This week’s Extra Sugar is inspired by Mary Jo and Julia’s stint in the jogging world – and Julia taking it a little TOO serious. Like 2010s crossfit serious.
That’s right, y’all, we’re talking about fitness trends. We’ll probably admit to more than a few. Some are flat out hilarious, and there are time stamps galore. This one is just for funsies.
Come on y’all, let’s get into it!
Reads/Views:
Find out the hottest fitness trend the year we were born.
This article also breaks down the activewear for women in a given time period. Anyone up for heels and pearls with their pilates??
Sweatin' To The Oldies TV Commercial from the 1980's | Richard Simmons
Know your contraptions:
Shake Weight funnies for your enjoyment
From Peloton to Soul Cycle to Tae Bo, why we fall for fitness fads - Vox
Or listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Podcasts | Amazon Music.
Transcript
Salina: Hey, Nikki.
Nikki: Hey, Salina.
Salina: Hello, everyone, and welcome to this week's edition of Extra Sugar.
Nikki: Hey, y'all.
Nikki: I don't know if I was supposed to say that or not, but I did.
Salina: You can say whatever you want.
Salina: You have a microphone.
Nikki: I do.
Salina: That's right.
Salina: Today's topic is inspired by Mary Jo and Julia's brief relationship with jogging.
Salina: In season five, episode eight, julia was giving us some serious 2010s CrossFit energy.
Salina: And so that got me thinking about different exercise or fitness trends over the decades.
Salina: And I thought it might be fun for us to just chat about it, maybe.
Nikki: Will it be fun?
Nikki: Will it be triggering?
Salina: It could be so many things.
Salina: I've pulled ones that stood out to me so that we're not trying to sit here and remember on the fly, because I figured that could be interesting.
Nikki: Less than fun.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: Plus, as I started looking into these, it's amazing how much the brain can forget.
Salina: And there's just been a lot of them.
Salina: So this is really just a chitty chat.
Salina: I think there are probably several of these that we ourselves have taken part in, so we can admit that as needed.
Nikki: Admit?
Salina: Admit.
Salina: Some are just flat out hilarious.
Salina: And boy, oh, boy, do the time capsules abound.
Salina: So really, you just jump in wherever you want?
Salina: I did pull some things about them in case people don't know what they are or if I are you going to mention Taboo?
Salina: Oh, girl.
Salina: Okay.
Salina: You know, I'm going to I did notice some themes as well.
Salina: The general, we love contraptions.
Salina: We are quite susceptible to marketing.
Salina: And just one person, the right person, can start an entire movement.
Salina: Billy Blanks, then related, we'll touch on why these fads always seem to get us every single time.
Nikki: Because we want to be skinny.
Salina: Well, skinny gives you value, believe it or not.
Salina: That is not in the mix of reasons.
Salina: But I would love for you to join.
Salina: Not my reasons today.
Nikki: Oh, okay.
Salina: Yeah, not in the world's reasons.
Salina: People are lying, but it's a little bit more commercial than that.
Salina: So here's how we're going to do this one.
Salina: We're going to take it by the decade.
Salina: And I included it in the decade.
Salina: It was created, for the most part, until I break my own rules and then not necessarily when it became popular.
Salina: So you're welcome to comment on that as well, if you so please.
Salina: We'll see.
Salina: We can also spend as much or as little time on these as you want so we could set this pace.
Salina: Okay.
Salina: Up first is the 1950s.
Salina: That's why I said we could spend as much or as little time on these as you want.
Salina: And the first one is the hula hoop.
Salina: Now, I'm going to tell you that for me, I just thought this was a toy.
Salina: I didn't realize that this was like, an exercise thing.
Nikki: I keep getting these TikTok ads for what is what I would call the elevated hula hoop.
Nikki: So it's like a weighted hula hoop.
Salina: I think it's so funny that you say that because I have on here that today you can get a weighted one if you like.
Nikki: I get those ads all the time.
Nikki: Yeah.
Nikki: I would not have guessed that it was a fitness pad.
Salina: Yeah, it started as a toy and then it eventually becomes a fitness trend.
Nikki: As these things do.
Salina: Yeah.
Nikki: When is my skip it going to come back into style?
Salina: Those are fun.
Nikki: I don't it started as a toy.
Nikki: When do I get to do that for fitness?
Salina: I'm just going to tell you.
Salina: Well, you got to start the trend, get it going.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: Let's talk skip fit.
Nikki: Don't steal that.
Salina: Give us all the ideas.
Salina: Don't give away the go.
Salina: But I think for me, obviously sleeve, this is not one I really partook in.
Nikki: I don't know how to hula hoop.
Nikki: I mean, I know how, I just can't do it.
Salina: I don't really understand.
Salina: It's supposed to be well, I was about to say it's supposed to be about the hips.
Salina: Oh, maybe that's why I need like a HIPAA hoop.
Salina: And then I think I'd really have it because I've got the hips.
Salina: But it's a lot there's a looseness.
Nikki: That has to come with it.
Salina: I think one time I made it go 3 seconds and it felt really good.
Salina: I was like but anybody who's just sitting there going like they're better than me.
Salina: I don't know.
Salina: Guess what?
Salina: We're going to skip a decade and.
Nikki: We'Re going to go, was there no fitness in the lot of drugs and smoking?
Salina: Well, that's a good just sex free love.
Salina: It's a sexual revolution.
Salina: Sure.
Salina: So I skipped to the 70s.
Salina: We're going to do jazzer size.
Salina: So I think for me, I will just say that one.
Salina: I don't really know until I was looking at it.
Salina: The difference between say, jazzer size and aerobics.
Salina: To me they're different shades of the same thing.
Nikki: They are, right?
Salina: Well, I think jazzer size well and.
Nikki: Where does Sweat into the oldies fit in?
Salina: Don't come at me.
Nikki: Oh, sorry.
Salina: If we're going to get to it okay.
Salina: We're just the wrong decade.
Salina: Okay.
Salina: But jazzer size, I think don't come for me, y'all, but I think it's like a slightly more challenging thing than aerobics.
Salina: Only because it's more dance oriented.
Salina: So it's jazz, dance, ballet, Pilates, yoga and kickboxing.
Salina: God, it's like a lot of stuff.
Salina: And I think for our generation, this is the thing we think of moms doing okay.
Salina: Or at least I do.
