Health & Fitness Workshop for Jurong Junior College JC1 Girls: Part 2
Today’s the second installment of my health and fitness workshop at Jurong Junior College (JJC) for the JC1 Girls’ Camp. Returning for the second time is always memorable as feedback from yesterday’s session showed the students wanting more bodyweight exercises.
Sporting a more energetic look in my sporty red & black themed gym gear, the stage was set for an energising 1.5hr session ahead.
Looking at the girls decked in their PT attire reminded me of my own school days. With the floodgate of junior college memories wide open, I started the workshop by getting the girls to do a self-assessment of their own measurements. First up was BMI, followed by BMR, EER and finally the Waist-Hip Ratio.
When I took out my measuring tape and casually asked if anyone would like to measure her waist and hip, the girls immediately volunteered one name. And the ‘lucky’ girl gamely stood up and had an assistant to help her glean the readings off the measuring tape. This was also a demonstration for the girls to know what to do later. As a matter of fact, I found it interesting that most did not know where the hips were. But worry not as Mr Trainer taught them to correctly identify the location of their hips by swaying them from side to side.
Immediately following that, I shared with them the fundamental difference between digesting and eating by way of incorporating the various food clusters in our daily diet. From my experience, I know most ladies would avoid eating carbohydrates as they are afraid of putting on weight. Yet carbohydrates are essential to the human body as they provide us with energy to carry out our daily activities.
Deciding to up the ante on this last workshop day, I taught the girls four simple, yet effective bodyweight exercises which they could do anytime, anywhere. Selected to target the different parts of the body where most ladies accumulate their fats, I certainly enjoyed watching the girls sweat it out…all in the name of having fun while exercising.
The stationary leg lift must rank among one of my favourite abs exercises as it really targets the core muscles and trains one’s stamina to hold it there for 30 seconds.
After working the abs, it’s time to lunge. The group today experienced a different type of lunges compared to the group yesterday. For today’s group, I made the girls do walking lunges. As they were already divided into four teams, I queued them up according to teams and had them lunge across the hall. While one team lunged, the other three teams cheered. Had you been there, you would have sensed the strong JJC team spirit in the air!
After the walking lunges, it was done to our final exercise – pushups. Mind you, I was really impressed when I caught sight of two girls doing the male version of the standard pushups (in similar fashion to Gwen Stefanie!). They were an inspiration to the rest of the girls who did their 15 pushups on bent knees.
As they say, all good things must come to an end. Challenging the girls to be active proponents of a healthy lifestyle, I ended the workshop on an uplifting note by inviting them to take a group picture with me for keepsake as I really loved the energy of this group today.
This is for all the beautiful angels who touched my life both yesterday and today. Thank you JJC!
