Get Active with AARP Colorado Virtual Fitness Classes

When the pandemic hit, Stephanie Two Eagles felt the need to be more physically active. So she began taking virtual yoga classes, offered by AARP Colorado, in the den of her Denver home.

Two Eagles’ daughter—who had experienced a series of traumas—lived with her at the time and would join in. The 71-year-old, who often felt lost and unsure of how to help her daughter, recalls how important the yoga sessions became for the two women.

“She would come in the room and set out a mat, and we would giggle,” Two Eagles says. “It was the one hour a week we could let everything go and be together.”

Both mother and daughter are doing well now, and Two Eagles continues to join online yoga every Friday. It’s one of the online fitness classes AARP Colorado began offering during the pandemic that continues to remain popular. To help meet demand, the organization has created a Healthy Living Hub, where recorded sessions are available for viewing.

The hub is part of a broader effort by AARP to help empower Coloradans 50 and over to stay healthy and live well as they age. AARP has also created a private Facebook group where people can discuss healthy living efforts and share tips. Participants in AARP’s fitness classes are invited to join the group.

Allison Snyder, AARP Colorado senior program specialist, provides a weekly challenge to the online community to help motivate people—from encouraging them to drink more water to getting them to try a new class.

The aging process can feel chaotic, especially when new health challenges present themselves, Snyder says.

“AARP Colorado is offering healthy living programming because when you take the time to work on healthy habits, you gain some of that control back,” she says.

Snyder adds that hundreds of people—from Colorado and around the country—sign up for the classes.

Low-impact options

The fitness classes cater to all ability levels, with no prior experience necessary. Instructors demonstrate how to modify exercises to meet different physical needs and explain how movements relate to everyday activities, such as getting in and out of cars.

The hour-long classes are free, but registration is required. The courses include:

• Functional Fitness: Works the entire body to enhance the basic movements of daily life, including push, pull, squat, hinge, lunge, rotation and motion.
• Barre Fusion: Incorporates ballet, Pilates, yoga and strength training to improve balance and flexibility. The workout is high-intensity but low-impact.
• Low-Impact Kickboxing: Combines martial arts, strength training and brain-boosting exercises.
• Mobility/Restorative Exercise: Increases range of motion, relieves tight muscles and helps prevent injury.
• Low-Impact Cardio/Strength Building: Increases strength and helps improve balance.
• Hatha Yoga: Improves balance, flexibility, stability and muscle tone, using gentle poses.

Terri Potente, who is 80 and lives in Fruita, regularly joins three virtual AARP classes each week and also visits a yoga studio twice a week.

“I’ve been active my whole life, and just because I’m aging—I hate that word—I don’t see any reason why I shouldn’t still be active,” Potente says.

She helped recruit some of her local community center’s certified instructors, including Shauni Hawkins, to lead AARP classes. Potente notes that Hawkins introduces new things, so there’s always a challenge.

“It’s not the same old, same old every week,” Potente says.

Hawkins guides the Barre Fusion and low-impact cardio/strength classes, which often include as many as 400 participants from across the nation.

“I try to encourage people to remember you have one body,” Hawkins says. “A good way to honor our body is through fitness—not treating fitness like a punishment [but] treating it as a gift.”

Most of the online classes will be on hiatus in the summer months, but recorded sessions are available on the health hub website until live classes resume. To register for one, go to that site and select “Sign up for a class.”

AARP Colorado also plans to hold community fitness activities, such as cycling or walking events, during the summer.

In addition, AARP Colorado hosts monthly cooking webinars with registered dietician nutritionists from Colorado State University’s Kendall Reagan Nutrition Center. The culinary sessions can also be viewed on the health hub website.

For more information about AARP activities, go to aarp.org/COevents. ■

Cynthia Pasquale is a freelance writer and a former editor at The Denver Post. She has written for the Bulletin since 2011.

Also of interest:

• AARP Staying Fit
• AARP's Guide to Pickleball
• 10 Exercises to Do Today for a Healthier, Happier Tomorrow