Fitness & Stretching: 80's vs. Now

Jane Fonda, Richard Simmons, Cindy Crawford. Icons of the health and wellness sphere. But this day and age there seems to be a big resurgence of health and wellness. The "wellness aesthetic" or "California and LA style" of wellness, where everyone goes to Pilates wearing matching workout outfits with a green juice in their hands. The more we see this the more we think this is what should be health and wellness and maybe how it's always been. But it wasn't always like this, let's go back and compare fitness and stretching routines and myths from the golden age of the 80's workout routines to what we know in the 2020's.

Forget about target heart rate zones or "intermittent fasting" or hell even doing your weights before your cardio. If it was weird but challenging, then that's what 80's aerobics was all about. Big hair, one-piece singlets or even one-piece bathing suits to workout in, and Cindy Crawford ruled the space. As far as stretching in the 80's, there was little to no science going on at all. The only stretches they were using or knew of were from trainers of Olympic athletes or coaches for sports teams. But this was just information passed down from one coach and trainer to the next year after year. Nothing new or a new way of doing a stretch came from doing this. The 80's was less concerned with science and technique of working out and more about making you sweat till you dropped on the floor. (By the way Tracey Anderson is the new age way of this concept).

I see this all the time in classes with older members in it and even some personal trainers and instructors depending on their age. The technique is horrible when they stretch, they lock out their knees for every leg stretch, any arm stretch is being yanked out of it's shoulder socket, and over stretching is a HUGE issue. "If it burns then keep going." We are just now learning that that is not ok at all for your body and trying to undue literal years of damage and telling people the wrong information. Half of my yoga classes alone are telling members to scrap everything they learned in the 80's and rewire how they think about their stretches.

I'm grateful for the 80's getting people moving and working on their health, it's what spiraled this sort of new age wellness concept we have now. But there are things the 80's got right and they got oh so wrong. Step classes wouldn't be a thing today without the 80's and at home workout VHS (now DVD'S and streaming) wouldn't be a thing without Cindy Crawford. And as far as stretching, it is still a relatively new concept that we haven't quite figured out how to fix from decade to decade. Sometimes I wish we would put as much effort into the aesthetic and lifestyle look towards stretching as we do more intense workouts and how they look and come across. The 2020's can be the golden age of stretching. But hey I'm just a girl dreaming over here.

Thanks to the 80's for providing me with the job I have now of group exercise instructor and showing me the way. Thanks to Jane Fonda, Richard Simmons, and Cindy Crawford for starting a wellness revolution. We are all eternally grateful. Especially the Pilates girls of this new age.