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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Better body the boot camp and barre way

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One way or another, everyone manages to find himself back in the gym after the holidays doing battle against the seasonal bulge. Two popular additions to the fitness mix — boot camp and barre — have  participants sweating buckets, burning calories and shedding inches.

Boot Camp

Monty Miller, creator of Monty’s Boot Camp, believes the best way to exercise is to find something you genuinely enjoy doing.

“It’s all about feeling better and looking better,” Miller said.

The exercise industry learned from the military to incorporate an intense workout using camaraderie and variety to inspire its participants to push themselves to their full physical potential.

The Mayo Clinic states a boot camp workout is a type of interval training — bursts of intense activity alternated with intervals of lighter activity.

Miller works participants through a “cleansing combination of stretching, cardio and torture in one big happy bundle,” he said.

One of Miller’s clients, Diane Hack, said she enjoys exercising in the group setting.

“Working out in a group is great motivation; you cheer each other on and help each other make it through the part of the circuit you know is going to make your muscles burn,” Hack said. “For the first time in many years I feel better, look better, have more energy and my cholesterol is in check for the first time without a prescription.”

As Coast Guard reservists and with certification as physical fitness instructors through the Marine Corps at Camp Lejeune, two new Wilmington boot camp instructors, Lawrence Blanton and Angila Berni, have firsthand experience with the boot camp regime.

Blanton teaches an outdoor boot camp, Take it Outside, at the YMCA for most of the year, while another instructor teaches an indoor class there year round.

Blanton works every class around the theme of strength, agility or endurance. One of his favorites is a farm workout, during which he leads participants in hauling bulky objects, dragging and pushing sandbags.

“I’m always changing it up,” Blanton said.

With two or three boot camp classes per week, Blanton said, members usually see results at the three to four week mark.

“They feel better, are even more motivated to work out hard, and are ready to accept even greater challenges,” he said.

Berni’s approach at ATP Fitness is supported by the science of physical fitness as she works her participants toward lean body mass rather than dropping pounds.

To motivate clients, she implemented a six-week challenge to see who could lose the most inches and also introduced a “light” class for those intimidated by full-on boot camp.

A graduate of the challenge, 32-year-old Lauren Amato went for one to two hours every day for six weeks.

“I hadn’t worked out for two years and I was getting lazy,” she said. “Now, I have much more energy. I feel stronger. Each week the classes seemed more manageable as I was building strength.  And my jeans are not so tight!”

Barre

Staff photo by Allison Potter. Alexandra O’Rourke, co-owner of the Pure Barre franchise in Wilmington, participates in a class Dec. 3, 2014. Left:
Staff photo by Allison Potter. Alexandra O’Rourke, co-owner of the Pure Barre franchise in Wilmington, participates in a class Dec. 3, 2014. Left:

Instead of the cardiovascular exercises associated with boot camp classes, barre classes use the ballet barre, the stationary handrail used as support, to perform small isometric movements with low impact. The goal is to develop long, lean muscles without the bulk of more traditional exercise, said the founders at Pure Barre, one of largest barre workout franchises in the country.

The regime began with Lotte Berk, a modern dancer in the 1960s, who, injured while dancing, developed the barre practice as a form of rehab. The major focus of the practice is toning the seat and thighs, while also working on other muscle groups.

The purest form of the practice is to push a single muscle group until it begins to shake; “embrace the shake” is the motto at Pure Barre studios. Teachers instruct the students to isolate a muscle and move it an inch so the student can feel the exact muscle targeted and perfect its contour.

Alexandra O’Rourke and her sister were among the first to introduce barre classes to Wilmington in 2012.

“As long as you can hold onto the barre, you can do it,” O’Rourke said.

Melanie Bammert, in her mid-40s, started in 2012 after looking for a new workout routine.

“I’ve tried everything in terms of a workout — running, everything,” she said.

Bammert likes the physical changes she sees in  hard-to-reach areas like the thighs and abdominals, but has stayed because of the mental benefits.

“I have a very stressful job and this class can turn my entire day around,” Bammert said. “My body craves it. The environment is not competitive but motivating. I see other people’s bodies changing.”

Forged Strength and Conditioning, one of Wilmington’s latest entries into the physical fitness arena, offers a different model for its barre classes using a format called Booty Barre, developed by celebrity trainer Tracey Mallett, which incorporates dance and other exercise routines into the workout. Instructor Amy McCauley loves the ever-changing high-energy workout as well as the ability to keep an eye on each student since everyone is at eye level.

“I love it when a new student comes up to me and says, ‘I can’t believe how much you’ve changed me. And it’s not intimidating.  It’s such a welcoming environment,’” McCauley said.

Offered as a perk to employees of CastleBranch, the gym also has a personal training facility in Wrightsville Beach.

The instructors in both disciplines — boot camp and barre — agree that in a matter of weeks, students see dramatic changes to their bodies, making them effective programs for working past the three-week mark when many well-intended exercisers abandon their resolutions to get in shape.

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