Tag Archives: hula hoop

Hoopnotica’s Hula Workouts Resonate with Men and Women Alike

Jen and Keith Moore never thought they’d be professional hula hoopers.

But when Keith was laid off in 2024, leaving the the Moore’s and their three children to live off $200 a week, a hula hoop changed their life.

hoopnotica

“Keith and I were looking for a lifestyle change. We had always had problems with our weight. We weren’t obese per se, but we emotionally ate and felt mentally obese,” said Jen. When Jen saw advertisements for the Hoopnotica exercise device, she saved up, bought the hoop, and has been addicted ever since.

“Keith thought it was just another exercise fad,” said Jen, “but he finally caught on and was an intuitive hooper.” Through hooping and eating right, the Moores lost a combined 270 pounds. (more…)

Why Five Minutes of Exercise Makes a Big Difference in Your Fitness

According to MayoClinic.com, the number one reason people don’t exercise on a regular basis is lack of time. I hear the same thing from clients.

But lack of time also tops my list of excuses for not exercising that are crap.

Our world is a busy one. I run my own business, so I get it. Yet, have you ever asked yourself how much time you waste on Facebook, reality TV or complaining you don’t have time to exercise? In the time you spent complaining you could have done something!

To start many of my clients off, I give them exercise homework that takes 5 minutes or less. A Cornell University study found that just 5 minutes of exercise per day can result in fitness gains and improve our self image. It can go a long way toward forming the habit of being active and chances are once you get going you’ll want to do more than those 5 minutes. (more…)

This Year’s Most Unorthodox As Seen on TV Weight Loss Gadgets and Gizmos

Oh infomercials, my longtime friend when insomnia strikes, I’m sick and laid out on the couch, or I’m bored out of my mind and have nothing better to do. In three minutes, a pitch man can make me believe I must have that product and my life without it is unimaginable, or that all of the bad things in our culture like laziness, instant gratification, and unrealistic expectations just collided into one awful mess of television advertising.

Fitness and diet infomercials are in their own category of skepticism and hilarity, and part of me actually wants to try the product. Whether it’s car wax or food storage, there seems to be a solution for everything. Diet and fitness isn’t immune and we found some of the newest and crazy As Seen on TV fitness gadgets.

Sauna Pants/ Slimming Sauna Shorts/ The Belly Sauna: While these products have some key differences, their goal and method is largely the same. With the Sauna Pants, just slip on the orange shorts, turn on the heat dial, and your extra water weight is promised to be gone in no time with 50 minutes a day of use. The Slimming Sauna Shorts don’t heat up, but they’re made of thick, non-breathable Neoprene (like what Scuba divers wear), so you’ll definitely compress and sweat in these. And they come with an adjustable Velcro strap! My favorite, however, is The Belly Sauna. It’s just what it sounds like – a sauna for your belly. Bizarre. (more…)

7 Non-Traditional Workouts That Make Exercise Anything but Typical

Working out can really bite sometimes. Am I right? It’s repetitive, boring, and takes forever, or at least it feels like it does. However, tight jeans and a climbing scale bite, too. Is there a remedy? Is there a happy place where working out doesn’t irritate AND you aren’t resigned to a life in your “fat jeans?” It’s possible, if you’re willing to go off the grid a bit and find some activities that might not look like exercise at first. There are plenty of non-traditional fitness routines that might just be where your happy place resides.

View Non-Traditional Workouts Slideshow

Pole dancing, roller derby, and Capoeira are really just the tip of the alternative workout iceberg. There are lots of ways to stay fit without having to just run on a machine that goes nowhere. Active living can be rewritten; it no longer has to stay in the gym. Find your happy place, do something you love, enjoy your workout, and get in those skinny jeans!

Jen Moore Lost 150 Pounds by Hula Hooping

woman trowing hula hoop into the air

Jen used Hoopnotica to lose nearly 150 pounds.

Most of us think of a hula hoop as a retro children’s toy, rather than a tool for serious weight loss, but Jen Moore’s weight loss journey will make you change your mind.

Jen and her husband Keith both used food to cope with a range of emotions, and reached obesity following their marriage in 2001. At her heaviest, Jen weighted 288 pounds, and described her relationship to food as an addiction. “We had tried dieting in the past,” she says. “I was the queen of yo-yo dieting. It just didn’t work.”

