Guest Fit: Vicki on ResoLULUtion Bootcamp

Cool J's friend, Vicki, is a fellow fitness enthusiast who offered to share her recent experience with the ResoLULUtion bootcamp!

"Recently I was on the hunt for some free fitness options that I know are out there if you look hard enough, and are somewhat flexible in your schedule.  I, like the Right Fits bloggers, love fitness and trying new classes/gyms but I spend a lot of money doing that (“it is my hobby/social outlet” is my standard justification to myself on the cost!).  So, to try and lessen my fitness costs a bit, I thought I could start incorporating some free options into my routine when possible. 

One of the places I started looking was my local Lululemon store (http://www.lululemon.com/minneapolis/westend) since I know they offer some free yoga classes.  In looking at their calendar, I noticed they had a free two week boot camp starting the next week!  
2 whole weeks for free??…sign me up! 

This was perfect as I had really been craving a butt-kicking boot camp to get myself back on track after the holidays, but hadn’t been able to justify the cost of one.  The Lulu boot camp was limited to 45 participants, and I was one of the lucky ones to get in.  The sessions were Monday through Friday from 6 to 7 am at the store (they just moved all the middle clothing display racks into the back storeroom).  They brought in a different instructor(s) from local studios/gyms every day with the schedule being intense workouts Monday, Wed and Friday with a good stretching yoga class on Tuesday and Thursday.  So, here we go…here’s a brief summary of the boot camp!

Week 1

Sunday night

One hour orientation to discuss the boot camp schedule, introduce the Lulu store staff that would be joining us for some of the workouts and briefly go over some nutrition tips.  They brought in Katie Jasper (http://katiejasper.com/) who is a health counselor and an instructor at CorePower Yoga, Highland Park (http://www.corepoweryoga.com/) to discuss nutrition with us.  She gave us some helpful tips for eating the right things during our two weeks to keep our energy up and to make sure we take care of ourselves. 

Monday

Instructor:  Linda Mertens, Fusion Fitness, http://www.fusionfitnessmn.com/Fusion_Fitness_Home.html

Hard workout!  Squats, lunges, sprints outside (unusually warm Jan morning), etc.  She kept us moving the whole hour.

Second workout*:  Yoga Sculpt at CorePower

Tuesday

Instructor:  Ella Chissotti, CorePower Yoga, Edina

Wow, I was sore today, those two workouts yesterday kicked my butt!  This yoga class was so nice.  I liked the instructor and felt so much better after the class.  Only complaint is that she went over a bit on time so we didn’t get out till 7:10.  I wasn’t wearing a watch so I didn’t notice until I got to my car at 7:15 and realized I needed to hurry to get home and shower for work.

Second Workout:  None (besides walking the dog).

Wednesday

Instructor:  Katie Haggarty, Lifetime Fitness, St Louis Park, (http://clubs.lifetimefitness.com/St-Louis-Park/11256/)

Great instructor!  She had tons of energy, was super positive and made a hard workout of lots of jumping jacks, boxing moves, squats, etc. very fun.

Second Workout:  4 mile jog on treadmill.

Thursday

Instructor:  Vinny Amendola, CorePower Yoga, Minnetonka

Another good yoga class after Wednesday’s hard workout.  I do have to admit that I was tempted to skip out of this class and head to an actual CorePower Yoga studio this morning as it was crazy cold and I really wanted the heated studio…I didn’t though…I am grateful to have a spot in this bootcamp so I’m going to show up every day.

Second Workout:  2 mile jog on treadmill.

Friday

Instructor(s):  Rachel and Paula Warford, The Barre, http://thebarrestudio.com/

I was really looking forward to this workout when I saw it on the schedule…I’ve tried a couple barre classes at local studios and have been wanting to incorporate it more in my routine.  I liked this class although we didn’t have the benefit of having the actual ballet bars in the Lulu store so we didn’t quite get the whole picture of a barre class.

Second Workout:  3 mile jog on treadmill.

Saturday and Sunday

No boot camp classes this weekend so I did a couple Yoga Sculpt classes on my own at CorePower on Sat and Sun and a 3 mile treadmill jog on Saturday.

Week 2

Monday

Instructor:  Mike and Tessa Belke, Optimum Fitness, http://optimumfitnesspt.net/location/

I was not feeling boot camp this morning.  This was another circuit training type workout (squats, lunges, burpies, mountain climbers) but I didn’t think it flowed very well as we were doing a lot of up and down (on our mat for one exercise, up for next one, etc. which I guess gets you moving but also wastes some time getting to right position).  That being said, like I said, I was not feeling boot camp this morning so I’m not sure if my lack of enthusiasm about the workout was because of the class or my bad attitude…I’m going to chalk it up to my bad attitude.

Second Workout:  None, like I said earlier, rough day from start to finish, I was dog sitting though so I did walk two dogs instead of my normal one and I was being pulled the whole way so maybe that counts as a second workout!