Salina: I don't know, my mom did it, but I think of moms doing it probably similar to the way that people probably felt about what was the dance.
Nikki: One sweating to the oldie not that one.
Salina: Much more recently.
Salina: Like I could have done it on a wi fit.
Nikki: Just dance.
Salina: No, not dance dance.
Salina: Revolution Zumba.
Salina: Oh, God, I hate Zumba.
Salina: Tell us how you really feel.
Salina: I actually love Zumba off, actually.
Nikki: Lots of people love it.
Nikki: And so you do you?
Nikki: I am a terrible dancer.
Nikki: I had to go to see jazzer.
Salina: Size would not be for you?
Nikki: No, absolutely not.
Nikki: I went to one Zumba class and I was just mortified the whole time.
Nikki: That's too much for me.
Salina: That's hard, I think, to do with an audience.
Nikki: I would agree with that.
Nikki: But some people see it yeah.
Nikki: Some people see it as like a social event.
Nikki: They absolutely are not embarrassed by it.
Nikki: And that multiple people in the class were like, don't be embarrassed, this is for fun.
Nikki: We're all just having fun.
Nikki: I was like, I am not having fun.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: So it doesn't sound like the look in your eyes tells me you don't have much of an association with Jazzer Size.
Nikki: I don't.
Nikki: And I think I hit a mental block because I cannot pull it apart from Aerobics and Sweat into the oldies like you.
Nikki: It all feels very of the same thing.
Nikki: So jazzer size itself.
Nikki: No, I don't know anyone who's ever done it.
Nikki: I've certainly never done it.
Salina: I think Casey's mom did it.
Salina: I can't pull it apart from the 80s because that's what I picture.
Nikki: Right.
Salina: And I think many other people would probably associate it with the actually gets created in 1969, then it finds its footing in the went mainstream in the 80s, largely in part to VHS.
Salina: I didn't put this as like, one of the themes that crept up, but VHS is definitely in the theme.
Nikki: Yeah.
Nikki: I think it's a really clever name, jazzer Size.
Nikki: I think it's an excellent name.
Nikki: I'm really annoyed that there's more to it than just jazz music, but that's fine.
Salina: Or just that everything it's made up of.
Salina: They're also all different fitness trends.
Nikki: Right.
Salina: Which is funny.
Nikki: It's like the mega trend.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: And some of them I think we might associate with being so much newer.
Salina: But like, Pilates, I think, has been around since World War I.
Nikki: They call it jazzer size.
Nikki: It's really just exercising.
Nikki: It's just all the exercises.
Salina: Well, I think there's something to be said for that as we go down the list.
Salina: So we are at the I've got great news for you.
Nikki: Are we finally sweating to the oldies?
Salina: We are indeed sweating to the oldies.
Salina: This, for me, is very special because I just think, again, coming back to the time capsule, I can picture my grandmother's VHS tapes.
Salina: She definitely had the whole set.
Salina: If you're not familiar with Sweat into the oldies, then you are very young.
Salina: Because I feel like if you're our age and older, this is like something that is just almost visceral.
Nikki: Richard Simmons led it.
Salina: Right?
Nikki: Yeah.
Salina: So it's a mixture of dance and low impact aerobics to oldies music.
Salina: Did you ever do it?
Nikki: Yes.
Salina: Me too.
Salina: Yeah.
Nikki: How why my mom had lots of VHS.
Nikki: She had sweat into the oldies, she had Taibo in the 90s, but she also had several Jane Fonda VHS.
Nikki: And I think there were various periods in my life where there was this effort to help me lose weight.
Nikki: Help me lose weight, honestly.
Nikki: And so there were suggestions no, I think there were suggestions that exercise would be helpful.
Nikki: And so I've got this VHS.
Nikki: You can try.
Nikki: It always kind of felt silly to me, but this goes back to me not being a dancer.
Nikki: So that stuff feels really silly to me.
Nikki: No, but that doesn't matter.
Salina: And I want to say that that is part of the lovely part, which I think we can skip ahead and talking about this.
Nikki: I think I just imagined one of the people in the background's faces made myself laugh.
Salina: So I think it's really important to talk about Richard Simmons as a part of this because he is our first example of someone who can start a whole movement on his own or on their own.
Salina: So he creates sweat into the oldies.
Salina: He's southern, by the way.
Salina: He's from Louisiana and he's a really big personality.
Salina: If you watch these, I don't think you forget him.
Nikki: You do not.
Salina: He's a very big personality in very tiny 80s shorts, but really importantly, very curly hair.
Salina: Very curly hair, despite kind of like how you might laugh a little thinking about it.
Salina: What is really interesting and nice about him, I think, is that he offered a path to health for people who were often left behind by the fitness world.
Salina: Because the fitness world kind of like especially at this time, they really only want you if you're already fit.
Nikki: Right.
Salina: They really don't like it if you're struggling with your weight, which seems counterintuitive.
Salina: And also they don't necessarily like it when you skew older.
Salina: There is almost kind of like a culture of attractiveness that comes along with this.
Salina: And he really came in and he busted that up.
Salina: He offered a place where people could have a good time without judgment.
Salina: When you watch these videos, that's what you see.
Nikki: Yeah, he was obese at one point.
Salina: That's right.
Nikki: And I think that fueled a lot of his approach to it.
Salina: It's perfect that you say that, because he offered an emotional component.
Salina: The videos were like interspersed with him bringing people out of the crowd and talking to them about whatever their triggers were.
Salina: And I thought that was different.
Nikki: Humanizing.
Salina: Absolutely.
Salina: I think a lot to do with the fact that he was struggling with his own weight when he was younger.
Salina: And I think he really cared about people and that was special.
Nikki: I am a person who cries during peloton rides.
Nikki: Like fitness oriented stuff, especially people pushing through really hard circumstances, but still focusing on themselves and trying to prioritize their well being.
Nikki: It just gets me, it gets me deep.
Nikki: I will full on cry in a workout.
Nikki: And I'm sure there were times with those Richard Simmons videos where I'd get misty eyed hearing someone's because there's so much infectious energy from him, and then the people in the audience are thrilled to be there, and then they're talking about these very emotional things.
Nikki: Yeah, I'm going to cry.
Nikki: And I haven't seen a sweat into the oldies video in, like, 25, 25 years.
Salina: So he interestingly.
