When someone asks to “meet you at the barre” you might want to check their spelling! Don’t get the barre confused for a place of cocktails and canapes, this barre is a place of strong toned women who are training like ballerinas!

I have blogged about joining ballet classes before, as a way to compliment pole dancing, foster elegant lines, correct body alignment and engagement. The barre originated in a ballet studio, but has now made friends with Pilates to create a burn in you core and legs that you have never felt before!

Joining a barre class on a Sunday morning I foolishly thought it would be a great way to double up in the studio. A long warm up in barre to prep for an advanced pole technique class. About 15 minutes in, however, I realised that my stamina for this kind of exercise is truly lacking. My legs did not want to participate in the following pole class.

My complaining aside though, if you’re up for the challenge a barre class is a great way to cross train and perhaps add some balance to our upper body strong pole dancer bodies.

Here’s what’s being served at the barre:

Aperitif
Warm up in the middle of the room, getting in touch with your breath and tuning in to the body. A little bit of yoga with some general loosening up of shoulder, hips, back, and neck.

Wine Course
The barre is set at the perfect height for balance. While you squat, plie, and do leg lifts, try not to grip the barre with white knuckles, we are aiming to be graceful ballerinas after all.

High Balls
Be careful with those mixed drinks. They taste sweet and fruity, but really hide a devilish cocktail of hard liquor. With a ball held behind my knee I aim to look poised and in control as I lift the ball up and away and out to the side. It’s not the squeezing of the ball that hits me, but the effort required to stablise through my standing leg, especially after all those squats and plie’s. How many shots in this drink again?

Digestiv
A little bitter-sweet, we are then offered resistance bands. The relief of now working our arms and back, quickly turns sour. The movement intensified by the requirement to stay in a squat, everyone begins to pant and moan as we work though three songs of shoulder blade squeezes, bicep curls, and arm raises. Surely it’s time to call last drinks?!

Shots
Now we are all legless and can no longer stand up at the barre, we best lie down – for crunches, dips, push ups, and planks that is! I sweat my way through the final countdown, and then struggle to my feet and make my way to the door. The DOMS hangover for this class is going to be long.

 

This review has been written with all respect for barre instructors and enthusiasts. Let’s leave the drinking to the real bar and rise to the challenge!