BodyJam Training Journals: Day 1

(Part 2 of a 4 part series)

The night before, I bought a tin of Tuna Mayonnaise and Gardenia bread in the sad delusion that I would enjoy eating it without any butter or hot beverage. I didn’t. The girls had a better breakfast at the nearby 24 hour mamak stall.

The studio was still empty at 7.30am and we just sat around waiting for the others to come in. The other two Penangites were already there waiting, and soon other trainees came in. I was surprised at the number of guys taking the module. It’s no secret BodyJam classes are mostly attended by girls, so I was glad to know the boys actually outnumber the girls in this training.

Arnold Warren, our trainer all the way from Manila, started the show at 8.30am and got everyone together. He introduced his teaching partner, Fetty from Jakarta, and soon things were rolling! In the interest of those who haven’t attended any module trainings before, I’m keeping things general because I wouldn’t want to spoil the magic for you.

We had an ice-breaking session, BodyJam stylez, and by the time 23 of us introduced ourselves it was just nice for the Master Class. Meanwhile, in the background, Master Trainer Kylie Gates observed our trainers in action. Like she said earlier, Arnold and Fetty are probably as nervous as we were!

The Master Class was the first time I got to do the release in full. And even though I didn’t have prior experience doing release 45, I’m so glad I’m not training on 44, which was a boring release with only a few moves overall. Although people doing 45 for the first time might think it’s more of the same old house taps, the more you do it the more you’ll like it. There’s quite a layer of complexity in some of the moves and even now I still find new things to learn (and that’s saying a lot since I did the release about 6 times in 3 days). On the other hand, I already felt blah with 44 after two classes.

So here’s a review of BodyJam 45 for those who haven’t seen it yet. The warmup is hot, hot, hot! I was expecting more of a Bollywood feel in the isolations but it was still pretty uplifting. The Work warmup combo wasn’t as fun as, say, New Day from 44, but it serves as a preview to moves in upcoming tracks so I understood the reasoning.

The Roppongi Line Dance is absolute madness! It’s a simple and quick track, so make sure you get your moves and orientation down pat coz’ once you start going around 4 corners you won’t be stopping! First timers might also get a little confused because instructors will follow member’s direction sometimes. But as long as you always start from your right leg, you’ll feel as if you’re partying in a Japanese night club, 4am in the morning!

Feedback serves as a mini-recovery (trust me, take it). It’s cool, smooth, and groovy. Once you get the rhythm down pat just lose yourself to Janet J. Also, if you like to perform on the dance floor, start thinking of your own unique 4 count arm combo. You’ll get the chance to use it towards the end.

Contemporary Rock will completely blow your preconceptions about what can happen in BodyJam. If you thought the Contemporary Rock from release 42 was a bit simple and dull, prepared to be amazed! The moves fit with the music like a perfectly manicured hand to a silk glove. The butterfly turn is not as tricky as it looks and sounds, but the easy option is safer for most people. Before I went for training I was pretty nerve-wrecked at the idea of having to butterfly turn, but after trying it out myself, I found it quite simple! Just make sure you have enough space around you or you’ll probably kick someone in the ribs.

The recovery brings the temperature down a bit, and the moves are pretty groovy too. It’s quite easy to feel relaxed to the track but you gotta pay attention to what the instructor is saying. Many times you’ll find yourself doing the wrong thing because there are minor variations to the same move and you keep switching between them. You’ll go from a clap to a knee & clap to a knee only and back to no knee with a clap. Confused? So was I, so just pay attention to the instructor!

When I first read the sizzler and it said the second block was called Global Electro, I heaved a sigh of relief. We’ve been doing House for four releases now, and the Old Skool House in 44 was just so boring – a rehashing of old moves into a new routine. I was looking forward to a more dance-y feel in Global Electro, so imagine my shock and disappointment when we started doing House Taps again. Oh no, more single-single-doubles? Say it ain’t so!

By the end of the block though, I changed my mind. The music and moves are very good – way better than 44. And as I continued learning the release over the weekend it kept getting better! This is something I couldn’t say about the second half of 43 and 44. So give the House Taps a chance and you might find something more complex underneath the moves.

Finally we grooved down to a very funky Disco style track. There are many places for your inner diva to shine, so make sure you get your acting faces ready straight from the first move. This is probably the most complex groove down track ever. After all, how many groove down have had double turns? The quick leg switch in the stretch will also trip many people up. In fact, I’m still trying to get it! But overall, it’ll bring you to the end with a relaxed feel.

That was the end of the easy part though. After a quick break we got started on learning the 5 Key Elements. At 1pm, Arnold gave us a 30 minute lunch break and I quickly went to get my lunch. Lunch consisted of a protein mix combined with a health drink mix, an energy bar, and two biscuits. By the time I finished “lunch” (if you could call it that), it was almost time and I had to rush back up.

