Fitness and music gets the toes tapping

Charlie Helliwell has started a Fit Club in Tauranga.

An international health and fitness craze has hit Tauranga.

Fit Club - Bay of Plenty has started classes at its Cliff Rd site on Mondays. They are free for anyone to attend.

Head coach Charlie Helliwell, who has a degree in dance, leads participants in fun dance moves for 45 minutes, which people can either choose to follow or move the way they want to, then gives them advice about nutrition.

"It's not a dance class like learning steps or anything," she said.

"People can come along, music is playing, they can come and do the moves I give them or do the moves they make themselves. It's a safe space where people can get some fitness with a community of people."

Miss Helliwell learned about Fit Club when she was living in Melbourne and felt there was a big need in Tauranga for something similar.

Charlie Helliwell has started up Fit Club, a free dance and nutrition class to get people fit and healthy. Photo/George Novak

She said a talk about nutrition was a key part of Fit Club as fitness was 20 per cent exercise, 80 per cent nutrition and 100 per cent mindset.

Three classes have run so far and at the last, 27 people attended. The next class is tonight.

Miss Helliwell said people of all ages had attended including elderly women, men and mums with daughters.

"People come along and have a go and realise they don't have to be a prima ballerina."

Nutritional smoothies are offered after the classes for $5 each, but those are not compulsory.

Other keen people have met Miss Helliwell and were looking to expand the clubs to other parts of Tauranga and were also looking at other forms of exercise they could include.

Fit Clubs had taken off worldwide, originally starting in the United States, Miss Helliwell said.

At an American event, Miss Helliwell said colleagues had attended a beach session with 300 people.

- For more information, call Charlie on 0204 036 7752.