Hip Hop Hustle

So at my gym last night they had a special hip hop class, Hip Hop Hustle, that I had to try out. I was a little hesitant because I really am not the best dancer and tend to have a hard time following classes when the moves go so fast – but I thought it sounded fun so I went. I was a little early to ask the instructor who usually teaches my Urban Iron class some questions. She assured me that I would be fine and that I would want to keep coming back.

As people piled in, few girls wearing backwards hats and dance pants, and then others like myself who were in gym workout clothes just checking it out, I got really nervous. It was almost like a soccer game - when the other team has dope uniforms and you think that makes them better than you. But I stuck around and by the time the class was about to start, it was literally elbow to elbow.

The instructor loosened us up, made me feel comfortable and started slow. She would show us piece by piece how the dance went and let us try it to the music. The slow learning helped me feel it and start to memorize it. I thought, this isn’t going to give me a workout – oh well, wait- once we got a few steps deep and were dancing hard to the music I was dripping sweat off my elbows, knees and back. The repetitive dance and whole body movement was intense, there were several times I didn’t know if I could finish the dance off.

After about 30 minutes we had the whole dance down and did it over and over. The instructor made it fun and even had us dance off against one another – which was oh so MTV like but really fun. At the end of an hour I walked away drenched in sweat, breathing heavy and thinking that maybe, just maybe I might have a new dance move at the bar or for my girlfriends. I posted the the dance we learned below, take a shot at it for about 30 minutes and see how much you work up a sweat.

And yeah, the next day my abs, calves, shoulders, butt, knees even the muscles in my feet are yelping…but in a good way.