Salina: Hasn't made a public appearance in nearly ten years.
Salina: There's a lot of speculation that I'm not going to add to there.
Salina: But what I will say is the reason I'm bringing that up is because I think if you're really young, richard Simmons, that may not mean anything to you, that name may not mean anything to you if you are our age.
Salina: It's almost hard to explain just how absolutely ubiquitous he was in the culture.
Salina: I mean, he was everywhere.
Salina: His image is, like, burned into my brain.
Salina: Is that fair for you as well?
Nikki: Yeah, he's been parodied a lot.
Nikki: Not all negative or hateful just because, like you said, he is a really big, identifiable personality.
Salina: Yeah.
Nikki: But there was definitely probably some hatefulness buried into that somewhere.
Salina: Well, it's the world.
Nikki: Exactly.
Salina: We build you up, and then we tear you down.
Salina: But I think anybody who makes it to the Simpsons, they're an icon.
Nikki: They're kind of a big deal.
Nikki: Yeah, he was definitely a very big deal.
Nikki: Yeah.
Salina: So I will say I did do them.
Salina: I think I just, at one point, crabbed.
Salina: I was like, let's see what this is all about.
Salina: I was probably a big whopping nine or ten years old, and it's fun, like, you're just moving around, but I felt goofy.
Nikki: I just feel silly most of the time doing aerobics type stuff, like the way they tried to make aerobics digestible for people and fun for people, because that's ultimately your ability to stick with a fitness routine depends very heavily on how you identify with that routine, which is the whole thing with Richard Simmons.
Nikki: Like, he was appealing.
Nikki: He was someone people wanted to hear from, and he did it in a fun people.
Nikki: For me, that's not fun.
Nikki: So I would never stick with it.
Nikki: It's just not fun.
Nikki: I don't like it, but I could see where it's infectious for a certain group of people, and I'm really glad they found that for themselves.
Nikki: But I have done it, and I did not enjoy it.
Nikki: I felt silly.
Salina: All right, I understand.
Salina: Next up on our list is the bowflex home gym.
Salina: It was created in 1986.
Salina: Now, my relationship to this and a few others on this list is literally it's a thing that interrupted my car commercials.
Nikki: Sure.
Nikki: Right.
Salina: It was the infomercials, it was the commercial.
Nikki: I've never touched a bowflex in my life, as far as I can remember, but I definitely know I can see.
Salina: The commercial was Billy blanks.
Nikki: Not in those commercials, too.
Nikki: Who is the bowflex guy?
Salina: I thought I would think there were several of them.
Salina: They all have mullets in my head.
Salina: I don't know why, but I think the gist of this one, if you are not familiar with a bowflex, is like, instead of it having the big, heavy weights, they had resistant spans that created tension as you pulled them.
Salina: In addition to making you buff, they were promoted as saving you space.
Salina: But I think that's because that's also where you slung your clothes personally.
Salina: And then, according to Men's Journal, their decline in popularity had to do with a series of recalls and then apparently one deadly incident.
Salina: I don't know what the deadly incident was, but if you've ever seen the machine, you can almost imagine kind of yeah, okay.
Salina: Maybe it's like a bunch of cords.
Nikki: Yeah, maybe it wasn't a famous celebrity.
Nikki: Who was the bowflex guy?
Nikki: I found someone on Instagram claiming to be the original guy.
Salina: Oh, you're going to show him?
Nikki: Oh, I will in just a second.
Nikki: But I just found an article that says that Darn bowflex commercial is cheesing me off almost as much as that Miss Cleo lady.
Nikki: That's how ubiquitous bowflex was in terms of commercials.
Salina: Oh, okay.
Nikki: The caption says he looks like Dennis Quaid.
Salina: Yeah, so not who I was picturing.
Nikki: Kind of looks like he's doing chest or size in that video.
Salina: This is him now?
Nikki: Yes.
Nikki: Okay.
Nikki: He still has a bowflex.
Salina: Hey.
Salina: I mean, you can still get that's the thing about most of these things.
Salina: You can still get most of these.
Salina: So this also serves as an accidental commercial.
Nikki: So crazy.
Nikki: Like, do they just have a warehouse or are they building them on demand?
Salina: I got no idea on that one.
Salina: But the next one I have, you already mentioned, and this is the workout.
Salina: Oh, no, I don't mean like that.
Salina: Just that your mom had the tapes.
Salina: So you've done the Jane Fonda workout.
Nikki: At least one.
Nikki: One or two of them, yeah.
Nikki: She might have had a step workout, too.
Nikki: My mom had it still to this day, has a step.
Salina: Sure, she still has a step.
Nikki: And so I think Jane Fonda had one of those.
Salina: She like when I say the Jane Fonda workout and you mentioned in the step, it's, like, very important, I guess, here in this context.
Salina: I don't know if it's very important in the grand scheme of the world, but to mention that we're talking about aerobics.
Salina: That's what the Jane Fonda workout was.
Salina: And aerobics had existed for a long time.
Salina: But Jane Fonda, like, takes it to a whole nother level.
Salina: She mainstreams it.
Salina: Yeah, she's Jane Fonda.
Salina: She puts aerobics on the map.
Salina: She popularized a whole fitness look.
Salina: Anytime you see someone goes to an 80s party and they're wearing, like, the sweatband around their head and the leotard and the leggings sweatsocks and the legging all that.
Salina: That is all Jane Fonda.
Salina: And we've talked about this right here before is the fact that she has one of the best selling home videos of all time with over 17 million copies sold.
Salina: I've never done it.
Salina: My grandma, I think, had these, and I think I probably found it when I was like a big whopping seven years old and was like, what am I going to do with this?
Salina: This looks weird.
Nikki: Yeah.
Nikki: There's a series of these homework because I guess my mom had a lot of them.
Nikki: My mom was not a particularly fitness oriented person.
Nikki: But I do feel like at a point, especially if you're in your 30s, you're a mom, you're working all the time.
Nikki: You've got to find some way to sort of like, again, this would have been the late 80s, early 90s, keep the weight off and stay trim.
Nikki: And so you sort of experimented with all of these things.
Salina: Your mom was like, more in her 20s, right?
Nikki: That's right.
Salina: Well, and I think it also kind of speaks again, I don't think I can say enough how big VHS is a pop out in this.
Nikki: Right.
Nikki: It made everything so accessible.
