Is Zumba Fitness Effective?

Many people have been curious about the latest fitness craze—Zumba. Whether it’s effective or not, let’s find out.

Short history of Zumba fitness

Zumba was said to have started as a mistake. Its founder, Alberto “Beto” Perez, a Columbian trainer had one day—the year was mid-‘90s—forgot to bring his aerobics cassette tape to his group exercise class. Scrounging and flipping every part of his car to look for it, he, instead, stumbled upon a Latin dance music cassette tape. As Rumba and Merengue music dominated the room, he danced his heart through it; unleashing his expertise in Latin dancing. It quickly became a hit as he introduced a fun series of dance steps and moves to the group exercise class he was handling. Sooner than he expected, it became the popular class in his own gym—Zumbacize was born out of a simple mistake. Perez moved to Miami in 1992 and brought with him Zumbacize. It also became a hit. As things go smoothly, entrepreneurs helped Beto Perez to market his dance step and re-brand the same. Now, it has been available as a fitness franchise all over the world, and is now known as Zumba fitness.

Now, let’s go over reviewing Zumba fitness’ effectiveness when it comes to weight loss. We don’t want to get hyped for the wrong reasons, do we?

Truth be told, there have yet been so little documentation evidencing its effectiveness to weight loss. This has been by the American Council on Exercise by commissioning Dr. Porcari and Mary Luettgen, M.S., researchers from the University’s Department of Exercise and Sport Science, to determine its effectiveness through valid data gathered.

Result of the conduct research and study

The study was conducted with the help of 19 female recruits between the ages of18 to 22, who have participated in Zumba classes. Each was made to perform a maximal treadmill test which measures heart rate and oxygen consumption. This was conducted to aid the researchers in getting the linear regression equations. Each of these recruits were then made to perform Zumba exercises with a heart rate monitor, conducted by only one instructor all though out the entire class which lasted between 32 to 55 minutes per session depending on the day it was performed.

Ready for the results?

After conducting the study, results show that participating in a single Zumba fitness class can burn an average of not less than 369 calories. That’s about 9.5 kilo calorie per minute. And how many minutes does it take to burn these much calories? It only takes 32 to 55 minutes depending on your day of workout.

Amazing isn’t it?

Perhaps by now you understand why Zumba fitness becomes a craze. Apart from the enticing yet lively music, you don’t feel the pressure of really losing weight because you are having fun dancing all the way. It’s definitely a win!

For those who don’t want to enroll in a gym-based Zumba fitness class, there are already a number of Zumba fitness videos you can easily download from the internet. You can try it out at home first and think of getting fitness to another level later.