And let's not forget the sweat. It's pouring down by the bucket.
Sure, to the curious on-watcher, it would be difficult not to be swept up into the most publicized cardio craze to capture the nation in nearly two decades. Not only can cardio kickboxing pack a knockout punch for your fitness goals, but judging by the expressions on the faces of its participants, the activity is also a knee-slapping good time.
Millions across the country are getting a kick out of cardio kickboxing, whether it's in the form of the insanely popular Tae-Bo or some of the more general forms offered by local martial artists, fitness trainers, and boxing fanatics.
Not since Jane Fonda helped trigger the aerobics explosion in the 1980's has any form of cardiovascular fitness captivated the country so convincingly. It seems like cardio kickboxing classes are cropping up in every aerobics room, in every gym, in every city across America. The man behind most of this is Billy Blanks, the seven-time Martial Arts champion and the quick-kicking dynamo you'll see on the countless Tae-Bo infomercials.
A handful of Hollywood celebrities are swearing by it - guys like Sinbad, Shaqille O'Neal, and Magic Johnson. Gals like Pamela Anderson, Goldie Hawn, and Carmen Electra are saying much of the same.
But next time you're on your way out the gym door, stop and take a closer look in the aerobics room. You may even recognize a few faces.
After all, you don't need to be Van Damme to do it. You can simply be the guy next door.
Cardio kickboxing, like aerobics classes, is usually offered in three different forms of intensity: low-impact, moderate-impact, and high-impact. While the low-impact version is an excellent way to obtain flexibility and form, the intensity of the high-impact class is a tremendous method of losing weight and strengthening the heart.
After a few weeks of taking the classes, you're likely to build endurance, while improving your speed, power, and agility.
But the appeal in cardio kickboxing lies elsewhere. While benefiting from a fantastic sweat session, participants also learn the various punches and kicks that have derived from different Martial Arts forms. In other words, as much of a fitness class that it is, it is also a self-defense class.
Don't walk into a cardio kickboxing class and expect to emerge as Bruce Lee. This is merely a class engineered to combine self-defense techniques with cardiovascular workouts and add a much-needed "kick" to your everyday workouts.
The most common testimony from participants generally revolves around two ideas. One is that cardio kickboxing is ideal in toning up the muscles, partiuclarly in the arms and legs, while getting you into top shape. And secondly, the kickboxing sessions, which many claim are indeed highly addictive, break up the monotony of those repetitive aerobics classes.
Above all, cardio kickboxing classes provide you in a shorter time with what hours of chugging along on the Stairmaster or stationary bike will. The full body workout - the punches, the kicks, the non-stop pivoting and moving - shoot by like a Jackie Chan movie. And you'll be equally exhausted when it's over.
History:
Martial arts boomed during the early 1970s and interest was greatly increased by their emphasis on competition fighting. Chinese styles of fighting began to take a more westernised form in the UK, and even more so in the United States, where the first real freestyle systems were beginning to be created. Indeed, many people claim that Kick boxing originated in the US during the 1970s. This, they say, was due to various American Karate practitioners becoming frustrated with the limitations of tournament competitive scoring. While Karate and the other disciplines were viewed as being entrenched with theories and set kata, and were performed in a controlled environment, practitioners wanted to see how effective their moves would be in a more realistic environment. Great emphasis began to be placed on specialised techniques, such as kicks and punches, being delivered with full force. Although full contact Karate was already established, concerns were expressed for the safety of competitors.
Development:
There is a close affinity between Kick boxing and Muay Thai. While it is believed that the Americans had created this concept in their attempt to find a sport that could refine full contact competition, it is believed that the development of Kick boxing was borne out of the World Kick boxing Association finding common ground between Eastern and Western fighting cultures.
It is also believed that Joe Cawley, Don and Judy Quinn, along with Howard Hansen, a Shorin ryn Karate black belt, were the initial promoters of Kick boxing and worked together for improved recognition. Hansen took Kick boxing a stage further by introducing fights in a boxing ring rather than the usual Karate tournament bouts. He became known as a ring matchmaker, staging a variety of successful events with stars such as Bill ?Superfoot? Wallis.
New rules evolved and were introduced into Kick boxing, most notably weight divisions ? from fly weight to heavy weight ? similar to those in traditional boxing. A down side to the discipline in those early days was criticism of a high risk injury. This led to improvement in the safety rules, such as contestants wearing protective clothing to cushion the impacts of the blows.
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