Studio: River North CrossFit, 330 W . Ontario

Class Focus: SkinnyFit offers all of the high intensity interval training of CrossFit, without the Olympic lifts. It tones and gets your heart rate way up all at the same.

Cost per class: $30

Money saving offers:

• $250.00 for 10 Punches ($25/class)
• $375.00 for 15 Punches ($25/class)
• $500.00 for 25 Punches ($20/class)

The Fab Fit take:

I’ve been wanting to try SkinnyFit at River North CrossFit since I saw the workout listed. The class title sells me exactly what I want from a workout – skinny AND fit. All I can say is give me more.

Regardless of the fact that this workout appeals to more of River North CrossFit‘s female base, You will not be gingerly plieing and pulsing. You will be going as hard as possible for the entire hour and, in my case spitting, swearing and sweating, a super lady-like combination.

Katie the owner of River North CrossFit led my workout and it was non-stop. (Sidenote: click on Katie’s name to see what CrossFit does, aka Katie’s 12-pack abs). After a 500 meter row, we jumped into our workout which was outlined on the whiteboard like every CrossFit WOD.

What that white board is laying out is the two circuits that we completed: one circuit to warm up and one circuit that toned the body and spiked the heart rate.

To start us off, we went through the first circuit three time, doing 10 burpees, 15 squats and 20 mountain climbers. CrossFit squats are lower and wider than what you’re probably used to doing, and I always find myself getting corrected during that exercise.

At this point, I was out of breath, but we’d barely scratched the workout’s surface. We had one more, much harder circuit to do ten rounds of: we started with burpee broad jumps down the wooden runway in the center of the gym (see image below) followed by walking lunges down the distance of the same wooden runway. After that we did 10 pull-ups.

(Image courtesy of River North CrossFit)

I can do all of 2 pull-ups unassisted (hey, I’m working on it) so that total of 100 sounds impossible, but all pull-ups can be assisted with the use of a resistance band (read: if I can do it, you can do it too). Placing one foot through the resistance band after looping it around the pull-up bar, I was able to get through all 100.

The thing that I always have to remember when doing high intensity interval training is that it always looks easier on paper than it actually is. Getting through 10 rounds of that workout took a lot physical exertion and a lot of willpower, but once complete it you can say, “Holy s&*T that was hard, but I did it.”

I loved this workout. It was a challenge, but the time flew by and it left me energized for my day. I’m going to throw this into my weekly rotation and name it one of my new favorite workouts in Chicago.

Tips:

• SkinnyFit is held Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 8:30 AM and Thursday at 6 AM
• You don’t have to take any additional training to do SkinnyFit at River North, so don’t worry about Olympic lifts.

Date/time taken: 3/7/13