Showcase at Ministry Does Fitness: set your alarm for a morning HIIT class

Klaudia Balogh17 February 2017

Getting up at 5 in the morning to go the gym requires serious commitment and motivation. It’s way too easy to hit the snooze button and go back to dreamland. But that won’t get you results, will it?

Whether you’ll get out of bed or not depends a lot on the workout or fitness class you’ll be taking. Looking back, I have to say that waking up at 5 a.m. to get to the 6:45 a.m. Showcase class at Ministry Does Fitness was worth the morning battle with my alarm.

The Class

This is a class where party meets fitness. It only took me about two minutes to get my heart rate going and forget that it was barely 7 am.

Mixes of Ministry of Sound electronic and house-style tracks along with red, blue and purple UV lights create an atmosphere that will not leave you short of motivation. Add to that the instructor, Rory Knight's encouragement - you're pushed to keep going. “Let’s go! Ten seconds left,” he’d say, just as your muscles are about to give up. It’s as if he already knows that you can push a bit further. And as you’ll see, you can.

What it entails

Showcase is a 45-minute HIIT and circuit-based workout, where you do eight exercises. You do each one for a minute and have about five seconds rest in between stations and 20 seconds rest between rounds.

Although Ministry Does Fitness has classes that focus specifically on either strength, endurance or core, Showcase is combination of all three.

Each station involves large compound movements engaging multiple muscle groups. The exercises aren’t difficult to execute, so you don’t need to be a fitness fanatic to be able to complete them.

We did two rounds of two separate sets of exercises. Some of the stations included lunges, squats, pushups, TRX, and running. The run was different to what I was used to. It wasn’t your everyday treadmill, but a self-powered curved manual one. It only goes as fast as you put one foot in front of the other. It’s quite a different feeling if you’re used to pounding regular treadmills or the streets of London.

Each station had two or four people performing the same exercise. We were put into pairs, but none of the stations were pair-dependent.

Clare Kavanagh and Petrine Vox are each other’s workout buddies. They try different fitness classes in London, and always do it together. “if something is new, we like to try it,” Petrine said, noting that she couldn’t think of anything similar to Showcase. “The format might be the same at other classes, but these exercises are more unique.”

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The Verdict

If you want to start waking up early to hit the gym, make it fun and enjoyable. Showcase did exactly that. I had fun — credit all the endorphins released throughout my struggles.

The toughest station for most us was pushing the prowler - that’s also called dog sled - with weights on it. Just as time was up, I was going to stand up, but my legs decided otherwise, so I landed on my butt.

When I asked Rory why he thought we should work out so early in the morning, he laughed and gave me a very straightforward answer: “Why not? We lead busy lives, and it’s nice to get the workout done in the morning.”

At the end I wasn’t athe only one who said that this class made me forget that I'd only slept about five hours - most of London was hardly waking up when we were already halfway through the workout.

People who are up early might get cranky, but you can’t say the same for those who wake up early and work out.

Both Clare and Petrine were in an upbeat mood after class without any signs of sleepiness. “It’s the endorphins, it’s just that rush,” Clare said.

Showcase at Ministry Does Fitness costs £14 per class; ministrydoesfitness.com

Klaudia is a freelance health and fitness writer. Follow her on Twitter @ByKlaudiaBalogh

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