Is this method safe and effective? Are you really able to generate quicker results and, more importantly, retain them into the future?
In short, yes. Once you get past all of the marketing hype and sales talk behind the product, a boot camp is merely offering advice which has existed in gyms worldwide for over twenty five years. Simply put, it's nothing new or ground-breaking.
In fact, if you stroll into any gym in your local area you will see countless fitness enthusiasts putting the foundations of a boot camp workout into their regular gym routine. Circuit classes have existed for decades. Likewise, high intensity interval training has been around for years. Both principles are widely adopted by outdoor fitness classes.
So if it's advice which has existed for years already, why are boot camps often billed as miracle weight loss solutions? Quite simply, it all comes down to marketing. By giving something a catchy name and making outrageous claims about the results you can achieve, you'll undoubtedly have something which appeals to a lot of people. This marketing tends to be misleading in a lot of cases, as it's often aimed at individuals who have never exercised before, with promises of instant results.
While the general marketing behind boot camps tend to be quite misleading, the theories the style of training is built upon are actually very solid. Any high intensity interval training workout is going to get your blood pumping and your heart reaching the upper scales of it's ability. This will lead to weight loss and will improve your fitness. If you incorporate resistance training into the routine, which most trainers do, then you will also notice an increase in strength, too.
The only negative about the boot camp gimmick is that it often gives off the impression that you are getting some kind of miracle formula. You're not. The exercises are very basic, often relying on classic body weight moves such as push-ups and pull-ups, and indeed you could perform this by yourself at home or at your local gym without splashing out hundreds of pounds or dollars on a membership to a 'training camp.'
The biggest problem boot camp classes face is customer retention. While some of this comes down to the fact that they often target their marketing efforts at individuals who are looking for a quick fix, who therefore quit quite fast, there is also a problem with people who actually see results. It doesn't take long for an individual who is serious about his or her fitness to realize they could get just as good a workout without paying for a class. This is why boot camps begin hyping up the group atmosphere they offer, trying to get members to work together as a team in a bid to keep them coming in.
Ultimately, boot camps are a mixed bag. While the science behind their HIIT workouts is sound, if you ask a boot camp trainer how to lose weight you're not going to get a miracle answer and the marketing behind the whole gimmick often discredits it's product. While you could certainly get the same physical results by yourself, if you place a huge importance on working out in a group atmosphere then boot camps could be just what you're looking for.
