Although you may not find these three trends at the top of this year’s Canfitpro ‘Top 10 Canadian Fitness Trends’ list, there’s something to be said about them. Body weight training, circuit training and boot camps and fusion style group fitness are the trends that stand out to me as a fitness professional. Body weight training is strength training that requires only your body as a weight; moving against gravity as the resistance. Movements such as push-ups, pull ups, squats, lunges and sit ups are the most common bodyweight exercises. Engaging in this type of exercise will help build a great fitness foundation so that you will have the strength and stamina to participate in functional fitness workouts and high-intensity-interval-training (HIIT) – this year’s top two, fitness trends. Once you become efficient and feel confident moving your body, you will be ready to take on more – more intensity, more challenge and more variety. This is the reason that circuit training and boot camps have remained strong in the trends for over a decade. They are both training formats that save time, are highly efficient for achieving results and are adaptable to all levels of ability. Boot camps and circuit training also offer a great amount of variety. You can do this type of a workout virtually anywhere from the home to the gym. The camaraderie with other participants in a circuit or boot camp workout is by far the highest over most other styles of fitness workouts and the coaching you receive feels so personalized despite being in a group. Like circuit training and boot camps, fusion-style group fitness mixes a variety of exercises to create a new workout. Changing up what you do helps you achieve results faster and for longer. There are more fusion-style fitness classes then there has been in years – from NEWBODY, BodyFlow to Piloxing, and SoulCycle to name a few. The large majority of people who exercise fall out of interest quickly and all three of these trend-setting programs offer great challenge and variety that will help keep you motivated with your fitness goals, especially if you are craving something different from your regular routine. Workout Let’s put these trends to the test in a ‘bodyweight fusion-style circuit.’ Repeat the circuit consisting of bodyweight based exercise in an interval fashion (one body weight followed by one aerobic exercise), 2-4 times, alternating sides when applicable, for a total of 20-30 minutes.
- Warm up with 1 minute of light cardio exercise (rebounding on the stop with a light up and down jumping; with feet remaining on the ground), shadow skip or jog.
- Begin the circuit of exercises (1 through 5 listed below) and insert 1 minute of high knee jogging, jumping jacks or skipping on the spot between each of the bodyweight exercise and at the end of the circuit.
Lunge Touch Down
(1 leg) 15 repetitions
Plank Push-Up
(hold plank for 10 seconds, do 5 push-ups)
5 repetitions
Crunch get-up 10 times alternating toe touch (5 each side)
Squat power press
20-30 repetitions
Single leg hip bridge
15 repetitions
*When you first begin any exercise program, first check with your health professional to ensure you are healthy enough to start an exercise program, and start with the recommended number of repetitions as outlined.