Nikki: Like, you didn't have to be a yuppie in a gym.
Salina: The video clubs where you would join them and you would buy like, my mom was a part of this.
Salina: And you would buy X amount of videos, and they come once a month, like a Fruit of the Month club that's relatable a subscription box.
Nikki: I had it, like, today.
Nikki: There were CD versions of that where you would get CDs.
Salina: Do you like CDs?
Nikki: I've been part of that.
Salina: It's been well established.
Salina: So the next one on my list is Buns of still.
Nikki: My mom had this one, too.
Nikki: I thought it was the weirdest name.
Salina: Okay.
Nikki: And the COVID was a little bit weird.
Salina: Well, it was a picture of a b***.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: So I'm going to go ahead and just say that I've actually done buns of still more times than I can count.
Salina: And thighs of still.
Salina: There's also an ABS of still.
Salina: My mom didn't have that one.
Salina: So I went and like, I took these tapes from my mom at some point and probably when I was like 15, and I was still doing them when I moved it to this house.
Salina: Oh my gosh.
Salina: Let me tell you why.
Nikki: Because you had firm buns.
Salina: They're good.
Salina: Not my buns.
Salina: The tapes.
Nikki: They're steely.
Salina: I think they were more like Reynolds Wrap Cheesiness Factor.
Nikki: I cannot get past the whole thing, but, like, absolutely awful title.
Salina: I love Body Weight Moves is like, one of my favorite workouts, and it will always be ingrained in any routine.
Nikki: So you're not doing it anymore just because you don't have a VHS player anymore?
Salina: Probably, honestly.
Salina: But I just it's true.
Salina: I sent a Christmas present coming.
Salina: I'd be so excited.
Nikki: Enjoy your VCR.
Salina: So you've seen them then.
Salina: And you saw your mom do?
Nikki: Yeah, I'm sure I've done them before.
Salina: I used to know them by heart.
Nikki: Haven't done.
Nikki: Oh, my gosh.
Salina: I took them to my friend's house, and my friend Sarah's mom still talks to this day about how she would come downstairs and I had snuck down, and I would be doing workouts, like, early in the morning in their living room before anybody was up.
Nikki: That's not orthorexia or whatever exercise sick person.
Nikki: You just would get past.
Nikki: You didn't mind people seeing the COVID.
Salina: Like a little 15 year old, like, down in their basement or something, and you'd be like, honey, can I get you some cereal?
Salina: 1990.
Nikki: Oh, no.
Salina: The Thigh master.
Nikki: I've never used one of these.
Salina: I never had one.
Salina: I mean, this comes out in 1990, so I was a little young, but.
Nikki: Wouldn'T every house have had mine didn't, but it feels like every house would have had one.
Salina: Certainly.
Salina: I went to either my mom's friends if I was, like, a tag along to those situations, or my friend's parents or something had them, because I've definitely used one before.
Nikki: It seems very dangerous.
Salina: Like what alien knock out an eye.
Nikki: There's springs involved, people.
Nikki: There are springs involved.
Nikki: And it's between your thighs.
Salina: So this is the first little contraption on the list, and it is a resistance coil, and it's a spring.
Salina: You stick it between your thighs and you squeeze it with the goal of getting Suzanne Summer's legs over and over again.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: Because she is the face, I think, for us.
Nikki: Rest in peace, Suzanne.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: I do want to say that she just passed in mid October, so very recently, after a long battle with breast cancer, she is the face of Thighmaster.
Salina: But I think for our generation, she was TGIF step by step mom and the Thigh Master.
Salina: And the Thigh Master.
Salina: And I think also, I think probably very few of us, myself included, at our age, was watching Three's Company, and I watched it in Reruns reruns on Nick at night.
Salina: It was on, like, TBS during the day and stuff, too.
Salina: So I think that is also a connector point for me.
Salina: But I think for most people our age, that's probably not true, but she was a really big deal.
Salina: She was also another ubiquitous figure, and apparently they stopped counting after 10 million were sold, so I can't why would.
Nikki: You why would you do that?
Salina: Keep counting.
Nikki: I'd be aiming for 17 million to beat whoever Jane Fonda.
Salina: Just beat them all.
Salina: So her infomercial is really legendary.
Salina: And about ten years ago, she was actually inducted into something called the Direct Response Hall of Fame.
Salina: And I actually did track down that infomercial that I must have seen like, 2 million times as a child.
Salina: Don't worry, we'll be sharing the link.
Salina: Yes, it was another cartoon ruiner.
Nikki: This is going to be one.
Nikki: It's going to unlock some core memory because I cannot pull it to the top of my I can remember the bowflex infomercial right now.
Nikki: That dude was ripped.
Salina: It's like just her sitting on a couch.
Nikki: Just doing it.
Salina: Doing it.
Salina: Also, I have to mention that I found in Men's Health Journal that the guy who created this also created the mood ring.
Salina: So if that everything that you need to know about these contraptions, wow, they're, like, just cash grabs.
Nikki: So crazy.
Salina: Next on the list is the AB roller.
Nikki: Oh, that looks really hard.
Salina: Okay, so you haven't used this either?
Nikki: I don't think so.
Salina: This is, like, also one of those things that was at friends houses.
Salina: Like, parents had them.
Salina: It first comes around in the mid.
Nikki: Ninety s.
Nikki: I didn't have a lot of friends.
Salina: It was marketed as a more effective work.
Salina: I don't know how to or is it more that you weren't the sick kid that was in there?
Salina: Like, oh, can I just buy masa?
Nikki: That my friend's.
Nikki: Parents just didn't care about fitness.
Salina: I don't know.
Nikki: I've got to do some self reflection.
Nikki: I've seen these things at the gym, though.
Salina: I think we'll both be doing self reflection after this one.
Salina: Well, yes, I have seen them, and it makes more sense there because they're kind of big.
Salina: It's about as convenient as me having, like, a regulation size bow and arrow downstairs in my living room.
Nikki: But in the workout I literally just did Thursday, they said we're going to do a core move, or maybe it was yesterday, we're going to do a core move that mimics the AB roller.
Salina: Oh, really?
Nikki: So it was just like hands and knees, getting yourself all the way out into a flat position and then coming back up, but the same concept of rolling out and in.
Salina: And I guess that was the draw, too, because you could position them and use them for push ups.
Salina: You could do all of these other things with it.