Imagine my surprise when Dance School started right at 1.30pm, barely any time for my lunch to digest! Thus began the most grueling part of the day – 4 hours of going through every single move of the new release. We would take some infinite amount of time to get the technique right, and lo and behold, we have to do the whole thing again with music. Rinse and repeat for all the tracks. We were totally exhausted by 5.30pm, and we haven’t had time to start drilling on our assigned tracks yet!

Earlier, I already saw my name written next to Livin’ a Lie, the recovery track. I was quite happy because recovery is quite possibly the easiest track of the whole release to teach (after Feedback). But then I got a bit worried when I found out it was assigned by Arnold himself. If it was random number picking, I could leave it to Lady Luck. But since it’s assigned by the trainer things could get difficult for me. Obviously in the interest of fairness if someone was doing a hard track today he or she would get an easier track the next day. And since the final evaluation that determines our outcome happened on the last day, it logically means that I’ll need to present a harder track! This impending sense of doom cast a dim cloud throughout the day. While I know I wouldn’t have trouble presenting the recovery track, I kept wondering what my second track would be. So that night I took a look at some of the harder tracks, as a mental preparation in case I was assigned any of them.

But first, let’s digress. As the first day ended, Melisha came up to me and said she wants to move out to The Summit Hotel. She’s not used to our blah room at all, preferring something more comfortable and clean. Unfortunately I already paid for our 3 nights stay so she offered to reimburse her share but I only accepted RM50 for the first night. She did ask us to join her but Summit Hotel is an overpriced taxi ride away so Pauline and I still stuck to our blah room.

For dinner Jackson picked us up and took us to Sunway Pyramid to have, arguably, the most delicious fast food burger – Wendy’s! This was the first branch to open in Malaysia and I totally enjoyed every bite of the two juicy, succulent, beef patties in the burger. At RM15 for the medium set meal, it was definitely cheaper than having a burger in Chili’s or TGIF. Definitely recommended, and recovered my strength for the night.

I had a nice time catching up with Jackson but soon it was time to go back to our blah room. I felt absolutely pooped but I stayed up long enough to go through my track and several others. Lights went off around midnight and we tried to get as much sleep as we could.

BodyJam Training Journals: Day 0

(Part 1 of a 4 part series)

The Plusliner bus pulled away from the bus terminal at 7.30am as promised, and I settled into my cramped seat next to Pauline. I'm not a big fan of express buses with 4 seats a row – they're just too cramped for long distance travel. Unfortunately, it was the best bus available as most Konsortium buses are still banned on the road, and I would prefer to arrive at my destination in one piece thank you.

The journey was uneventful and we arrived at the Old Railway Station before 1pm. We took the KTM train there to Subang Jaya station. We ventured into the nearby Carrefour looking for lunch but there was nothing appetizing, so we took a cab to our motel at USJ 9.

Cottage Inn is a motel converted from shop lots and besides offering rooms at a cheap rate, they also had "day rooms". I booked a Family Room, which was located on the ground floor next to the reception area so I wasn't bothered by any nocturnal activities throughout our stay. The room is pretty blah. Two queen sized beds, linoleum carpeting with some damp spots (probably due to a leak in the bathroom), and 14" TV (too short for me). No windows, with a strong hint of mildew in the air, but at least the air-con works. The toilet has a sad-looking shower head and we immediately decided to take our showers at the gym.

After a simple lunch at a nearby coffee shop we popped over to True Fitness Taipan for a tour. Weeks before I had already arranged with the Group X people there for a walk around. I wanted to know where everything was so I wouldn't be clueless when the course actually started tomorrow! Annie, the GXC of the gym kindly showed us around (thanks Annie!) and by the time she finished it was already late afternoon.

We went back to our blah room and prepared our bags for the next day. We just tried to mentally prepare ourselves for the module training while watching So You Think You Can Dance US auditions on my laptop (I had earlier loaded a couple of episodes in). I also turned on the blah TV and So You Think You Can Dance Malaysia was on, so we watched it as well. It was unfortunately, a sub-par edition to either the US or Australia incarnations.

Pauline kept voicing her nervousness and uncertainty in passing the module, and I kept reassuring her. She's a good dancer but she needs to get over her stage fright and learn coaching skills. And though I'm not as scared as her, I have my usual jitters before a big day.

We slept at almost midnight but I couldn't let myself drift off into la la land just yet because I needed to let Melisha in. Melisha is the third Penang trainee who will be sharing the motel room with us. She flew in by Air Asia's late flight, and it was almost 1am when she arrived. Groggily, we all went to bed until the alarm clock woke us up at 6.30am…

Preparations for BodyJam Training, Pt. 2

Most of the instructors I asked have warned me that I'll be on my feet most of the time during training. A forum member asked me to expect "16 to 18 hours of dancing each day". I can't remember the last time I was physically active for such long periods, so as a simulation I went for a class marathon last Sunday:

10.00am: Stretching (I had lower back pain that day)
10.30am: Tai Chi (easy!)
11.30am: BodyStep (take easy options - less propulsion)
12.30pm: BodyPump (go easy on squats, skip lunges)
1.30pm: Half of BodyBalance (leave after hip openers)
2.10pm: Rest, and lunch (whey and 1 yogurt snack bar)
2.30pm: BodyAttack (easy options - less propulsion)
3.30pm: Hip Hop (easy!)

