What is it?
Barre is a low-impact workout you can do at home or in a studio to gain strength and build endurance among other things. This specific workout involves dance moves that are usually found in ballet as well as other forms such as Yoga, Pilates, and aerobics. Barre can contribute to your overall fitness and health, help you preserve a healthy body weight, and keep your body in shape. According to Women’s Health Magazine, Barre “focuses on low-impact, high-intensity movements designed to strengthen your body in ways that few other workouts can.”
Expectations
You can incorporate many different elements of exercise, depending on the type of class and format. The workout will likely incorporate ballet movements like plié and relevé that rely on isometric movements. Classes can also include movements from Yoga, Pilates, Zumba, or aerobics to enhance your overall workout, and can focus on small muscular movements like a strength workout or faster muscle movements like aerobics or Zumba. The amount of exercise you get in your barre class depends on its length and the other types of exercise involved.
Benefits
A common benefit one could experience from a Barre class is increased muscle strength. The core, arms, thighs, glutes, and pelvic floor are the primary muscles that benefit. Strengthening these muscles helps to maintain muscle mass as you age, body weight control, joint flexibility, and sustained balance.
Another benefit is improved muscle endurance. Regularly participating in Barre will help increase your muscular endurance. This in turn increases your stamina, therefore maintaining a higher level of activity in your everyday life. Endurance also lessens the risk of developing health conditions like diabetes, heart disease, and certain types of cancer.
Increased flexibility is another positive one might see as a result of a Barre class. Barre workouts feature much stretching, which improves flexibility and range of motion in your joints. Having flexibility makes it much easier to move throughout your day and goes a long way to prevent or curtail stiffness.
Noticing an increase in bone density is also common. This is important because having a lower level of bone density can lead to osteoporosis which in turn weakens your bones.
Finally, posture is a benefit one could recognize from doing Barre class. After doing Barre, there is a high chance of you being able to sit or stand straighter. This is important because posture positively influences what’s going on in your body. It additionally decreases pressure on the spine, reducing the chances of back pain or injury.
Results
It will take several weeks before one starts to see noticeable results. However, despite this, you should feel the impact of the classes right away. Additionally, you will likely receive the external benefits from barre classes by keeping up a regular amount of exercise each week and engaging in other healthy habits.
Takeaways
There are two major takeaways from participating in Barre classes. One is that engaging in barre can help maintain your health, increase flexibility, improve your posture, etc. The other is that Barre will keep you strong as you age and reduce your chance of developing certain health conditions.
