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Karen Neal exercises with Hula Hoops during one of the Punk Fitness Detroit classes last week at The Belmont, a Hamtramck bar.Local spotlight
Offbeat fitness class pumps it up to punk
Access Wellness attracts nontraditional athletes with rock 'n' roll and a sense of attitude.
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FERNDALE -- Sarah Klein disliked the aerobics classes she attended in the past. She also dislikes the singles-club atmosphere of most clubs and the curiosity her bicolored waist-length hair and tattoos invokes.
For Marta Stefaniuk the music at a health club was enough to keep her away. "It's cheesy and irritating. It's painful," said the former professional ballet dancer. Plus, Stefaniuk likes to drink beer while working out -- not a traditional beverage at traditional health clubs.
Enter Punk Fitness Detroit, an alternative exercise class that meets three times a week at Metro Detroit nightclubs. Swearing is encouraged. The playlist features local alternative bands like the Hentchman and classic "punk" favorites like The Clash. Anything goes as far as exercise wear is concerned, though organizer Julie Hecker is strict about proper footwear. There is no choreography and never, ever, is a J-Lo tune played.
After the grueling 90-minute interval training session -- which incorporates Hula-Hoops and more traditional exercise equipment -- beer is readily available.
The brainchild of Hecker, 40, a self-described "old punker," with 22 years of experience as an exercise instructor, Punk Fitness Detroit is capturing a demographic of women -- and a few men -- who either dislike traditional health clubs, or who normally wouldn't exercise at all.
"It's just taken on a different market that would generally not participate in a regular health club setting, just because they may look a little different," said Hecker. "I have artists and photographers and Web people. These are people who would typically never go to a health club, they would be mortified to hear J-Lo and some disco thumping beat."
Punk Fitness Detroit, which Hecker started a little more than a year ago, is the latest offspring of her fitness and personal training company, Access Wellness.
Hecker, a musician's wife and mother of two, said she started Access Wellness seven years ago to create classes and schedule them around her children. She teaches everything from toddler fitness to senior water aerobics mostly through the Ferndale Parks and Recreation Department.
Hecker said she created Punk Fitness to blend her divergent interests. "I always thought I had two lives. ... In the daytime I'm in the health clubs and at night I'm in the nightclubs helping him (her husband) load his gear. It was a great way to fuse these two personalities."
Besides introducing fitness to a new demographic, Punk Fitness is also about the music. "I really wanted to expose them to great music that they really couldn't hear on the radio and local bands because I've always been a pro-Detroiter," said Hecker, who has been following local bands more than 20 years. "If I know a band is going to be playing I try to play them (in class)."
Interconnectivity is important to Hecker. Punk Fitness Detroit, she said, helps bar owners with a ready-made clientele during non-peak times. It helps local bands gain exposure. It helps people who hate gyms work out. And it helps people get over their shyness of dancing, which, Hecker said, energizes nightclub crowds and makes bands perform better.
"If I can get more people dancing in these clubs I will have had true success."
Klein likes Hecker's Punk Fitness approach
"I do work out a lot, but I went to gyms ... and plugged in my iPod and liked to be by myself. I like her class because it's not a traditional aerobics class," said Klein, culture editor of the alternative news weekly Metro Times. "Before that (Punk Fitness), my idea of a traditional aerobics class was an anorexic blonde woman screaming at you."
Stefaniuk, a graphic designer, said she got involved in the class after seeing Hecker's flier at a nightclub. "I'm one of the bad girls in the back (of the class) who will drink a beer during class. It's amazing how toned you can get while drinking beer."
Hecker said her live-and-let-live attitude attracts smokers and others who traditionally don't exercise faithfully. "I figure something is better than nothing," said Hecker.
The class, which costs $5 a session, has a loyal following of about 50 and about 200 participants on any given week.
Christine Snyder is a Metro Detroit freelance writer.
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