Coronavirus: From yoga to Barry's Bootcamp — best exercise classes on Zoom, Instagram and YouTube
Thousands of children recently joined fitness instructor Joe Wicks for a live-streamed PE session
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Your support makes all the difference.On 23 March, the prime minister Boris Johnson announced that the UK is now in lockdown in an effort to tackle the coronavirus pandemic.
Members of the public are only allowed to leave their homes under specific circumstances, one being for a single form of exercise a day.
While this means you can go on a daily outdoor run, being in self-isolation may result in some people feeling less motivated to workout and consequently falling out of their usual fitness routine.
Several organisations have set up online workout classes that people can join from their comfort of their home, so that they can maintain their fitness and stay connected to the fitness community.
From dance to PE lessons for children, here are some of the best options around.
Yoga and Pilates
Doing yoga on a regular basis can be extremely beneficial for your flexibility, help you boost your strength and improve your overall fitness.
If you would like to practise your downward dog in your living room with the help of an instructor, you can do so by joining in CorePower Yoga’s live classes.
Every day, the US-based yoga studio chain is streaming classes on its YouTube channel at 8am MT (2pm GMT) and 1pm MT (7pm GMT).
LV Yoga Fareham, in Portsmouth Yoga, is also offering free yoga classes, which are being live-streamed on its Facebook page.
The yoga studio is offering children’s yoga classes every day at 11.30am and adult yoga classes at 6pm and 7.30pm.
While the classes are free, participants can give donations if they would like to the studio’s Paypal account.
Yogo and pilates studio triyoga has announced it is going to be offering online classes, which will run six days a week from Monday to Saturday and will be bookable through the studio’s website.
Immersive London-based yoga studio Fly LDN is running Instagram Live yoga classes on a daily basis, at 8am, 12.30pm and 6pm.
Every day, the yoga studio will post the exact class timetable on Instagram for the following day, in addition to sharing a number of flows and yoga workouts on YouTube and IGTV.
Meanwhile, Chalk Farm-based pilates studio Exhale Pilates recently launched an online platform, on which it is offering online classes with prices starting from £15.
Businesses can also look into booking corporate group classes through Exhale Pilates.
Dance
Over the past few years, Seen On Screen has been making waves offering dancers of all levels the chance to learn routines inspired by stars including Beyoncé, Rihanna and Britney Spears.
Now, the dance studio is providing its followers with the opportunity to learn the routines at home by following live-streamed tutorials on its School of SOS Instagram page and on video chat platform Zoom.
“We are running both on-demand and live classes, and we feel the live classes in particular are important at this time,” the dance company’s founder, Bonnie Parsons, told The Independent.
“When people across the UK and the world are working from home and self-isolating, it’s more important than ever to bring communities together.”
Parsons added that the demand for the Seen On Screen online classes has been “exceptional”.
Dance cardio studio 305 Fitness is also offering free dance fitness classes on its YouTube channel, which are being shown at 12pm ET (4pm GMT) and 6pm ET (10pm GMT).
HIIT and Cardio
Barry’s UK, the fitness studio famed for pushing its participants to the physical limit, is bringing its intense workouts to Instagram live.
On the studio’s Instagram account, it is sharing details of the classes it is offering online, which include sessions that use your entire bodyweight and others that focus on different areas of the body.
Another option for a high intensity workout is to check out the classes being offered by Peloton.
In addition to providing spinning workouts, Peloton also boasts a variety of different options, including classes that focus on strength, put you through your paces on bootcamps and much more.
In addition to offering strength classes, the Peloton app also offers cardio classes that focus on running and cycling.
The fitness company is currently offering a 90-day free trial on the app, after which the app costs £12.99 a month.
While boxing studio Rumble may usually require apparatus such as boxing gloves and skipping ropes as part of its workouts, while people are self-isolating at home, it is offering a variety of workout classes online.
Live-streamed on Instagram, the classes include sessions such as a boxing-inspired HIIT workout.
On Thursday 26 March, fitness studio F45 Training is live-streaming its Gravity workout on Instagram, which will be hosted by actors Mark Wahlberg and Mario Lopez.
The class, which will be live-streamed at 11pm UK time, will be available to watch later on the company’s Instagram Story.
Kids
Thousands of children recently joined fitness instructor Joe Wicks for a live PE lesson following the closure of schools across the UK.
The live-streamed session was made available on YouTube, where more than 790,000 households tuned in.
Wicks is uploading daily PE lessons onto his YouTube account, which goes by the name The Body Coach TV.
Northern Ireland-based yoga instructor Anne Monaghan is offering yoga classes for children on Facebook.
Ms Monaghan told Belfast Live that she often trains teachers to be able to run yoga sessions “to relieve anxiety and promote calmness” in the classroom.
“It’s important to stay busy and focused in these times and yoga promotes mental and physical health and resilience and concentration primarily working on our parasympathetic nervous system – the one that reduces stress and keeps us calm,” she said.
Elderly
According to the World Health Organisation, it is advised that adults over the age of 65 should do at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic physical activity on a weekly basis or approximately 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic physical activity.
While elderly persons are staying at home to protect themselves against Covid-19, it is important that they stay active and keep moving.
Exercise company Move It or Lose It, which caters for older adults, is offering live workout sessions on its Facebook page.
The company has also created a support pack for older people providing guidance on how they can keep exercising at home.
In addition to devising PE lessons for kids, Wicks has also shared a 10-minute chair workout for seniors, which he shared on YouTube.
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