Tuesday Week 2

Instructor:  Colleen Brown, Corepower Yoga, St Louis Park and Sigh Yoga

http://www.sighyoga.com/

Great class, I’ve take a barre class from Colleen at Sigh and really like her…I was still feeling a little crabby this morning but this was the perfect class to get me back on track!

Second Workout:  30 min on elliptical.

Wednesday Week 2

Instructor:  Heather Corndorf, Lifetime Fitness, St Louis Park      

Cardio Kickboxing!  What a great way to switch things up…this class was fun and hard…I don’t get to do kickboxing much so it was a nice change.

Second Workout:  3.7 mile run outside.

Thursday Week 2

Instructor:  Lauren Teyssandier, Moksha Yoga, http://minneapolis.mokshayoga.ca/

The instructor was really good, I’ve never been to Moksha and would like to try it…we did some things that I’ve never done and she explained things really well.

Second Workout:  snowboarding for about an hour…OK so the beer and cheese curds after more than wiped this out but oh well!

Friday Week 2

Instructor:  Aaron Leventhal (and team), Fit Studio, http://www.fittc.com/

Wow hard class!  I’m not going to explain this very well in writing but we did a couple series where they picked a main exercise (ie situps, deep squats, plank pushups) that we had four one minute periods to do as many of that exercise we could with the goal to get to 100 before the four one minute periods were up.  At the end of each one minute period that you didn’t get to 100 you had to do another exercise (ie skater jumps, burpies) before the next one minute period with the number of reps of that exercise increasing after each period you didn’t get to 100.  Hard to explain but it was tough.  The class went fast and I was beat at the end.

Second Workout:  None, I was tired after this morning and knew I was already going to struggle with the 7 mile run I had planned for next day.

That is it!  Boot camp was over after the Friday AM workout.  We had a fun surprise at the end of Friday’s workout from the Lululemon staff.  A bunch of them showed up at the end of our class to congratulate us and to hand out prizes!  Throughout the two week period, they kept attendance and put the names of those who showed up everyday into a bucket and gave away three one month unlimited passes to CorePower Yoga!  Sadly I didn’t have my name drawn but they also gave all of us a free Lululemon yoga mat…nice!  Although I know I will be glad Sunday night when I know I don’t HAVE to wake up at 5:25 am, I’m mostly sad that it is over…it was such a great experience and all for free!  Amazing.

Here's a quick summary of the pros/cons of this ResoLULUtion bootc amp over others I’ve done (I’ve participated in CorePower Yoga’s two week boot camp and also done a couple six week boot camp at The Shed (http://theshedfitness.com/)**

Pros

-Free, the instructors all donated their time!

-Exposure to many different studios/instructors in the area

-Well organized by Lulu staff

-Good scenery (get to look at all the great Lulu clothes on the wall while working out!  Well, I guess this could go under con too if you don’t have a lot of willpower to not buy)

-Positive/Encouraging attitudes of all the Lulu staff and the other boot camp participants

Cons
(OK, it is really hard to come up with cons for 10 free workouts but here are a few minor things that I would point out if I were paying for a boot camp)

-Sometimes crowded in the room so hard to do some of the exercises (although I’ve also found this with the other boot camps I’ve done and other classes)

-In most boot camps, you have the same instructors most days so they get to know you and can encourage you by name…this wasn’t case here because of structure of bringing in different studios each day…I liked the different studios though so this con was outweighed by the pro of exposure to many different studios

-held in the store so would be difficult to do this boot camp if you didn’t live close to the store to run home and shower before work or have access to showers at work

Where can I find other free classes???

Here a few of the places I’ve found that offer some free classes, I haven’t tried many of them yet but I plan to when the times work (please share if you know any others to add to list!):

Lululemon – check out your local store – most offer a free yoga class and/or run club each week in store

Athleta – various free classes offered throughout the month also in store

Steele Fitness – they sometimes offer free boot camp workouts often in conjunction with Lululemon

CorePower Yoga – in the summer they offer some free outdoor classes by Lake Calhoun

*Second workouts each day weren’t really pushed for this boot camp as they often do for some boot camps such as those at CorePower.  One of my fellow boot campers asked if we should try and get a second workout in and the staff just said sure if you can but they didn’t stress it at all.  I made the decision that I would try and get second workouts in on Mon/Wed since I knew I’d have a good yoga class coming the next day.  I have mixed feelings on being pushed to do a second workout when already participating in boot camp where you are working out hard every day.  I have found that often the second workout makes me too sore the next day to really push myself as hard as I should during the actual boot camp workout.  So, I figured I would do what I could but I wouldn’t stress myself out about getting a second workout in.

**Since CorePower’s boot camp is already being reviewed on this site, I would be remiss not to put a plug here for The Shed’s BodySHED boot camp.  It is a 6 week program with scheduled workouts three mornings a week, two classes on your own each week and a BIG nutrition component.  If you are someone that is really looking for weight loss results and/or are trying to get yourself started on a workout/nutrition program, I personally think a longer boot camp like The Shed offers with every other day scheduled workouts with a couple more on your own schedule might provide more results and less burnout.  I really believe they have one of the best programs around.     


THANKS VICKI for the awesome detailed review!