Woman of Fitness: Robbin U.

My name is Robbin. My life, for the last 32 years, has been divided between raising my two children and working as a nurse on a labor and delivery unit of a local hospital. I cannot remember a week that I have not worked at least 50 or so hours. Overtime always helped make ends meet. A little over 5 years ago, I went into management on the same unit. The hours remained the same, but the stress level went up exponentially! It was that same year that I decided to take care of me.

I had stepped onto a scale at the doctors office and could not believe what I saw. I had been on Weight Watchers most of my life and decided to add exercise. I took a Zumba class at the local park district and the instructor told me that she taught the class at Women’s Workout World as well, and I joined soon after. I never imagined that Zumba would take me where I wanted to go, but slow and steady won the race.

As I started losing weight I started new classes. I tried Turbokick early on, but I could not hang. 65 pounds later I was running back to Turbo because I wanted that challenge. Some of the weight crept back on, and I am determined to not allow that to happen. So at almost 60, I am going to kick it up and I started to take team training.

I have always been a strong-minded person, and now I am going to let the trainers at W3 help me to become strong in body as well! I used to say that I wanted to lose weight and get healthy for my kids. They are grown now, and I truly believe that when I really do it for myself, I feel better. I do not feel my age, and that is a great feeling!!

Oh… and did I mention that I am a HUGE Cubs fan??? 🙂

-Robbin

Unsolicited Testimonial for W3

We were checking in on a Yoga instructor who sprained her wrist and was supposed to be out for 2 months. During that time, she originally thought she would be able to still come to the gym and do cardio. Unfortunately, her doctor told her otherwise, and here was her email to us expressing how much she will miss W3 for the 2 months she won’t be able to come in! This is a true testament of who we are…. you can be a part of it, too!

Hey, Jamie –
Thanks for checking in! I’m hanging in there. I saw my doctor yesterday who told me I couldn’t do any sort of cardio (no dancing!) for 3-4 weeks. That’s really bumming me out. Like, alot. He might as well confine me in a windowless shack, that’s how depressing this will be. 🙁

The next few weeks will be challenging, but I’m determined to keep my mind and spirit strong so that when it’s time, I’ll be ready to werq!

Actualy, your timing is pretty good. I wanted to send you a note expressing how much I miss everyone at W3. Consider this an unsolicited testimonial:

Several years ago I made a committment to make better, healther choices. I didn’t go on a diet: I started eating mindfully. I didn’t just get a gym membership: I made a lifestyle change. I treated my gym routine like a second job, and I held myself accountable for showing up. (Eventually, it literally became a second job! Technically, third since I was already hosting movie trivia as a second job… but I digress.)

The more effort I put into my workout, the more results I saw. As my strength grew, so did my drive to get even stronger. I began to understand that my body is a strong, powerful machine. And I truly believe that I would not have been able to reach my fitness goals – and maintain my enthusiasm when that goal seemed unreachable – if not for the tremendous team at W3. We truly are a team: with members as the players; Cassie, Sheeba, Susan, Reina, Toya, et al as our coaches; and Juanita, Jamie and everyone else as our cheerleaders. Everyone does their part to stay positive and to encourage everyone else on the team. The team at W3 is not only supportive, it’s empowering.

As I recover from a fractured wrist, my doctor has ordered NO CARDIO. Which means no Zumba or Werq. You know,only my primary source of endorphins and stress relief. No big. (!!!) But I’m staying positive and looking at this as an opportunity to explore other avenues of wellness, like meditation and restorative yoga. And I have the all-clear to do floor work, so I can focus on abs and lower body. But for me, those options are actually easier to do at home; which means no – or very limited – visits to W3 over the next month. And that, too, is a depressing thought.

I already miss everyone so much. The life-changing concepts I’ve learned at W3 (proper alignment, breathing techniques, pacing) have provided a good foundation on which to build an effective home practice. But nothing compares to the palpable comraderie and sisterhood one feels just walking into W3. From Juanita greeting “Hello, beautiful!” to Cassie screaming “Get lower!”, and every interaction in between,I know everyone there has my back. I miss my sisters in fitness!