Salina: Bad news, bears.
Salina: It's like, apparently only slightly better than a regular crunch.
Salina: But I think the whole thing was like it kept you from straining your head and neck.
Salina: That was what it was sold as.
Salina: I'm doing the motion for Nikki.
Nikki: You're welcome.
Nikki: Because I had forgotten how to do a crunch.
Salina: But you can tell that I'm using AV roller right now.
Salina: This sucker made a billion dollars.
Salina: That is amazing.
Nikki: It's making me think, what kind of random, kitschy fitness thing could I create?
Salina: And can we market it as a sweet tea and TV product?
Salina: We've tried all of the dumb things.
Nikki: We're talking about a protein based iced tea?
Salina: Yeah.
Nikki: Like bone broth.
Salina: It's just, like, in the bottom.
Salina: It's like just three inches thick protein.
Salina: All right, well, you'll be very excited about the next one because it's the first one you mentioned.
Salina: It is Tybo.
Nikki: Oh, yeah.
Salina: Zoomers may not know Billy Blanks, which is a shame.
Salina: That's right.
Salina: But if you grew up in the 90s like we did, he was another figure who was larger than life.
Salina: And I like this one because it really did feel like a capsule, like where I was just transported back to the late 90s.
Salina: He created Taibo, Billy Blakes did, which was a combination of taekwondo and boxing.
Salina: Apparently it stands for do you know.
Nikki: What it stands for?
Nikki: Taekwondo and boxing taboo.
Salina: What's happening right now?
Salina: No.
Salina: Stands for total Awareness of Excellent Body obedience.
Nikki: And I such garbage.
Salina: I have something here that says sure.
Nikki: So stupid.
Salina: So Taibo made cardio boxing and kickboxing explode across the country.
Salina: I never did Taibo.
Nikki: Oh, really?
Nikki: But I did kickboxing tai.
Nikki: Bo videos are probably with potentially the exception of maybe one more.
Nikki: You're going to mention the ones I can remember most vividly.
Nikki: I remember the sheen of sweat on Billy's face for the entire workout.
Nikki: How buff he was completely ripped.
Nikki: So Buffy and I'm like a chubby 15 year old standing here like, how do I look like him?
Nikki: When is this going to happen?
Salina: How do you remember that?
Salina: Buff man.
Nikki: How do I make a buff man covered in a buff man?
Nikki: The sheen of sweat.
Nikki: Yeah.
Nikki: I never looked like him.
Nikki: I never looked like him.
Nikki: It didn't work out for me.
Salina: Okay, spoiler alert.
Nikki: I don't look like Billy Blanks, but yeah, I can remember this video most vividly.
Nikki: This is probably I mean, I know there's a series of them, so I couldn't tell you exactly which one, but I probably had it memorized.
Salina: Well, the funny thing is you saying that just how big it is.
Salina: Right.
Salina: And I didn't know this until I was looking into it, but in 1999, it outsold every major home video release, including The Matrix.
Salina: And unless you were alive in 1999, I also can't explain to you how big The Matrix was, probably.
Salina: But probably spinning is next on my list.
Salina: So I don't know if you know much about the genesis of spinning.
Salina: Do you, by any chance?
Nikki: Okay, so it all started with the Unicycle in Victorian England.
Salina: I wish you did.
Salina: So both the indoor bike and what is spinning is a fitness program are attributed to competitive cyclist Johnny Goldberg or Johnny G.
Salina: So I've seen different backstories for how he came up with it.
Salina: In one account, it said it all started because he was tired of weather impacting his workout.
Nikki: I also am tired of weather, just in general.
Salina: Others report he came up with the idea after nearly being hit by a car.
Salina: Perhaps it's both.
Salina: I was going to say it's not.
Nikki: That mind blowing of a concept.
Nikki: I love to bike ride, but I can't get on my bike right now.
Salina: Well, certainly being struck by a car would impact your workout.
Salina: Sure.
Salina: I mean, they both feel like minor inconvenience, reasonable attribution.
Nikki: Two things can be true at once.
Salina: That's right.
Salina: So.
Salina: He partnered with Schwinn, the American bike company, and we get our first stationary bike off the ground in 1995.
Salina: Doesn't that seem late?
Nikki: It really does.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: It's not like I read that and then was like, let me cross reference that.
Nikki: But I feel like I can imagine a really big, bulky 1985 stationary bicycle.
Salina: It seems crazy to me, but maybe there's something going on here that just makes it a spinner buying well, that is what this whole segment is about.
Salina: I love spin, and that's what I was going to ask, because I feel like as we go across this list, I would argue that this one has more staying power than almost anything else that we'll talk about, if not the most.
Nikki: So I don't know that I have actually taken part in the spinning what would you call that?
Nikki: Like curriculum or like the spinning umbrella?
Nikki: I just like peloton.
Nikki: It's a spin bike.
Nikki: It is all it is.
Nikki: And I do the Peloton workout, so I don't know if there's like jazzer size is trademarked, and spinning I'm sure, is trademarked.
Salina: I think this will come up very much so when we get to why we keep falling for these fitness trends.
Salina: But that's fair.
Salina: It's almost hard to for me, the way that I'm like aerobics, jazzer size, what's the difference?
Salina: I'm sure there's someone who's very steeped in it.
Nikki: It's like idiot.
Salina: But for me, I'm like I think.
Nikki: What makes spin so exciting is it merges music in which I think is also what makes running bearable for me is to run with a very specific playlist because I'm motivated by music.
Nikki: The people who run without music.
Nikki: Aren't you one of those people?
Salina: No.
Salina: Oh, okay.
Nikki: Someone I know.
Salina: Killer.
Nikki: I was going to say someone I know runs without music.
Nikki: And I think it is borderline psychopathic.
Nikki: There's something unnatural about that.
Salina: I literally couldn't do that.
Nikki: So what I love about think that.
Salina: That'S the person that you think I.
Nikki: Really thought you were.
Nikki: Yeah.
Nikki: Like on these, like, ten mile runs with no music, I don't go anywhere.
Salina: Without some sort of something.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: Okay.
Salina: And I think that's only child stuff for me.
Nikki: Okay.
Salina: I had no other person, so I needed some music or some background.
Nikki: He's company in the background.
Salina: Just me playing a two person game by myself.
Salina: Hey, that's why we become actors.
