Gazette

Loretta Milo led a Nia class Aug. 15 at the YMCA on Nevada Avenue. Students range in age and level in a system modeled after the colored belts in some martial arts training.

Nonimpact aerobics

Workout combines dance, healing arts, martial arts

September 01, 2008 12:14 AM

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By ALEXIS FITTS

THE GAZETTE

They call it Nia, or nonimpact aerobics, but don't let the name fool you; its practitioners get quite a workout.

On a recent Sunday morning at the Briargate YMCA, a handful of students drop into a "sumo stance." Crouched on tiptoe, they exhale noisily as their bodies sink.

Kim Nelson, in an oversize T-shirt, her French-braided bun littered with pastel butterfly clips, drops her head back and grins as her arms hit the ground. She is jubilant.

Nia, practiced barefoot and to music, delivers cardiovascular and whole-body conditioning by combining healing arts, dance arts and martial arts. The result, practitioners say, is a fun exercise class that allows everyone to reap benefits.

It was started about 25 years ago by a Portland couple looking to combat the "no-pain, no-gain" mentality of 1980s exercise classes. Nia is not as well-known as other '80s fitness trends such as bikram yoga or Jazzercise, but it has developed a passionate group of followers.

"Nia" is a Swahili word meaning "with purpose." It's a suitable name for this workout, since Nia challenges students to examine the purpose behind their motions.

After an accident left her homebound and out of shape, Nelson was looking to make some "life changes." But weighing in at almost 300 pounds, she had trouble finding a itness routine she could take part in, let alone stick to.

She wandered into a Nia class, but was concerned when teacher Loretta Milo told her the class involved floor work. At her weight, Nelson was unable to get up from the floor.

"I told her, ‘I won't waste your time, I'm on my way,' and (Loretta) just stopped me and said, "‘No way, you're not leaving now,'" Nelson said.

Now, three years later and 80 pounds lighter, she's a Nia devotee.

"I've got my balance back; my ankles are stronger than they have ever been in my entire life," Nelson said. "I had to gradually get to where I can go up on my tiptoes."

Because Nia operates in levels - white, blue, brown and black belt, fashioned after martial arts training - where students work to their own personal intensity, grandmothers and workout fiends can take the same class with comfort. Students laud Nia for the supportive atmosphere that the level system creates.

"I've personally never been in a Nia class and seen any negativity or any anger," said Mel Stahl, a Nia white belt. "That's just not what Nia's about and you can tell that in the class."

When Stahl came to Nia she was a busy executive looking to lose some of her pregnancy weight. But what she found in Nia was transformative. In her first class, her shoulders dropped, her chest loosened. For the first time in years, she slowed down.

Two classes later, she plunked down the $1,500 to go to her whitebelt intensive course. "I thought I was crazy," she recalls.

Before she brought Nia to the Springs, Milo was just another overworked businesswoman looking for a fitness routine. She'd tried the usuals, including pilates and yoga, and even a Latin dance-fusion class called zumba.

"I needed something for my spirit, something that I couldn't wait to show up for," Milo said. "That just wasn't yoga."

After reading a blurb advertising a Nia class, she drove to Boulder to check it out.

One class later she was hooked, driving the threehour round trip several times a week for her Nia fix.

One year later, she took her white belt intensive to gain teacher certification, and brought Nia down south.

To get the Nia name out, Milo didn't accept pay during her first year of teaching. She offered free "new to Nia classes" at the downtown YMCA, manned booths at women's conferences, and started remembering all of her students' names.

Five years later Nia is thriving in the Springs. There are eight Nia teachers working under Milo's springsNia umbrella and about 400 students.

Part of what makes Nia unique is its emphasis on working with your body, rather than against it, says Milo, now a black belt. Students aren't used to not hurting in an exercise class.

"You will never hear a Nia teacher say ‘no pain no gain,'" Milo said. "We say, ‘If it hurts, stop.'"

But students say the joy of Nia comes from the motions. It's just fun.

"I don't like the idea of exercising just to be exercising," said Jack Miller, a Nia white belt.

"In Nia we're dancing we're having fun, we're doing yoga, we're just doing all different forms. It's kind of like playtime for adults."