I know that becoming too active too soon could exacerbate my injury; so a few weeks on the sidelines is worth a lifetime of wellness. I just have to remember that allowing myself proper time to heal is part of that committment I made to making healthy lifestyle choices. I may be an injurred wallflower now, but I’ll be tearing up the dancefloor in no time.

Thanks again for reaching out!

Miss you,
J

W3 Hosts WERQ fitness group exercise dance certification!

What is WERQ? WERQ is a fitness dance class. All of the music in this class is current top 40 pop, hip hop and rock. Unlike other hip hop fitness formats, WERQ ensures that anyone who is teaching this format is a fitness professional- in other words, holds a nationally recognized group fitness certification, such as ACE or AFAA. WERQ was founded in Chicago. Women’s Workout & Wellness recently hosted a WERQ certification for our instructors to become certified in this format. We are always looking to improve our group exercise schedules! And one of the ways we look to improve our group fitness classes is by adding new formats to keep our members excited. We also change our signature formats (we recently changed our HardBody group X class format) to ensure our members get a great yet different experience each time. If you’re looking for group exercise classes in Chicagoland, check out our vast group exercise schedules. You will no doubt find something you like from Latin dance- Zumba- to weight lifting- HardBody and Body Fit- to interval classes, like cardioflex, and then to cardio kickboxing, like Turbokick! We also offer mind/body classes, like Yoga or PiYo. Now, with our recent WERQ certification, we have yet another fun, calorie-burning format to add to our group exercise schedules throughout our Chicagoland gyms! Stay tuned for when this class will be added to the group exercise schedule at the W3 nearest you! In the meantime, check out this picture of our awesome W3 instructor TEAM before the WERQ cert!

Happy 30th Anniversary W3!!!

Women’s Workout World, now Women’s Workout and Wellness, has been in business for 30 years! What an amazing 30 years it has been. A special thanks goes out to our long-time members who have been with us for the past 10, 20 and even 30 years! You have trusted us with your fitness goals and have been with us during grand openings, remodels, fitness trends, new classes, new instructors, numerous  promotions, special boot camps, breast cancer walks, American Heart Association walks, and now you’re here to see our newest, results-driven program- functional training. Your dedication has proven to us that W3 is succeeding in reaching women across Chicagoland in making YOU fit, healthy and happy. And of course, thank you to all of our newer members who are adjusting to our programs and putting their faith in W3 to motivate and help them achieve all of their goals. We, at corporate and at each W3 location, sincerely hope that we have made a positive impact on your health and life each and every time you walk into a W3, take a class, hop on a treadmill, or get your butt kicked in a group functional training! We are continuously educating our staff and trainers to be the best in providing you with the best workouts and information as possible.

Taking a look back, we have come a long way in fitness. It’s actually kind of funny… we used to think standing there with vibrating bands would help us shed pounds and going over a roller would roll the fat right off of our bodies! (Seriously- check out the pictures!) We used to lift 3lb weights because we didn’t want to “bulk up!” We did hours of never-ending cardio. Basic aerobics. Jane Fonda workouts. Jazzercise. The era of “skinny-fat people.” The past few years, we’ve seen new programs come in to play: Zumba, Turbokick, high intensity interval training, a push toward strength training and of course, our own W3-exclusive formats! (We didn’t always have our core-defining workouts of Kickin’ Core Ball and Body Sync…but HardBody has been with W3 for awhile longer!)

 And now we are on to the greatest thing we could possibly be doing in the fitness world. (And I guess we can call this the era of the toned, fit woman!) We are training our body the way it should always have been trained- functionally- to be functionally fit and perform everyday tasks without any problems, without an ache or a pain. It’s awesome! And we are pushing toward making everyday lifestyle changes and taking a proactive role in our health and in our lives. Of course, we could not accomplish any of our company’s goals without our amazing staff (especially managers!), motivating trainers, empowering instructors and dedicated members- new and old. Thank YOU!

We are so excited for the future and for the next 30 years of W3 as we continue to strive to be the best at what we do- the best group exercise programs, the best personal and group training programs, the best provider of results in Chicago! Cheers to the next 30 years and many more after that!

Only at…

The W3