Nikki: So spinning.
Salina: So spinning.
Salina: I have never taken a class, so I don't know.
Salina: But I do know, I think, almost all my friends just it's a big, huge difference.
Nikki: I bought an adapter when I was doing triathlons that I could set up my road bike to make it a stationary bike inside.
Nikki: Because climate really is a challenge and biking on the road really is a so.
Nikki: Like in Atlanta, if you can get away to one of the greenways that allows bicycles, it's fine, but otherwise you're racing on the road.
Nikki: And that's the terrifying place to be in Atlanta.
Nikki: So even in the suburbs, it's scary.
Nikki: People don't know how to drive with bikers.
Nikki: And some people, like my husband, hate people who ride their bike on the road.
Nikki: So I had adapted it to a stationary bike.
Salina: Yeah, that makes sense.
Salina: It's a good idea.
Nikki: Wasn't mine.
Nikki: Well, I'm not a millionaire.
Salina: You're not Johnny G.
Salina: So, moving along to the dancing classes and stripper aerobics, I don't know if there's really anything more to say except what a time to be alive.
Salina: This one might be the biggest time capsule of all.
Salina: I'm also going to go ahead and just put all my cards on the table.
Salina: My roommate and I had the Carmen Electra DVDs.
Nikki: Oh, my gosh.
Salina: I actually double checked with her because I couldn't remember.
Salina: Her aunt bought them for her.
Salina: I can confirm through her also that I did do them.
Salina: I literally don't remember now.
Salina: She sent me one of the YouTube video of it.
Salina: And once I saw what Carmen Electra was wearing because there's a routine where she has, like, pigtails, which is like we passed a pigtail point.
Salina: It sort of came back for me a little bit.
Salina: But, yeah.
Nikki: Listener.
Salina: I did it.
Nikki: Dixie Ann probably knows the King of Queens episode where Carrie does a pole dancing class because he thinks it's going to be like this super sexy thing.
Nikki: So he encourages her to do it, and he even gets, like, a VHS for her to try.
Nikki: Turns out it wasn't particularly sexy.
Nikki: And that is what me doing pole dancing would be.
Nikki: A lot of groaning and creaking and falling on the floor.
Salina: I don't know, it's just such a weird thing.
Salina: And it kind of reminds me of, like it's not The Onion where I read this article, but some article that was basically poking fun at these fitness trends that come up.
Salina: And I think they were, like, making fun of free days where you just.
Nikki: Eat whatever you want.
Nikki: Like a cheat day.
Salina: Yeah, like a cheat day.
Nikki: You have to add guilt to it, a sign of morality to it's.
Nikki: Cheating.
Salina: Got it.
Nikki: Now I get it.
Salina: And so where they're like, well, first I ate 17,000 donuts, and then they were like and the next day I went to the cargo shipping class.
Salina: No, it's dock working.
Salina: And it does feel like this sort of works its way into fitness trends.
Salina: And there's just something that, like I don't know, it's really crazy.
Salina: Next on the list is P 90 X.
Salina: These were twelve high intensity workout DVDs created by Tony Horton back in 2003.
Salina: If you're not familiar with Tony Horton, he's also another big personality.
Salina: Apparently, he's an actor as well.
Salina: And he started in acting and then kind of transitioned into more of, like this fitness guru role.
Salina: I did not know that.
Salina: So that was new news to me.
Salina: But each workout is 60 to 90 minutes long.
Salina: I just want to say that's a.
Nikki: Long time and should be it's not high intensity.
Nikki: It is the highest intensity.
Salina: Yeah.
Salina: High intensity, high impact.
Salina: It's supposed to be done six days a week and it's often compared to CrossFit.
Salina: This is another one where I'll have to step in and say that I did this one.
Salina: I did the whole program.
Salina: It's what Casey and I did to get in shape for the wedding.
Salina: It works.
Salina: What I will say is that I just don't know how anybody can do it in perpetuity.
Nikki: It's so hard.
Salina: It does introduce this idea of muscle confusion that's supposed to fight workout boredom.
Salina: I actually thought it was supposed to keep you from hitting like a plateau.
Nikki: Right.
Salina: But I really enjoyed them a lot.
Nikki: Not me.
Nikki: I did not.
Salina: Did I borrow them from you?
Nikki: Maybe I borrowed them from somebody and I tried like two of them and I was like, screw this.
Nikki: It's the highest intensity.
Salina: I loved watching Casey do the yoga ones.
Nikki: It's like military it's military influenced.
Nikki: It's very militant.
Nikki: It's very like the other thing about me in fitness that you should know is I do not like to be yelled at and I do not like to be belittled.
Nikki: Some people really feed off of that and I am not that person.
Nikki: I want someone to tell me like, you are beautiful.
Nikki: Every muscle in your body, every muscle in your body is just growing stronger by the second.
Nikki: And you are going to be alive, beautiful unicorn, by the end of this.
Nikki: I do not need someone telling me, you big fat hump of lard.
Salina: Oh, he didn't do that.
Salina: But there was no body shaming on it.
Salina: But definitely it was like you could do ten more.
Salina: Go ahead and knock out ten more.
Nikki: To me, the undercurrent is almost like you are not enough.
Nikki: And it's going to take two more videos, it's going to take four more days of torture for you to be enough.
Nikki: And I can't do that.
Nikki: I don't like that.
Salina: Well, I can tell you that I reached all into the twelve week program or whatever, and by the end I can assure you that I'm not sure I felt like enough.
Salina: Does that help?
Salina: I don't think so.
Salina: Better help.
Salina: I'm really fine.
Salina: This is just how I exist.
Salina: The Shake Weight, perhaps my favorite across the list.
Salina: If you're unfamiliar, they are literally weights that shake, which is supposed to intensify the work on your muscles.
Salina: But it really is a thing you just have to see to believe.
Nikki: It looks vulgar.
Nikki: Yeah.
Salina: It debuted in 2009 and was actively being made fun of by, well, literally everyone on planet Earth.
Salina: But it becomes a thing on SNL South Park.
Salina: So many others I found like a website that is nothing but memes dedicated to the Shakewaite.
Salina: They say it was unintentional, but these are the most suggestive infomercials that you will ever set your eyes on.
Salina: But the joke is on us because they made $40 million.
Nikki: Okay, that was going to be my question.
Nikki: Did they actually sell any of them?