Although I did not go all out in the classes (my lower back would have given out halfway) I finished feeling I could go on for another 3 classes. I wasn't a big fan of snack bars before this, but I now appreciate the convenience and energy provided by those overpriced sugar and flour confections.

Next milestone: Continue limbering up my stiff back and tight hamstrings with daily stretches.

Countdown: 9 days....

Reflections on Fitness Instructing

It's been slightly a year since I started teaching group fitness at my company's gym. I can say I've come a long way since those first few classes.

I used to copy more or less my entire class from Les Mills programs. And my cueing and execution was really weak. I still remember the first class after it was officially announced to the company - more than 30 people turned up and it was sooo packed. But I only saw less than 15 the following week! And it kept on decreasing after that.

I took that in stride and kept on evolving. Release #5 of my class was the first release that I completely stopped copying from Les Mills. The format and feel is the same, but I choreographed all the tracks myself. It is a great achievement because I consider choreography a step higher than instructing. As an analogy, there are many great piano players, but how many of them can write their own pieces?

Last month my company's new group fitness hall was opened and it can finally accommodate 30 - 50 participants (compared to 15 before renovations). I'm glad that it only opened recently - it gave me ample time to improve myself and be a better instructor.

Unfortunately, no matter how good one is, most employers look for that little piece of paper that states you're certified. And that's stopping me from teaching in the large gyms. Hopefully that will change once I get my BodyJam cert next month. It's time for another chapter in the interesting world of fitness instructing!

Preparations for BodyJam Training

There is surprisingly a dearth of blogs on BodyJam training experiences! So I'm just jotting whatever I can to inform and guide future trainees.

I'll be trained on BodyJam 45, which is the coming release. I'm both happy and terrified. Happy because BJ 44 kinda sucked and was very low on innovation and the fun factor ("Stronger" kept dragging on and on...!). Terrified because I wouldn't have any chance to preview the moves since instructors only get their DVDs the weekend before my training. I consider myself a fast learner, but it's still kinda hard without having done the whole release before going for training.

And oh, there's that butterfly jump I'm deathly afraid of.



You can see a preview of the butterfly jump (or twist) around 1:02 in the video above. Looks really cool, but also hard to get it right. During the training we're supposed to present 2 tracks over the weekend. My greatest fear would be to present the tracks with the butterfly jump. Yes, there are options to take but I'm a perfectionist and I wanna be known as an instructor with good technical skills, so I'm gonna have to brush up on my jumping ability.

Furthermore, we'll get drilled on performing each move over and over and over again. I can imagine practicing this butterfly jump countless times. And it's not the safest move to execute in the first place. With my unflattering history of lower back pain and knee arthritis, I risk injuring myself if I land badly or I twist too hard. I can't afford to get injured when I have to look my best! This is also a fear that's stopping me from jumping too high.

This is the age of the Internet so it's YouTube to the rescue! Apparently the butterfly twist/jump is more common in kung fu and figure skating than it is in dancing. But the videos I found below provide some helpful advice.

First off, knowing the difference between a good and bad butterfly twist:


All in one tutorial:


Series of more in-depth tutorials:


















All the best... to me!

It's Wow Wow Wow Wow!

Bouncing back from breast cancer, Kylie Minogue's "X" album proves you can experiment with different genres while keeping me happy. Alright, so most of her songs remain painfully cheesy regardless of genre but that seems to be her true genius.

I actually find 2 Hearts average, but many other songs on the album are great. I heartily recommend Stars, All I See, Cosmic, and White Diamond (slow version).

And did I mention I love her concert DVDs? The stage set up is so extravagant, along with the costume changes. Now that commands respect. X is a keeper!

This concludes my series of music reviews. I'm officially out of stuff to write.

Formula for Success

Unlike Madonna's flailing (failing?) attempts at genre-busting music, Mariah Carey found her formula for success and stuck with it, creating a listenable album on E=MC2. I immensely enjoyed her last one The Emancipation of Mimi as it was really a comeback album. E=MC2 continues that honourable tradition and has a similar feel.

Unfortunately, having discovered Duffy recently I didn't devote much time to Mariah as it's so... formulaic. But overall a worthy illegal download.

I know I'm hard to please. I complained Madonna for veering from tradition, while I get bored with Mariah for staying the same. But I *can* be pleased - tomorrow's artist did just that.