ab-solutely flabless

I’m early for Body Balance and as I stand outside the aerobics studio (do they still call it that?), I’m suddenly aware of how undignified group exercise is. For starters, they insist on making the doors glass so that passersby are welcome to gawp in as you jump about looking like you’ve decided to have your face painted to resemble a ripe tomato. I can hear the instructor shouting instructions above the blaring music but she is hidden from my view and I’m watching two girls who have decided that Step class will be their voluntary torture for today. One looks fairly competent , if even a bit over-confident, while the other…oh dear… oh dear.This girl is clearly a first-timer and she is spinning, flailing her arms and bouncing up and down at all the wrong times, then glancing over at others in the class to see if she is the the only one who wants to run screaming out of the door, never to return. You see, the key to safeguarding your dignity in a gym class is not whether you know the moves but looking confident and never, never standing in front of the doors where everyone can see you. I catch the girl in front of me sniggering as she witnesses this display of incompetence.

We’re up next and I casually walk into the class as others push past me in a stampede towards the exercise mats. I calmly dispose of my excess belongings, retrieve a mat and go to claim a spot. But Oh No! I’ve played it too cool and now the only space left is…in front of the glass doors. So while I find myself in full “downward dog" and it’s a free for all Rox’s-bottom-in-the-air show, I ask myself why we put ourselves through this? Surely there is a better way to achieve this ultimate physique for which we strive – solid abs, a perky bum and triceps minus wings. Is it all worth this?

An hour later, when I walk out feeling well stretched and patting myself on the back for dedicating a whole hour of my day to my health and well-being, I decide it is. No matter how humbling the odd class might be, it sure beats running on the spot for an hour.