Nikki: Are there any dedicated jokes?
Nikki: That's what I think.
Nikki: I was wondering if it was 20 million.
Salina: Had to be a joke, right?
Nikki: I never used I just figured out a Christmas present for somebody, though.
Salina: I really hope it's not for me.
Salina: I'm expecting puns of steel in a digital format, so I never used them.
Salina: I did laugh at them.
Nikki: Yes.
Nikki: Longtime laugher, no time user.
Salina: That's right.
Salina: Well, right, this we're just going to work our way into two thousand and ten s and I'm jumping right into CrossFit.
Salina: I am breaking my own rule here because I think it was invented in California.
Salina: It was definitely invented in 2000.
Nikki: That seems right.
Salina: It's not as popular as it was like ten or even five years ago.
Salina: But trust that this form of high intensity interval training was a thing the highest intensity.
Nikki: It was like P 90 X, but in a gym with other people.
Salina: Right.
Salina: I found a 2019 NBC News article that said that at that time, at least, this is pre Pandemic, but 7000 gyms in the US alone were offering it 13,000 worldwide and there were roughly 4 million CrossFitters.
Salina: It definitely had that cult like reputation.
Salina: I mean, it was very Julia in the Designing Women episode.
Salina: And it entered that pantheon of how do you know if someone is doing X?
Salina: Because they won't shut up about it.
Salina: Yeah, sorry.
Salina: But it definitely was they would be.
Nikki: Showing you their blisters at dinner, telling you about the what do they call it, the Murph, how they all completed the Murph earlier today.
Nikki: And you're like, that was the Murph.
Salina: I don't even know what that is.
Nikki: I know what am special workout.
Nikki: Yeah, it's like a special one day a year.
Nikki: And it is in honor of somebody like Sergeant Murphy.
Nikki: Whatever.
Nikki: I don't know.
Nikki: It's in honor of I bought a groupon.
Nikki: So this is the moment in time this happened.
Nikki: I got a group on to the CrossFit gym near me.
Salina: It's everything you need to know about the time frame.
Nikki: About the time frame.
Nikki: Everybody there was friends except me.
Nikki: The random group honor.
Nikki: Well, me and like, two other people.
Nikki: And they had us, like, asterisks on the board as the group honors.
Nikki: So one you already feel like exactly looking for a deal.
Nikki: And then it was h***.
Nikki: I have a friend who was like a dedicated CrossFitter for many years and still, like, to this day, she doesn't CrossFit as much anymore because she has young kids.
Nikki: But really thanks, Nicole.
Nikki: She loves CrossFit and it really resonates with her.
Nikki: And I am all about you.
Nikki: Do you what works for you?
Nikki: I hated every second of my CrossFit experience.
Nikki: There was like a vibe in the gym, low key, bad vibes, didn't love it.
Nikki: They asterisk my name because I wasn't a full member.
Nikki: And yeah, again, I don't like to be yelled at and I don't like my body to show that I work out.
Nikki: So I go back to the blisters on the hands.
Nikki: But people would have bruises on their arms because dangerous.
Nikki: They have poor form and they encourage poor form.
Nikki: So people are dropping these barbells on their body.
Nikki: It was just horrible.
Nikki: I don't like it.
Nikki: But you do.
Salina: You class.
Salina: Yeah, but awesome for you.
Salina: I've never done a class because a lot of times I'll develop my own workout for the day.
Salina: There's a lot of those that you can find on Pinterest and other websites.
Salina: And so I've definitely done as many reps as possible kind of workout before, which I like.
Salina: I'm a workout by myself kind of gal.
Nikki: I do not enjoy group classes.
Nikki: Spin may be the one exception, though.
Nikki: I do much prefer doing my spin workouts on my own too.
Nikki: I just like to be in the basement by myself when no one else is around.
Salina: I'm going to tell you what, this is a really excellent segue into the very next trend, which you have already mentioned.
Salina: So we know that you're dedicated to this particular trend, Peloton.
Salina: That's right, yeah.
Salina: I would argue that this one has or had soared to even higher heights of cult like status than CrossFit.
Salina: These first entered the scene in 2012.
Salina: I don't think I heard about this for at least five more years.
Nikki: I think it was New York exclusive and maybe like a studio in London.
Nikki: It didn't expand, which is how a.
Salina: Lot of these start out, like these little nuggets.
Salina: But I'm also usually behind these kinds of things.
Nikki: What's the other one?
Salina: Oh, no, I don't know.
Nikki: There's like a Peloton competitor, gosh, it's going to kill me.
Nikki: But they were competing studios almost.
Nikki: And then you're going to get into this, I'm sure.
Nikki: But Peloton took off during COVID And this other one, well.
Salina: I don't know.
Salina: I'm going to go exactly on that.
Salina: But I think I'll work my way around it and then I'll give you time to Google because I know it'll drive you crazy.
Nikki: It's just going to kill me.
Salina: So if you don't know Peloton and you'd like to crawl under from that rock right now.
Salina: It's a high tech bike that gives users the ability to take studio style soul Cycle.
Salina: Soul Cycle.
Nikki: Soul Cycle.
Salina: Sorry, no.
Salina: Ability to take studio style cycling classes from home.
Salina: It's also really well known for its deep bench of motivational instructors that Nikki's already talked about.
Salina: Those folks have reached their own kind of celebrity status in some regard and in some cases.
Salina: And then there's this app which provides access to hundreds of workouts on and off the bike.
Salina: They're pricey.
Salina: They're 1995.
Salina: That's $1,995, not $19.95 plus delivery and $39 a month for the subscription for live and on demand classes.
Salina: If you use it, it totally makes sense that in the long run is going to run you way less than a gym membership.
Salina: If it is going to be a clothes hanger, then it is not worth it.
Salina: I thought they'd hit some snags, and a recent CNBC article confirmed that that was the case.
Salina: They went from a market cap of around 50 billion during the Pandemic to issuing a recall on one of their bikes in 2021.
Salina: Then the following year, they reported a 1.2 billion loss in just one quarter.
Salina: How does that compare to 50 billion, though?
Salina: I don't know.
Salina: But they laid off thousands of workers and their CEO stepped down.
Salina: So they've been pivoting.
Salina: I think they're actually trying to put more things like in hotels and so having to pivot away from what was working during the Pandemic, because I think a lot of gym rats were ready to get back in the gym.
