Great Escape: Box to Get Fit at Rec Center

People probably think of one thing when they hear the word “boxing” – fighting.

Yes, it does involve a lot of punches and jabs, but it's also a great form of exercise and a healthy way to blow off steam.

A boxing workout is being offered at the each week – for $5 a class. That’s for residents and non-residents.

Carlos Aprea, assisant director of the recreation center, is the man behind the boxing class.

The boxing class is a bit off the beaten path. Pun intended. Aprea teaches it from 1-3 p.m. Sundays and anyone is welcome to walk in, work out and pay as they go.

Stop at the center and you’ll find Aprea working with people one on one. In the meantime, students are busy in the gymnasium, jumping rope, using a weighted hula hoop, punching and jabbing while ducking under a rope (think “Rocky”), sparring, tossing a medicine ball against the wall, pummeling the speed bag and double-ended bag, and punching the 120-pound heavy bag.

The class works the whole body, enjoy cardio, practice coordination and sweat (really sweat). The class also engages the mind, because boxers have think and concentrate to as they jab and duck jabs. (Don’t worry, Aprea is going to challenge you, but he’s not going to break you.)

Aprea had a handful of students in class last Sunday, sweating a bit before the snow storm hit. He was working with them at various stations, holding the heavy bag while they threw punches at it, and having everyone spar with him for 2-minute rounds. Aprea seemed to have no trouble keeping people engaged, even offering some good-natured taunting and teasing.

“You have to keep it fresh and fun,” he says. If you don't, “people won't go. I try to take the excuse out of not working out."

And this workout, he says, “is engaging all the muscles of the body.”

Ingrid Mueller was enjoying the class. The Mount Clemens resident meditates and does yoga, but wanted more yang to her yin. She said even though she's extroverted in her ways, she says she's also “very inward” with the yoga and meditation and wanted something “very active, and to get my feelings out.”

Rachel Poucher is taking the class with her husband Duane. The New Baltimore couple had taken boxing with Aprea before, and started attending again once it rebooted.

“I wanted an old-school workout,” she said. “Being in the ring is the best cardio ever.”

Poucher likes that Aprea doesn't offer a cookie-cutter workout. She has a bad back and he tailors moves, suggests actions that won't trigger a flare-up. (He should know, since he's a certified trainer.) Plus, she adds, the workout is a great stress reliever.

Mueller had nothing but raves for the boxing workout. “It's by far the most extraordinary workout,” she said. “I can hear my fat sizzling and burning,” she said at the end of class.