Day 42 ! Sweat Factory @ Frame

Holy shmoly. The stats pretty much say it all here so we’ll start with those.

The Stats:

- Total Time: 59mins

- Calories Burnt: 445 (New leader for calories burnt/minute!

- Average Heart Rate: 153 (New leader!)

- Max Heart Rate: 173 

Overtaking tennis (Day 4), Boxing (Day 16) and Nike x Frame run club (Day 7, we now have a new leader in the calories-burnt-per-minute category! And also a new leader in the average-heart-rate category (taking over Boxing at 147bpm).

But, as you already know by now, calories aren't burnt without hard work and my God this class was hard work. Led by Instructor Robb, our sweat glands didn't know what hit 'em. I'm talking Glow Yoga (Day 18) equivalent in sweat, but without the glowing, heated room - just proper, body-created, exercise sweat (mmm). Needless to say, this is a very aptly named class.

There are three parts to the factory. In a nutshell, you will interval train on exercise bikes, on the treadmill and then have 20mins of minute-long exercises on the powerplates. Sounds so simple and easy written down, doesn't it? Yeah…

For me and three fellow factory workers, first, were the bikes while three other workers started on the treadmills. After a pretty short warm up (either cycling or jogging), the interval training for bikes meant alternating intervals of normal, light resistance with bursts of cycling at 80% (of your total energy), 90% or going flat out at 100% with more and more resistance (replicating cycling up a mahoosive hill). By the end of the bike section, we were on max resistance, which means your legs are moving incredibly slowly but burning burning burning throughout.

Treadmills were next – the crucial point here is what you set your “base” speed to. Instructor Robb had advised a speed just faster than jogging but not sprinting. Then the intervals alternated between base speed and base speed plus 1,2,3, 4 or 5(!) km/hr, plus a variation of inclines from 0 up to 9 or 10 (I forget, again – all you’re focused on is telling yourself to “power through, power through!”). Because you can set your own base speed, you do have control over how much to push yourself but as you’ll end up on base+5km/hr, you will still be pushing yourself either way (Instructor Robb won’t let you start on too slow a base speed, no siree). We lost a compadre on the treadmills. She got halfway and decided she’d had enough…and I didn’t judge her – it was an intense class.

By the final powerplates section, I was dead already. I recall doing some squats on the machine, some jumping lunges, V-sits and some other exercises but to be honest, it was all a bit hazy by this time. 60 seconds for each exercise seemed like a lifetime but somehow I made it!

Instructor Robb did a fantastic job alternating instructions between the bikers and treadmillers - I guess the intervals must have been between 1-2 minutes each but Instructor Robb would worry about the time which meant that we were able to simply focus on the task in hand while listening out for Instructor Robb's next instruction. And believe me, you will not have excess energy to be thinking anything other than "power through, power through." Work hard, but feel great after it! (Well, after the shower, straight after the class you will feel so sweaty it’s gross.)

The Need To Know:

- Where: Frame Shoreditch

- Nearest Station: Shoreditch High Street (4mins)

- When: Mon/Tues am or pm, Thurs pm, Fri am, Sat am, Sun afternoon

- How Much: £8off-peak/£10peak if you have a top-up card, else all-inclusive memberships available. Bar.gain for cost-per-calorie-burnt!

- Special Note: You can purely pay as you go but it’s worth having a to-up card to benefit from slightly cheaper per class fees.

  

The Want to Know:

- Who’s it For: For those who want to work out h.a.r.d.

- Sweat Scale: 9/10.

- Strength / Cardio / Flexi / Tone: Mucho cardio, some toning

- Complexity: 6/10

- Fun Factor: 7/10

- Changing Facilities: A few showers and toilets in the changing rooms. Try to avoid showering at peak time, if you can.

- Instructor Inspiration: 8/10. Super organised and motivating!

The Stats:

- See beginning of post!

Thank you Instructor Robb!

A couple of the girls agreed to a collective "Look How Sweaty We are"  photo!

Intense. Interval. Training.