Ok so I’m holding my hands up. The abundance of ‘NEW YEAR, NEW YOU!’ articles have finally gotten to me. I’ve become one of those people who’s ripping out healthy recipes from the Saturday supplements and pinning them on my noticeboard and my camera roll is currently nothing but screengrabs of #fitspo from Instagram and healthy smoothie recipes! With a trip with my sister on the horizon to Coachella and LA in April, I’ve got a new motivator to get fit as for the last couple of months I’ve become a bit lazy (and Christmas is all about over indulgence after all isn’t it).
Despite it taking me basically the whole of this freezing cold January to get myself organised, I’m back into the zone. To get in shape before my wedding a few months back, I discovered my love for fitness classes. Mixing it up by doing a different class a week was a great way to keep my exercise regime fun and interesting.
I’ve pulled together some of my recommendations below of classes in and around London, if you too are looking for some fitness inspiration. This way we’ll all be doing this in no time on our next holidays…!
MOVE YOUR FRAME
Brilliant mix of classes from flow yoga, reformer pilates, boxfit, dance fit and frame barre, the FRAME instructors are all great and the studios are all fully equipped. Locations are Kings Cross, Queen’s Park and Shoreditch so you should find one near you that’s convenient – you can book online here.
SEEN ON SCREEN FITNESS – DANCE CLASSES
Seen on Screen Fitness has the best dance teachers (they have danced with the likes of Bey, Rihanna, Britney and more) and the classes are held in the most fun and friendly environment – you can turn up to a class and even if you feel a bit nervous, you’ll instantly feel at ease. With studios all over the Capital from Notting Hill, to Farringdon, Clapham and Tottenham Court Road, SOS Fitness guys devise a monthly dance timetable to all the latest tunes – dance to Rihanna, old school R’N’B and the latest Ibiza dance tunes. SO much fun.
GYM CLASS LONDON
This gorgeous boutique studio in Holland Park is the brainchild of fitness industry expert / celeb trainer Helle Hammonds. She’s devised the ultimate gym class where each 55 minute session is split into sections of High Intensity Interval Training and Resistance Training work – amazing way to start a weekend if you opt for one of the Saturday morning classes.
REFORMER PILATES
The intense all-over body classes at Ten incorporate reformer machines for an amazing Dynamic Pilates session – it’s a really brilliant workout and one of my personal favourite classes. They have studios all over London from Mayfair to Hatton Garden, with their Notting Hill studio as their HQ. Another great studio I would recommend for this type of workout is Form, Notting Hill.
SPINNING
I love a good spin class and my two favourites are Ride Republic and Psycle. Spin classes are the ultimate way to truly sweat out any stress you have and these two classes have an epic soundtrack to cycle along too – bonus!
BARRE CLASS
I also really enjoy barre classes. I’ve written about the class at Barretoned before on the blog, and I still thoroughly enjoy the class where the principles of ballet are used – it’s a lovely hour where you’re stretching and strengthening your core. Paola’s Body Barre class in Fulham is also a great option.
As I’ve been getting in shape, I’ve realised it really is all about just adapting your routine a little to fit in a small amount of exercise where you can – even if that’s just getting off a couple of stops earlier off the bus and walking! It’s also about everything in moderation; I’m trying to eat healthily during the week (more veg and less bread/carbs) and then eating what I want on the weekend – no matter how healthy I become, I will never be able to not want to scoff cheese on every occasion, but at least I’m now working it off!
I’m going to be reminding myself of these little points for a happy and healthy 2016. These are just my picks of classes and I’m sure there’s loads of other great options out there so let me know what your favourite workouts are too and if there’s another amazing class I’m missing out on.
LMNH x
*Images sourced from Pinterest*
