This Spring, Dance Your Way to a Toned Body

The increasing popularity of shows like So You Think You Can Dance and Dancing With the Stars have made it so that more and more people want to lose weight and tone up with dancing. If dance classes are not an option, for one reason or another, a good idea would be taking home a DVD with a dance workout from the many available at this moment, and thus getting the best of both worlds: breaking a sweat and having some fun, as USA Today also puts it.

Fitness instructors are decided that dancing is the most popular form of cardio this spring. The fact that it’s also very fun and allows to be practiced indoors are also two pluses working to its advantage, aside from the obvious selling point that it burns lots of calories and tones the muscle nicely. Other pluses include the fact that it doesn’t require a special equipment, it allows us to listen to whatever music we like and, of course, we don’t have to get it right the first time, while also sparing us the embarrassment of making a fool of ourselves in public.

“When you see people on the TV screen having fun, losing weight and toning up in all the right places, it motivates you to try the same thing in the privacy of your own living room,” Lindsey Emery, senior fitness editor at Fitness magazine, says for USA Today. “What people like about these workouts is you can burn a lot of calories without getting bored. They’re definitely more amusing than traditional aerobics,” she adds.

“Besides providing a good cardio workout, dance exercise DVDs also could help men and women feel more comfortable dancing at a club or an event such as a wedding, Emery says. And there are distinct advantages to learning to dance at home rather than at the gym, she says. ‘You can wear whatever you want and listen to whatever music you want. You don’t have to worry about someone staring at your backside while you are shaking your booty, either’,” the aforementioned publication says.

While most of these workouts are good, in the sense that they engage most muscle groups and burn plenty of calories, they don’t imply too much effort on behalf of the dancer, so that too works to their advantage. On the downside, they might be a walk in the park, but they still require plenty of balance, coordination and, of course, concentration.