloxing before?  I had only heard bits of info here and there, so I was totally pumped to try it.  If you are like, “What the heck is Piloxing?” it’s exactly what it sounds like.  The program mixes Pilates and kickboxing moves into a “fat-torching, muscle sculpting, core-centric interval workout, guaranteed to whip you into shape, using a class format that’s both fun and challenging.”  Truth.

Leslie Grosshauser was our instructor, and she started the class by giving us a little background and history on Piloxing.  The program came about when Swedish dancer and celebrity trainer Viveca realized that many of her personal training clients would actually rush out of their Pilates or training work so they could make the cardio class offered down the street.  Viveca wanted to create something that would blend the Pilates/core work she was already doing, but something that would also keep the cardio appeal as well.  A little of this, a little of that, and Piloxing was born out of Viveca’s mission to physically and mentally empower women through fitness.

From the website:  “At the core of Piloxing is the  principle that feminine is powerful and it aims for women to attain a sleek, sexy and powerful self-image.”  Leslie mentioned this “Sexy, sleek, and powerful” motto several times throughout the workshop.  Sexy = the dance component that gives everyone a chance to show their personality.  Sleek = the sculpted look and flexibility you can achieve through Pilates.  Powerful = the power, speed, and agility of boxing.  She actually made us all yell together:  “Sleek! Sexy! Powerful!” at the end of class while striking different poses.  Cheesy, but it gets the “empowering” message across.

I could definitely see why people LOVE this class!  After Leslie talked at the beginning for about 25 minutes, we got moving.  What a great way to start the day!  It was definitely a good great cardio workout.  For those nervous about the dance component, it was not intimidating at all.  All the Pilates moves were based on standing work, and I definitely got my kickboxing fix in there.  I loved the music, I loved Leslie’s energy, and I found myself smiling the entire time.  The class is also done barefoot, which scared me a little at first, but my feet were actually ok.  Lastly, the class uses light weighted hand gloves to assist with arm toning, etc.  We took a group picture at the end of class, but it hasn’t been posted yet, so when it is I will add the picture to this post.

Now I want to certify in it, of course, especially since gyms don’t have to license to teach the material (I think).  But we’ll leave that for another time.  If your gym offers Piloxing, PLEASE go try it!

Have you ever tried Piloxing before?  Would you?

Hope everyone’s weekends are winding down nicely.  Tim and I are hosting a mini Friendsgiving later today.  Gotta get cooking!