By Linnea Sheldon

The Zumba craze continues to grow, with classes popping up all over Worcester County. What’s the secret behind the increasing popularity of this exercise class? Well, it’s fun!

For many of us, exercise is a chore. Think about how many times you’ve had to drag yourself to the gym, counting down the minutes on the treadmill while you try to distract yourself with a magazine or TV show. Now compare that to a night out on the town with your best girlfriends, dancing and working up a sweat to some great music.

Zumba is an exercise class, but it’s more like that fun night out at the club. The classes revolve around lively Latin music and easy-to-follow moves, with an instructor at the front of the class leading it all.

The idea behind Zumba is to take all the benefits of exercise ~ weight loss, good health, cardiovascular training ~ and put them into a format that will keep people coming back for more.

The Zumba routine is based around the concept of interval training, combining fast and slow rhythms and resistance training. With an international flair, the classes are always challenging but never boring.

Fitness has never been more fun, and Zumba classes are everywhere, from commercial gyms and fitness centers to community centers and dance studios. There are over 20,000 trained instructors in over thirty-five countries. With more than 3.5 million DVDs sold, the fitness movement is available to just about everyone.

Local Zumba instructor and Latin dance enthusiast Glenda Carnate describes the class as the hottest dance-fitness craze on the planet. “It is the most fun dance class, it’s very hip, very sexy, plus it burns calories,” she said.

Carnate explains that the classes are very inclusive and describes a party atmosphere where everyone is very positive. “There are no dancing skills required, no expectations, you learn the dance one step at a time,” she explained. “When you walk in you will see people similar to you and you will see people different from you, but all of you will become one because you’re doing Zumba.”

Carnate is the owner and instructor of Revolution Dance and Fitness Complex, located at 173 Grove Street in Worcester. Classes are offered on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. For more information and a full schedule, check out www.youdanze.com.

pic: Glenda Carnate