Week 3 Do you like sports? Reading 3 Leggi il brano e da un titolo a ciascun paragrafo scegliendo fra questi elencati in ordine sparso. A. PRODUCTS B. CLASSES C. ORIGIN D. CELEBRITIES E. WHAT IS ZUMBA ? Shall we do zumba? 1 Zumba is a dance fitness program you can do in every fashionable gym. Zumba involves dance and aerobic elements: its choreography incorporates hip-hop, salsa, samba, merengue, soca, mambo and martial arts; it can also include squats and lunges. Nowadays about 14 million people take Zumba classes weekly in more than 150 countries! 2 In the 1990s, its founder, Bets Perez, used to teach aerobic classes, but one day he forgot his tape of aerobic music for a class he was teaching. No other teachers had a tape to lend him, so he took one he had in his rucksack with traditional salsa and merengue music and improvised a session with it. People really liked this original fitness training and after an initial success in Colombia, Perez moved to the U.S.A. in 2001 and with two friends, Alberto Perlman and Alberto Aghion, produced a demo tape to promote Zumba through a set of home videos. 3 The trio also created the organization Zumba Fitness to sell its products: they started with DVDs in 2002, a clothing line called Zumba wear in 2007 and two successful videogames in 2010 and 2011. In 2005, the company also launched the Zumba Academy to provide qualified Instructors to teach Zumba classes. 4 Zumba sessions are about one hour long. The exercises include music with fast and slow rhythms, as well as resistance training. The music comes from different dance styles: salsa, flamenco, merengue, hip- hop, tango, mambo, etc. and a typical session burns between 500 and 1000 calories. Zumba offers different options and for this reason it is said to be safe for all ages. For instance, beside the basic Zumba Fitness party class, Zumba Gold mainly targets the older population: it is designed to the needs of the elderly people to help them build strength, improve motion and posture and socialize. With a similar aim but different rhythm and exercise, children between the ages of 4 and 12 can choose Zumbatomic. Zumba Toning is for people who do their workouts with toning sticks, while Aqua Zumba is done in a swimming pool. 5 Due to its success, Zumba Fitness has raised millions of dollars for charitable organizations in recent years, but Zumba s popularity can be explained by its adoption by celebrities. Jennifer Lopez and Kirstie Alley take Zumba classes as part of their workout routines. Other celebrities who are fans of Zumba include Jennifer Love Hewitt, Emma Watson, Halle Berry, Toni Braxton, Shakira and Nicky Hilton. Summing up, Zumba seems to be an original and fun way to get fit and healthy: well done if you already do it, otherwise why not try it? USEFUL WORDS to burn = bruciare; to lend = imprestare; (Adapted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zumba) lunge = scatto in avanti; rhythm = ritmo; session = sessione, allenamento; squat = posizione accovacciata; strength = forza; to target = mirare; toning stick = barra tonificante; workout = allenamento, esercizio. 26