Then in September of 2024, Jen began teaching herself hula hooping from Hoopnotica DVDs. The hoop used in this workout is built for adult use, and weights about two pounds. She would take her hoop to open gym at the local Y and practice. “I’d go to the corner of the floor to hoop while the basketball players stared, pointed and laughed,” Jen says, but that didn’t deter her. “It took me ALMOST three weeks (yes I was there every day) just to keep the hoop spinning around my waist, but from day one, I felt a tremendous difference in my core strength, confidence and energy just from the workout involved in dropping, bending over and picking up the hoop.”

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Hula Hoop to Trim Inches From Your Waist and Arms

Lisa Johnson is a fitness blogger at LisaJohnsonFitness.com. She has been teaching Pilates since 1998 and owns Modern Pilates in Brookline, MA. She can frequently be found on Twitter @LisaJohnson.

I love hooping! Yes, the hula hoop, that simple, round, plastic circle, has come a long way from whizzing around your waistline. It’s now a fitness tool to be reckoned with, sculpting abs, of course, but also toning arms and legs.

A good hooping session will burn over seven calories a minute, the same as a boot camp class and, in my opinion, a whole lot more fun!

Don’t think of the hula hoop as a toy for kids. Now hoops come in different sizes and weights and can be used for different training regimens. Heavier hoops are good for a quick workout to tone the abs. The lighter hoops are more fun and are meant to be used for a series of movements both on the body (whizzing around your legs or torso) and off the body (in your hands or on your arms).

Hooping is so much fun you don’t even notice the minutes flying by or the sweat soaking into your t-shirt. It’s great cardio that you can do indoors or out, although outside is more fun because you’ll have more space to move.

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Take Off the Weight With a Hoopnotica Hula-Hooping Class

By Tish Merritt for FitBottomedGirls.com

Hula hooping may seem more like playtime than a workout, but if we know anything, it’s that you’re more likely to stick to a workout when it’s actually, you know, fun! And don’t get it twisted — working out with a hula hoop isn’t a walk (or a swivel) in the park…

I met up with Jackie Hesley, hoop dancer extraordinaire and Hoopnotica instructor, on a beautiful Saturday morning in the Santa Monica, Cali., area and basically got a nice slice of humble pie served to me on a hoop for breakfast. My boyfriend scoffed the hula hoop, stating it wasn’t the kind of workout a guy could get sweat to. Hmph. He came back from running around the park and saw his girl, hula hoopin’ and sweating like I do in his boot-camp classes (he’s a personal trainer and tortures me regularly in class) and his mouth fell open. Score one for the hula hoop.

Don’t get me wrong, the class is totally fun. Jackie plugs up her iPhone to a small speaker system, and we party like it’s 1999.  Plus she’s hilarious and nice to boot. She teaches a hodge podge of folks (men and women), so she’s used to different levels of hula-hoop hossness being in her mix, thankfully. I personally hadn’t hooped since probably kindergarten when my boy crush hula-hooped up to me and said he’d marry me if I could hoop for longer than him. I tried. I really did! But, alas, no love connection. (more…)

Weight Loss Secrets for Swimsuit Season

Summer doesn’t officially start until June 21. But, the weather is starting to warm up, reminding us that it will be swimsuit season soon. Luckily, it’s not too late to lose a little weight before you show off more skin.

No more crash diets, long boring workouts at the gym, or endless fitness class routines. The goal to losing or maintaining weight is to find something that you can stick with and that actually allows you to keep your sanity. Avoid engaging in weekly or monthly diets that you cannot sustain for a long period of time due to the fact that you will probably fall off the bandwagon and eventually be right back where you started.

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Hula Hooping

The Hula Hoop was invented in 1957 by Wham-O. They were first made of wood, grasses, vines, bamboo, plastics, and metals. The name came from a Hawaiian dance called the Hula.hula hoop Ever since then, it has been used for play and exercise. The Hula Hoop can decrease body fat and shed inches due to the fact that you use all the muscles in the midsection to keep the Hula Hoop going. By practicing for 30 minutes a day you can develop a good fat-burning workout. You can also use the Hula Hoop for a nice warm-up or cool-down activity. If you continue this fun activity consistently then you will see results in just a few short weeks.

It’s the perfect way to celebrate the 50th birthday of Hula Hoop.

Can’t keep the hoop on your hips, try the virtual Hula Hoop on the Wii Fit.