Time Out New York / Issue 641 : Jan 10–16, 2008
Get fit
New ways to work out
Where to lift weights—and compete in a cage match, cheerlead or train like Randy Moss. Your localized guide to the freshest gyms and techniques, with programs low-key, intense, hard-core or your choice of all three.
Crunch
Starting this month, Slope-bound Crunchers can finally have a go at the hot tricks Manhattanites have enjoyed for years—Strip Bar. “It’s huge for upper-body and core strengthening,” says instructor Christy Nacinovich, who’s been teaching the class at other Crunch locations since its inception. “Eventually, you get strong enough to climb the pole and do all kinds of spinning moves—and then forget about it, you’re looking to buy a pole for the living room.”
Rates: Per month $84–$99; initiation fee $49–$149. If you join in January and go to the gym at least seven times this month, you’ll get one month free.
330 Flatbush Ave between Park and Sterling Pls (718-783-5152)
Harbor Fitness
Spinning classes are generally known for blasting music meant to inspire you, but in this 24-hour gym’s newly revamped facility, you’ll be bombarded with visual input, too. Watch Lance Armstrong win Tour de France victories (from the perspective of the cyclist himself) or sail through the Adirondacks with coach Chris Carmichael. (No doping, please.)
Rates: Per month $59 with a yearlong commitment; initiation fee $20.
191 15th St between Fourth and Fifth Aves (718-965-6200)Ellie Herman Studios
This year, studio owner Ellie Herman will render herself irrelevant by equipping you with the tools to work out at home. The first two-hour workshop is February 23 and covers Pilates “from the ground up,” as Herman puts it, using props like the Magic Circle and a Thera-Band. And as for the irrelevance issue, she begs to differ: “Pilates is the kind of thing where you never stop learning.”
Rates: First private lesson $45; three-class intro pack $150. a five-person group class is $30; eight-week series $200.
788A Union St between Sixth and Seventh Aves, second floor (718-230-3707) Maxim Health and Fitness
Limber up starting in February with the new Active Isolated Stretching class at this 14,000-square-foot gym. “It’s not the standard hold-for-ten-seconds type stretch,” says part-owner Larry Betz. “It’s a scientific method that uses precise movements to isolate a specific area to be stretched—in other words, you contract a specific muscle to release tension on the opposite muscle.”
Rates: One year (paid in full) $875; or $129 down and $7 per month. Includes two free training sessions.
193 North 9th St at Driggs Ave (718-486-0630)
