Saturday, August 1, 2009

I'm Dancing In My Room and They're Calling It Zumba®

Yes. For exercise, I am dancing in my room. Put on 25-30 minutes of my favorite dance tunes and I'm on my way - incorporating fluid yoga poses, dolphin-like undulations, and full body muscle stretches into the same dance moves I busted 25 years ago in da clubs, baby.

Granted, now my mind focuses on keeping the core muscles tight and the posture straight while busting a move rather than the blonde at the end of the bar. On the plus side, I find that this focus is lurking into matters it previously eschewed - like standing in line at the bank or walking Max. Stomach in. Shoulders back. What can I say? Dancing in my room work's up a sweat and works out the heart. Like it did in da clubs, baby. (OK, that won't work a third time.)



Some people bicycle for exercise.


Another plus is that I get to choose my own music. Set it up first - all the CDs in a row. Today I start slow with Flashdance (Got a Feeling), the extended remix, to Unbelievable EMF, the dance remix. Swap the disc out to get Ram Jam Black Betty b/w Grace Jones's Pull Up to the Bumper. Past the point of no sweat I throw on Rosebud's pumping Have A Cigar - yes, the Pink Floyd tune - and follow it with the O'Jay's Love Train. Bring it to new heights with the Pointer Sisters Jump (For My Love), the extended version, and cap off the evening with the Captain and Tennille's Do That To Me One More Time, the latter strangely invoking a Kate Bush-esque ballet stretch and a nice cool down. Good times.


Dancing with myself


A few weeks after I started having this fun, I received a renewal in the mail for a membership to 24 Hour Fitness, a gym I had joined in Denver and used twice. They were asking me to pay $49 for one more year. Fuck yea! Can't not go to a gym cheaper than that. I joined and clicked through to the 24 Hour Fitness San Jose class schedule. I noticed a trademarked class. Zumba®. I had never heard of Zumba® so I looked it up. On Wikipedia of course.

A Zumba workout mixes body sculpting movements with dance steps derived from cumbia, merengue, salsa, reggaeton, hip hop, mambo, rumba, flamenco, and calypso and Salsaton. The routines feature aerobic interval training with a combination of fast and slow rhythms. It targets areas such as the glutes, legs, arms, abdominals, and the heart. A Zumba class is typically not formulaic in that instructors often add on their own music choices and choreographies to make their class presentation locally unique.


They're dancing in a room and they're calling it Zumba®.



Video of a Zumba® class with a cutie at the fore


Dancing in your room. It's the latest thing.


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