A Workout Day at Power Institute Fitness Club in Toronto

I work out three times a week with an active membership at Goodlife fitness club from Toronto, and the Goodlife location where I usually go for my workouts is just across my job downtown of Toronto. I joined the club last October, and I go there during my lunch hour at work. When I first started going there, I tried out all the available classes, and three of them became my favourites. On other days I prefer to work out by myself, and when I do that, I usually choose to work my abdomen.

Recently I received an invitation to visit the Power Institute fitness club from Toronto, located at 79 St. Nicholas Street in Yorkville area, and to try one of their fitness programs, as well as a beauty treatment. I gladly accepted the invitation, so one afternoon earlier this month I went to Power Institute to meet their team and to have a good workout.

From what I had found out before my appointment there, Power Institute is the first natural fitness studio to specialize in cutting edge fitness trends and technologies featuring Power Plate, which has been one of Europe’s secret weapons for years. Supermodels Claudia Schiffer and Cindy Crawford are long time advocates of Power Plate technology and Karl Lagerfeld himself attributes his ability to wear skinny jeans in his seventies to the workout. It was also applied by the space program, helping to prevent atrophy in astronauts’ muscles.

Personal training is available at Power Institute, so I had a one hour workout with one of the trainers from the studio, at a Power Plate machine. Well, I have to say it was quite a challenging work out, but I enjoyed every second of it. The trainer guided me throughout the entire workout session, and I completed a series of fitness exercises with his help. Each of those exercises were 45 seconds long (and of course, they can be personalized for each trainee), and I felt I challenged myself to my limits. The trainer was helping me complete those exercises correctly and made sure I was doing them to the full potential of the Power Plate machine and of my own body, and in the same time he wouldn’t let me get overwhelmed by the machine and give up half-way during training.

Comparing to the Goodlife fitness club where I go on a regular basis, I realized the workout one can do at Power Institute is much more challenging and rewarding. Of course, I probably could obtain the same results at Goodlife, it just happens that I didn’t personalize my training there at the same level. When I first started going to Goodlife, I expected to have muscle pain (which I also call “muscle fever) after the first few workouts, and I did indeed have that muscle pain. I had it about three times – once after a quite challenging class, called “Body Pump”, and a couple of times after I worked out my abdomen. And after that, my body got used to this working out rhythm and I didn’t have that muscle ache anymore. But this time, when I went to Power Institute and had this personalized workout session, I had quite a strong muscle ache which lasted for about 36 hours. Even though it was painful, I actually figured this is not a bad thing to occur, because it only means you burn a high amount of calories. I remember when I was in school and I would have this muscle ache after some of my sports classes – I hated it! Now I don’t hate it anymore, because I actually understand its usefulness, and more importantly, the effect that it leads to. And anyway, it doesn’t last for long, so I’m back to being myself again in no time, ready for the next workout.

After the Power Plate session, I also had a beauty facial treatment, courtesy of Lissa Hostland, personal trainer and beauty technician from Power Institute. The 30 minutes powered rejuvenation facial treatment was performed on my face with the help with a treatment machine called Ergolift, which works at different depths of the skin thanks to sequential suction. It also stimulates the targeted cells thanks to variable lift pulse speeds. The Ergolift treatment provides multi-dimensional stimulation on the skin’s surface for a visible rejuvenation effect and youthful appearance of the skin. These facial treatments can be done on a regular basis, let’s say once a week or a few times a week; but also they can be done occasionally, before a party or a social event.

I also published a press release about Power Institute here, if you would like to read more information about this fitness studio.

Photo credit: Victoria West