By Shelby
My Groupon fitness series concludes with what is absolutely the hardest workout I’ve ever done in my entire life—Pure Barre.
As someone who loves dancing, I’ve always been fascinated by ballet but never actually attempted it. Even though I’ve now been cured of any desire to ever dance “Swan Lake,” the ballet influence of Pure Barre was what initially attracted to me to Pure Barre. During my first class, I realized it was so much more and would probably describe it as something closer to Pilates and its super-isolated muscle movements.
The Westlake studio that Pure Barre occupies is surprisingly wee, perhaps half the size of the average yoga studio. Two walls were lined with mirrors, and the entire room was flanked by ballet barres, like the one you’ll see in the photo below:
For each workout, you use a set of light weights, a small inflatable ball and a stretch cord. And socks! In fact, Pure Barre even sells its own line of socks with those rubber non-slip dots on the bottom, which I’ve found also work really well on the wood floors of my house. Between the socks, the high-energy dance music and the extremely intense and precise movements, the Pure Barre workout was unlike anything I’d ever done before. And about two minutes into the warm-up, I thought I was going to pass out or my muscles were going to snap. Either way, it wasn’t going to be pretty. I powered through, and by the end of the 55 minutes, my muscles were exhausted, but I was invigorated—and most importantly, ready to come back for more. Between the arm, abs, glute, thigh and back work, the Pure Barre technique gives you a complete body workout in a new and innovative way that won’t bore you to tears.
While I can’t afford to the steep class price now that my coupon has ended, I would consider shelling out for a DVD to practice the technique in the privacy of my own living room. Now if I can only convince my husband to install a barre…