Focus on bodypositive: 5 top fitness aerobics trends

President of the Fitness Aerobics Federation of Russia

“Fitness aerobics grew out of fitness clubs. The main part of the adherents of this sport are club card holders who do not consider themselves athletes. But there is another fitness aerobics – with daily training, international competitions, a complex system of judging and sports titles. What is the relationship between these two “wings” of fitness aerobics? And what trends set the vector of development of this spectacular and almost universal sport? Let’s get to the bottom of it.

Interesting facts about fitness aerobics

• According to the data of the Ministry of Sports of the Russian Federation for 2023, more than 1.7 million people are engaged in fitness aerobics in Russia today.
• According to the Fitness Aerobics Federation of Russia, about 20 thousand athletes perform in this form as professionals.
• According to the Ministry of Sports of the Russian Federation, fitness aerobics is the sixth most popular sport in our country and the first among non-Olympic sports.
• More than 5 thousand participants annually gather the Russian Fitness Aerobics Championship.
• The standard number demonstrated by the competitors lasts 1.45 minutes. Athletes perform movements to music at a high pace – 132 beats (step aerobics) and 154 beats per minute (aerobics).
• The athlete’s heart rate during the number reaches up to 180 beats per minute, like running a kilometer distance.

Bodypositive focus

Everyone who comes to a fitness aerobics tournament for the first time pays attention to an unusual, from their point of view, detail: even at the final stages of the competition in the group categories athletes of very different builds can participate. In our sport, unlike rhythmic gymnastics, no points are taken off for excess weight, we do not have body standards fixed by explicit or implicit rules. The main thing is that the athlete moves to the music synchronously with the group, making the movement on each beat easily and artistically.

This approach is not only a tribute to the general trend of humanizing sports, although that is very important. In practical terms, the focus on body-positivity simplifies our task of popularizing fitness aerobics and mass development of children’s and youth sports.

Starting from the school bench

Since last year fitness aerobics has entered schools – in physical education classes and as an additional education. This happened as a result of the efforts of the federation, which developed a school module on fitness aerobics and approved it in the Ministry of Education of Russia. Then this module was successfully tested and today it is already in 356 schools of our country.

Fitness aerobics has several significant advantages over other popular “school” sports. Usually it is difficult for teachers to organize a lesson so that children are practicing at the same time. Sometimes students spend most of the class waiting and watching their classmates perform tasks, such as jumping over the “goat”. While fitness aerobics gives the teacher the opportunity to gather the whole class or even a “parallel” and actively work with all students for the whole lesson.

While performing the exercises, children move in one place without stopping, keeping their heart rate at 110 to 130 beats per minute. This is a great cardiovascular and strength endurance workout. Fitness aerobics does not require expensive equipment and special physical fitness uniforms. And therefore can be considered the most democratic and accessible type, which, incidentally, is suitable for both boys and girls.

More categories – more opportunities

In fitness aerobics new competition categories are appearing. Thus, until now we had five official categories recognized at the international level: aerobics, aerobics five people, step aerobics, hip-hop and hip-hop large group.

This year the federation has developed several more categories and has already started to “test” them at competitions. These are step aerobics duet, step aerobics small group, step aerobics large group, dance aerobics large group, hip-hop duet, hip-hop small group, hip-hop battle and power aerobics (solos, duets and small group).

The purpose of these innovations is to make fitness aerobics even more mass and spectacular. Everything is obvious with the spectacularity – the innovations keep the interest in the sport from the audience. We achieve mass appeal through variation.

For example, if a five-member team breaks up, the new disciplines presented in duets and small groups will keep the remaining team members in competitive sport. Large groups allow coaches to work with everyone who wants to compete, not to select children at the initial stage, to give everyone the opportunity to compete within the festival movement.

Convergence of professional and amateur fitness aerobics

Like any federation, we try to involve in our sport as many citizens as possible and “activate” those who seem to be familiar with fitness aerobics, but do it irregularly. Since this year we have taken a course to get closer to fitness clubs, most of which have fitness aerobics in one form or another. We give their visitors the opportunity to get discharges by participating in official competitions. Managers of aerobics and step aerobics club programs form teams of their charges and prepare them for competitions taking into account the official requirements of federations.

For club card holders, this opportunity becomes a good additional motivation not to quit. It is clear that money prizes at our competitions are not available to them – after all, we are talking about amateurs, not professional athletes. However, if they perform well, they can get official sports titles. Moreover, thanks to the recent changes in the law “On Physical Culture and Sports of the Russian Federation” concerning amateur sports, it is possible to become a “discharger” at any age, including the 35+ category, which coincides with the profile of the main audience of fitness clubs.

Another direction is the launch of children’s fitness aerobics sections in fitness clubs. Many children go to gyms irregularly, the club system allows it. The section helps to involve the child in the competitive process, including official starts organized by the federation. This is an incentive for children to regularly attend training sessions, and for fitness clubs – additional income.

Support for professionals: the appearance of “prize money” and mandatory certification

One of the priorities of the Federation today is the development of the professional sports system, which we adopted in 2022. Its main task is to enable athletes to receive remuneration for winning professional tournaments in order to continue their sports career in adulthood. For example, this year the average prize fund of a major fitness aerobics tournament is 1.8-2 million rubles.

In parallel, we are solving the problem of training and certification of our coaches. It is important that newcomers trying their hand at fitness aerobics get under the wing of real professionals – whether they are coaches of children’s sports sections or leading step aerobics classes in fashionable fitness clubs.