Nikki: Yeah, I think Peloton was a victim of its own success.
Nikki: And yeah, I think people just wanted to go back.
Nikki: They are very expensive.
Nikki: I actually started as a digital only user, so I had an off brand bike.
Nikki: I think it wasn't a Schwinn, but it was something similar to a Schwinn schwann Schwann.
Nikki: It was a smart bike, but only smart with that particular user company's, Studio, which was not nearly as good as Peloton.
Nikki: So I wouldn't even use the onboard system.
Nikki: I only would link up with Peloton.
Nikki: I had a whole workaround.
Nikki: I did that for a long time because that bike was $250 versus 2000.
Salina: It's quite a difference.
Nikki: But then Kyle's company ended up Reimbursing.
Nikki: They have a fitness reimbursement they offer the employees or like a wellness reimbursement.
Nikki: So we rent a Peloton because they pay for it.
Salina: And can every company learn from Kyle's?
Nikki: Yeah, so that's how I have one.
Nikki: And every person who does Peloton has a favorite instructor and mine.
Nikki: All this is how I learned this about myself.
Nikki: My personal style, my favorites are the motivational ones who want you to really dig deep.
Nikki: They don't care about body image and all that sort of stuff, although they are beautiful.
Salina: Well, that I've used.
Salina: My friend Alyssa has one and I've used hers.
Salina: That's a hard workout.
Nikki: It can be, really.
Salina: I mean, because you can pick different levels.
Salina: I've also used the app like several times, the different workouts.
Salina: It is impressive, the wide variety of workouts.
Salina: I will just say that for me, I didn't love it.
Salina: I don't love a bike workout, honestly.
Salina: I think it bores me.
Salina: So when I work out, I watch TV, which most people can't do.
Salina: So I realize I'm the weird one, but I'd rather watch something that has me engrossed, because then I don't think about what I'm doing, which I think is the problem for other people.
Salina: But I might be the biggest muscle memory person, so I can literally sit there and not even really realize I'm still working out.
Nikki: So you're not making the mind muscle connection?
Salina: Oh, I do I don't know.
Salina: That's a good point, but I haven't tried a bunch of the different instructors, but I don't think they're ever going to dazzle me into.
Salina: They're just not as interesting to me as watching a plot on a TV show.
Nikki: It does suck that you have to watch just someone in front of you bike the whole time.
Nikki: They have expanded it now where you can use Netflix on it if you just want to ride.
Nikki: For me, I'm not a huge fan of just working out to no end.
Nikki: Like, just sitting there and biking.
Nikki: I mean, I will, I definitely will get on the treadmill while I'm working.
Nikki: And I have a little thing that goes across the treadmill so I can type at the same time just to walk.
Nikki: But biking into nothingness is not going to do it for me.
Nikki: I need a roadmap.
Nikki: I need to know what I'm working toward.
Salina: Yeah, I always thought they should have one.
Salina: I mean, it would be a $15 million machine, but it like immersive get all the way inside of it, and then it would even do, like, weather patterns, and then you could pick different places.
Salina: And I know they what's his name?
Nikki: Tony G wouldn't like that.
Nikki: That's right.
Salina: I know you can have ones where you see it on the screen, like you're riding somewhere different, but I mean all around you where it's almost like one of those 3D roller coasters.
Salina: And so it feels like you're running through Paris or biking through Paris.
Salina: Okay, well, 2020s, really?
Salina: I'm just summing up this part by saying that we are in that period of fitness apps and virtual coaching and online classes.
Salina: We're already talking about it.
Salina: These really picked up in popularity during the pandemic.
Salina: I found a US news and World Report article that framed these as undoubtedly here to say, and I do think that's true to some extent, but I don't think it's quite the game changer that they thought it was going to be three years ago.
Salina: I just don't think any of us knew what the world was going to look like at that time.
Salina: But I do also think that it showed people something that I'm not sure.
Salina: It's almost like what they learned about telework.
Salina: It's what they learned about so many of these things.
Salina: You can do your job from home, you can have an effective workout from home.
Salina: So I do think it is in the list of options, more now than it ever has been before.
Salina: Only time will tell what's next.
Salina: Just so you know, Nikki, I did remove about 200 things from my list so you wouldn't murder me over a two hour extra sugar.
Salina: Is there anything critical, though, that has hit you while we've talked that you don't feel like we've covered?
Salina: We don't have to cover it in depth, but that you just want to mention?
Nikki: No, you gave me a chance to tee off on CrossFit and I got to talk about peloton.
Nikki: So I think I'm good.
Salina: All your dreams are coming true.
Nikki: I'm good.
Salina: So the last thing I want to do is speak to a Vox article I found.
Salina: We'll link to it and it explores why we fall for these fitness fads.
Salina: I've already talked about the fact that we covered this.
Salina: I'm not going in depth here.
Salina: I do want to share a couple of points.
Salina: So there's a fitness historian and professor, and in the article they say that fitness is experienced in this country, mostly as a consumer product.
Salina: So the rules of the markets apply to exercise almost more than the rules of science or health.
Salina: So don't worry, Nikki, it's not just about being skinny, because that's what the world tells us to do.
Salina: It's also about money.
Salina: So I'll translate, as the article puts it, workout companies and fitness studios are competing for our dollars with all sorts of tricks and gimmicks.
Salina: So when we were talking about, like, don't these feel the same?
Salina: They are.
Salina: They're just packaged differently.
Salina: Another thing that is important at this, though, is that people really do get bored.
Salina: In looking at differences over the decades, you kind of saw the number increase each decade we talked about.
Salina: And so I think we are getting bored faster now than we ever were before.
Salina: And the article's final point is something I truly believe, and I think you were talking about this to some extent earlier, but you have to find something that you like or you will not stick to it.
Salina: That is the bottom line.
Salina: So anytime that anyone asks me about workouts, that is the thing I tell them, do not invest in a $2,000 machine unless you go try it first.
Salina: And you really need to be passionate about it, because chances are you're going to leave it behind.
Salina: All right, y'all, if anyone still has their Shake Weight Stymaster or other fun fitness relic, please share it with us.
Salina: That's it for this week's.
Salina: Extra sugar.
Salina: You know the drill.
Salina: DM us, email us, or contact us from the website and find us all over the socials.
Salina: We'll see you next time, y'all.
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