A 2021 fitness trend – here’s an introduction to Barre workouts and how they can benefit your mind and body!
“Get out of your head and create strength in your body with Barre workouts”
Founder of Barre and Body, Elishea talks us through how the Barre workout can benefit your mind and body. A professional dancer and qualified fitness instructor combined her two loves to create her own brand. A supportive, empowering coach to women, she created Barre and Body, a wellness studio, a place to come where you close the door behind you, switch off from the outside world and get out of your head; to create a community of strong and empowered women.
Elishea talks us through the benefits of the Barre workout.
So, What Is Barre?
The Barre workout originates from the Lotty Burke method from 1959. However, times have moved on and a lot of instructors have taken the original method and made it their own. Incorporating Ballet and Pilates moves to create a technical workout, tucking and pulsing to the latest tunes; it’s the perfect mix of dance and fitness.
Expect loud music and red faces during this dynamic low impact but high intensity workout. It will strengthen and tone your body all over, there is no experience like the ‘Barre burn’ and it will keep you coming back for more.
How Does It Work?
So, here’s how it works:
Full Body Workout
The Barre workout focuses on the major muscle groups in the body; however, the small isotonic movements will strengthen into places you never knew existed. Barre focuses on the thighs, glutes and core targeting from every angle but let’s not forget the upper body focus in the warm up and using the barre as a resistant prop; pushing, pulling and balancing will get those arms working.
Strength And Define
Barre focuses on small isometric and eccentric contractions. Focusing on contracting the muscles will work deeper and quicker, creating strength in the muscles and joints; this is where we start to experience the ‘Barre burn’.
It’s so important to hold the contracted position for as long as possible, you will know if you are doing it correctly as you will start to shake and burn, this is the only way you will strengthen the muscles and start to see muscle definition.
Low Impact
The reason why I love Barre is because it is kind to our joints. Unless you are doing a more advanced class like Barre HIIT then you are not leaving the ground and not putting any pressure on the joints. In fact, Barre is all about strengthening into the joints, keeping us strong as we grow older. As Barre is low impact you are not prone to injuries and can even help rehabilitation; we can modify exercises when it is needed.
Corrects Posture
Everything we do in Barre is focused around our centre, even when we are working on our lower body we focus on standing tall and balancing our body evenly through the feet and hips. A strong core will enable us to stand taller; we focus anteriorly and posteriorly, strengthening the back of the body is just as important when we want to correct bad posture.
Flexibility
When we are contracting our muscles in such a way it is so important to lengthen them too, which is why we incorporate lengthening stretches after each body focus. This enables us to breathe and connect with our body and also prevents us from injury. Flexibility will improve with consistent Barre workouts and will help improve our posture as we will become more mobile and relieves any stresses on the body.
Mental Health
Because the Barre workout is dynamic and high in intensity it really helps us to hit that sweet spot in the body where we release those feel good endorphins. Barre really helps you to switch off and get out of your head; you forget about the daily stresses and you are in the studio getting a good workout, working hard, focused and most importantly being your own motivation.
Bio
Barre and Body offer’s in studio classes in Harrogate and North Leeds. Barre and Body Collective is an on-demand service which can be subscribed online worldwide.
From dancing at just 2 and a half years of age, Elishea has been disciplined in her craft; she has always been passionate about the love of her job which enables her to be creative and deliver dynamic low impact, high intensity workouts, which are just one of the reason’s her clients come to her studio. After a successful dancing career, she moved into fitness full time to create more stability in her life but also after suffering with an ongoing injury; she understands how important it is to keep the body conditioned, the importance of movement and how moving can improve mood and strength in the body. What is important to Elishea is to be a supportive trainer to her clients, to empower women to be their own motivation, whilst being consistent in their workouts will also encourage a healthy mind.
Elishea’s mission is to promote the importance of consistent workouts, to keep your body strong in a safe and fun way. Her aim is to create stronger, leaner bodies and a healthier mind so that we can create a better version of ourselves; she believes that when we start to see quick results this promotes body confidence and we start to become our own motivation, to become stronger than we were yesterday. She aims to empower women to be their own motivation and to honour your wellness journey by being consistent and finder your inner strength to work past your comfort zone. Image by Baird Visuals.
