Step-aerobics
The history of step aerobics goes back more than a hundred years if you trace the ideas that eventually gave it form. The basic idea behind aerobic exercise and step aerobics is that these exercises force you to move your large muscles. You can tell that you are doing aerobic exercise if you end up breathing heavily while you’re working out. If you don’t start breathing heavily then you’re not doing aerobic exercise.
Aerobic exercises have always been popular among sports coaches who are trying to get their teams ready for the sports seasons. Generally these exercises entailed things like running up and down stairs (which is similar to some of the moves that became important to step aerobics later) or to doing jumping jacks.
In the late 1960s, about when most of America was starting to discover that there were unfortunate consequences to living a severely sedentary lifestyle, the next part of the history of step aerobics started. In 1968, Dr. Cooper wrote a book about aerobic exercise. While he did not coin the term step aerobics, and in most cases talked about aerobic exerc ise like running, Cooper’s book did move us closer to starting step aerobics as a form of exercise on its own.
This idea helped people understand what type of exercise was necessary later on. One day, Gin Miller, who had injured her knee running, was working on getting her leg strength back up by stepping up and down the stairs to her porch. What she discovered was that not only was this little bit of exercise enough to make her start breathing heavily, but it also did not hurt her injured knee and was easy to start.
Eventually, Miller sold the idea to Reebok, who started to make the Reebok aerobic steppers. At this point, the exercise that we know of now as step aerobics was born. It was a mixture of dance and regular exercise steps that were often set to music so that the people exercising could stay focused on what they were doing.
Ever since then, step aerobics has been an important part of fitness in the world. There have been aerobics videos filmed all over the world, including Europe and Australia. Although there is a stereotype that only middle-aged women do step aerobics, this form of exercise has become popular among all demographics.
Now that you know the history of step aerobics, it’s time to start working out!