So you think you can dance?

I went to a Body Jam class at the Y this morning. I didn’t know what to expect since I haven’t taken an aerobics class since the early 90’s. My cardio workouts are of the solitary kind these days but since I had such a good experience in a group environment on Monday, I was looking forward to trying out the class. I was hoping it wasn’t going to be full of queer jazzercise moves like the grapevine and I wanted it to be challenging because I was taking the class instead of spending 45 minutes on the Stairmaster.

The instructor was great. She showed up in pink and gray camouflage pants with matching shoes and a sparkly pink military style hat. I liked her immediately. The room was packed so I figured she must be pretty popular.

The class consisted of hip-hop style combinations that we kept building on by adding more moves. I loved it. It was nothing like aerobics in the 90’s and the choreography was way cool. I could see myself doing some of the moves on a real dance floor with my girlfriends if I had enough wine in me.

And it was not easy. I always wear my heart rate monitor to track my calories burned because of Weight Watchers and I spent a lot of time in what I’m going to start referring to as the coronary zone. This class kicked my ass. I thought I was in pretty good shape cardiovascularly, especially when I work out on my NordicTrack but apparently I am not nearly as fit as I thought I was.

At one point my heart rate monitor showed 00 so I assumed I had died but since I was still booty poppin’ and shaking my groove thing all over the place I finally realized that the chest strap on my heart rate monitor had slipped down and wasn’t picking up my heartbeat.

The class finally ended 56 minutes after it started. I was totally wiped out and when I looked at my heart rate monitor to see how many calories I had burned it said 666. It was a devil of a workout.

My original plan was to check out Body Jam and then stay for Y-pump, which is the class I went to on Monday. I realized when Body Jam ended that taking another class was unnecessary and stupid.

Body Jam + Y-Pump= dead housewife.

But I’m definitely going back to this class on Wednesdays. I might take it on Saturday or Sunday at another Y location because I liked it so much. In time I’ll start my slow hostile takeover of one of the good front row spots. Then it really will feel like the 90’s again.