NZ Glen : BodyCombat fanatic

Okay team, bit slow off the mark here but better late than never! As you may know I was in Europe for this filming round, so I actually missed the classes. However I’ve had numerous reports from people who were there and I’ll try to update you as much as I’m allowed… but, obviously as I wasn’t personally there I can’t go into the detail I’d normally go into.

Firstly BODYCOMBAT 46. BC46 was presented by Dan and Rach, Hernan and Shaunna May from the USA (for more on this see Raina’s blog here). As seems to be the case with recent BODYCOMBAT releases I’ve had mixed reports. Let me put it this way – BODYCOMBAT 43 was pretty much unanimously considered to be a fantastic release. Definitely The Black Pearl has gone down as possibly the best track 6 ever – Send Me An Angel, Overload, Lovedrunk – all brilliant tracks. 43 was definitely considered a hit. BC44 – not so much. Pretty much all reports I’ve had back from instructors all over the world was that the komodo dragon move is a disaster (and I’ve done this release in 4 or 5 countries now!). ìNessun Dormaî although made for an interesting change was no Black Pearl – The Time of our Lives didn’t quite peak like Send Me An Angel and Energy didn’t set the scene for the workout ahead like Lovedrunk – although there’s no denying Your Shining was a great one. BC45, well to be honest it didn’t blow me away at the filming. I was a little confused as to why Because the Night was brought back so soon (it was in BC38!), that darn komodo dragon is back (sigh), Russian Roulette whilst is nice is just so sooo slow, and Proud Mary just doesn’t work at all (in my mind). However the release did grow on me a little at the workshop over the weekend, and perhaps I’ll enjoy it more when we release it here next week. But what has all this got to do with BC46?

I guess my point is after BC43 response to the releases have been “mixed”… and again it looks like 46 is no exception. What can I tell you. Well, firstly – there’s no komodo dragon (yay!!). Those of us with smaller group fitness studios rejoice! As I’ve said before, although the track seems to work at Les Mills Auckland (where the main studio holds 300!) – it doesn’t work in typical packed studios that hold 30-50 people. There’s just not enough room to go forward in busy classes and the move ends up being a mess. However in BC46 the conditioning is just pure ab work (in fact I’ve been told it feels like a BODYPUMP track 9 more than a combat – which I think is a good thing).

This is what I found funny though – here is the description I was given of 46’s track (6 oops) – I mean 5; “some weird ass Russian Folk Song” – Russian Folk?? You can’t help but picture those Russian Cossack dancers can you?! Don’t worry I checked and this move is not in the chorey! (but OMG imagine if it was- heck of a leg workout!) 😀

I’ve seen the tracklist for 46, and there’s a couple of interesting tracks (Russian Folk aside!). I can’t specifically name any tracks as you probably know – but, if I were to ask you who is a stock standard artist we’ve seen in many a combat track 3 or 8 what would you answer? Well yes, she’s in 46 as well (the track is a pump squat track if that helps!)

One thing I have heard is the warmup in 46 is brilliant – word is it’s almost too good to be a warmup! So look forward to that. I’ll of course update on more on 46 when I see it (which admittedly won’t be for some time) – but, hopefully it’s one of those releases that grows on you. Moving on…

BODYPUMP 76; okay, this is where it seems to get good! BP76 was presented by Glen, Susan, Emma Barry, Mark Sinclair and Ruthie T! (again, for more on this see Raina’s blog). Here’s what PJ had to say about it: “I was totally blown away by this release – I am starting to have doubts if Glen will be able to come up with anything awesome-er to top this release, but I won’t underestimate his magic…” – that’s a pretty great review!! Especially considering how great 75 is! You can read PJ’s full report plus pics on his blog here. So what did my other spies tell me?

Okay – well the first thing I noticed when I looked at BP76’s tracklist is we once again are missing a lot of rock. Lack of rock is the first thing I noticed when I did BP75 too. Personally, I’m happy with rock,. trance, dance, anything in pump as long as it has a driving beat and the music peaks. So, not having any rock doesn’t bother me so much if the other tracks are driving and uplifting (which in 75 I know they are). But, I do know some of my participants just love it so it would be nice to see a bit more in there. Here’s what else I noticed, the tracklist has a large amount of female pop (like half the class!). In fact, although there’s no Pink or Britney, if you could rattle of five other female pop artists they’re all in there! Don’t despair though – I’m told the remixes are awesome! And, everyone I’ve spoken to LOVES the shoulder track! Could it be better than the shoulder track from BP75? Personally I don’t see how that’s possible but time will tell!

So there you have it!

As I mentioned we’ve got local releases of BC75 and BC45 next week so I’ll let you know my thoughts on those after I’ve taught them a few times. In the meantime I hope the above gives you at least some idea, given it is an update on the releases, without naming any artists or specific choreography from someone who wasn’t even there! (thinking about it how did I even manage to write this post?!) 😉