Pole Dancing: Work The Pole, Work Your Core?

As of late, I've been clocking 60 hours of work between two jobs.  Working 10-15 hour days does not leave much time for exercise, and the first thing on my mind come 6:00pm Friday is hitting the bottle, NOT the treadmill.  Nevertheless, when the girls and I took a pole dancing class at Urban Studio in Nashville during my best friend's bachelorette weekend, I figured it'd be a fun, boozy activity to do with the gang.  Yes, boozy...they literally provide champagne while you swing around poles and dance on chairs.

I'm just going to cut to the chase.  I have a new appreciation for ummm...exotic dancers.  Well, their fitness skills, at least.  The chick who taught the class had legs of steel and energy for days.  Maybe this wasn't just going to be a little boozyballs skankercise sesh.  We were all a little hung from the night before but we rallied on, guzzled down some bubbly, and got down to biz.

We started off with chair exercises.  Ten minutes in, my legs were on fire and I was gasping for breath.  We basically did "sexy" squats, lunges, back bends, and yoga poses on and around a card table chair.  I was literally dying.  This stuff is no joke.




The Bachelorette's priceless reaction!

  


Back bends galore!

 During the second half of the class we got in some bonafide pole time.  You need some major upper body strength, core strength, or simply good coordination to be good at this stuff.  Unfortunately, all the spinach smoothies in the world have not given me Popeye biceps and this was an epic failure for me.  Not only do you have to hold up your own body weight, you have to manage to twist around the pole at the same time, all while trying to look hot?!  Gah!




Shake what ya mama gave ya!


All in all, we left the studio sweaty and tipsy.  Score!  The next day I could barely lift my arms to drink my vodka red bulls and bending my legs was pure torture.  I think you call that a successful workout!

Cheers.