Really doing GREAT with this Year of Fitness thing….. 2021 will be better (I hope!). I will say I did this class on October 11th but like the failure I am, I forgot to charge my Apple Watch. To be able to redeem myself and properly write this post, I booked a redemption class on October 25th but lo and be hold NYC trains where delayed and I was about 15 minutes late so decided to count my losses at book a massage instead because treat yourself!
Since I have continued to be a lazy blob since then, I am going to write this and just add the data when I go again, since I will be going again!
- Studio Name/Class: ConBody Outdoor Class (Lion’s Gate Soccer Field)
- Activity Type: HIIT
- Total Calories Burned: 1000??? (HA I wish, I forgot to charge my watch)
- Average/Highest Heart Rate (measured through Apple Watch):
- Skill level needed (i.e how beginner friendly is it): Hard
Quick thoughts?
WOW, this class kicked my butt! For those of you who aren’t familiar with ConBody: “CONBODY, developed by former inmate Coss Marte, is the ultimate no-equipment, workout program. Using military-style bodyweight training techniques that he learned in prison, Coss was able to lose 70 pounds in six months with nothing but the walls and floor of his 9-by-6 prison cell.
CONBODY’s real message is about prison reform. Our mission is to bridge a gap between two communities: young professionals and formerly incarcerated individuals. We partner with non-profit organizations to provide resources (educational, housing, employment, and mentorship) to former inmates. CONBODY has hired over 40 former inmates and has a 0% recidivism rate.” (Conbody Website)
I don’t know if it was my lack of fitness but this class was no joke. Like many classes, we started out with a warmup to get our cardio up which lasted about 15 minutes and by the end of it, I realized this was going to be a long, painful hour (in the best way possible). The next portion of the class was circuit style where you would superset a few exercises for time and breaks where short. The circuits where refreshing since alot of the classes I have been going to are repetitive with doing the same 5 exercises (hello burpees and lunges) and since the business was founded on prison-style fitness which I am assuming requires minimal equipment, they had alot of newer, complex movements.
After these circuits, we entered the fun part of the class which is best described as gym class, but make it more torturous. By this point we had attracted a crowd of bystanders and we where given three exercises that corresponded to certain words (i.e back was flutter kicks, front was push ups and up was squats I think), super simple exercises. The instructor would then shout these three words for a set amount of time in random sequences and you would switch between the exercises. I we as a group messed up more then 3x the timer started over. Like any instructor, they had to have fun with this and he began quickly saying them one after another so we wouldn’t have time to change, in hopes we would all end on the same final word. Our group did pretty well and managed to not have any time added.
Overall, I would say this class was an incredible workout, alot of fun and I felt like they where doing a great job following Covid Safety guidelines and distancing. I would set a disclaimer that if you are starting from absolute 0 and are easily intimidated, this may be a little much.