Author Archives: Stacey Beaman

About Stacey Beaman

Stacey Beaman is the co-founder and COO of PlyoJam. She is also on the lead choreography team and teaches in Westlake Village, California. You can register for Stacey's classes through the free SweatNow app. You can also email her at stacey@plyojam.com wtih any questions. Her current schedule is: Tuesdays 7pm Saturdays 9am RockIt Dance Studio in Westlake Village

Up Close and Personal with PlyoJam COO Stacey Beaman

PlyoJam Co-Founder and COO Stacey Beaman gets real about taking risks, getting over fear and self doubt, and getting out there and doing things that might feel scary.  In this interview she talks about her own struggle to find a form of fitness that worked for her and how she was afraid to get out on the dance floor for fear of not looking a certain way.  Stacey is a huge advocate of body positivity and self love and wants every woman and man to toss their fears and insecurities away and do what makes them happy.  Stacey feels that far too many people let life pass them by without doing the things they want to do because they are too afraid, or they don’t feel like they meet the “criteria.”  When Stacey first stepped onto the dance floor she was extremely overweight and out of shape.  She had body image issues and felt terrible about herself.  In fact, it took her months to work up the courage to finally step on the dance floor.  However, she fought through those fears and realized it wasn’t worth it to continue punishing herself.  She decided to rise up against her insecurities and fears and her journey has been one of strength, growth and empowerment.  Stacey’s goal is to pass that strength on to others who have been holding themselves back.  No one should feel they don’t deserve happiness.  No one should miss out on the things they want to do because they don’t look a certain way.  No more waiting. The time is NOW. Love your body, be healthy, be strong, be brave.

Watch Stacey talk about her journey HERE!  Watch Stacey teach a meaningful PlyoJam routine HERE!

THE TOP 5 CALORIE-BLASTING WORKOUTS

Let’s cut to the chase: When it comes to exercise, we want the workout that burns the most calories in the shortest amount of time. That’s where PlyoJam comes in!  Click HERE to read Shape’s top picks for calorie blasting including PLYOJAM!!!

Plyometric Movements …PlyoJam’s Secret Ingredient

The tagline for PlyoJam is “dance powered by plyometrics.” However, people often ask us about the word plyometrics. Plyometric movements are the secret ingredient of the PlyoJam formula. Not only do PlyoJam routines contain sexy, sassy fun dance combos, but plyometric movements are peppered throughout the routines to really increase the intensity and calorie burn. What exactly are plyometric movements? Plyometric movements can be categorized as short, fast explosive movements. You can also call it jump training. Historically plyometric movements have been included in the training and conditioning of Olympians and elite athletes. Plyometrics are exercises in which muscles exert maximum force in short intervals of time, with the goal of increasing power (speed-strength).

PlyoJam has about twenty signature plyometric movements that are used throughout various routines. You will see many of the following plyometric movements in a PlyoJam routine: jumping jacks, lateral hops, frog jumps, jump squats, star jumps and 180 jumps to name a few. While plyometric movements are excellent tools for sculpting and toning the body, they can also be very exhausting and take a lot of energy. The beauty of PlyoJam is how these plyometric movements are weaved throughout the routines and feel much less torturous then simply repeating the movements over and over in a stagnant manner. Other workout formats, like boot camps and circuit training classes, will often have stations where the student is required to do one minute of jump squats and then walk to another station and perform another one minute of some type of exercise. This is BRUTAL! Instead, PlyoJam has created this incredible formula where students end up performing just as many plyometric movements as they would in a typical boot camp or circuit training class, but the suffering isn’t there!

How did this idea come about? PlyoJam creator Jason Layden originally spent his days teaching a more traditional follow along dance class. His students loved his class, but they often felt they had to pair the class with something more intense to achieve the calorie burn and intensity level they desired. Many students would voice their wishes for a dance class that maintained the fun, party-like atmosphere, but provided an intensity level that could make students feel like they had really worked hard. Around this time, workouts like P90X and Insanity had taken off, designed around the idea of interval training and plyometric movements. Layden suddenly realized that dance fitness was missing these crucial elements so he started toying with the idea of combining the two. What if he could design and craft routines that maintained the fun, sexy, party-like feel his students loved, but also presented the intensity level they craved? He wanted to figure out a way to make his students train like athletes, but dance like pop stars. As he began choreographing his own routines, he looked for places in the combos where he could build and elevate traditional dance moves into a plyometric movement. He would take a simple side to side tap and build it into a hurdler jump. He would take a grapevine, and button the end with a pencil jump. By weaving these plyometric movements into familiar dance steps, the calorie burn was suddenly increasing and students were working up a major sweat. And thus, PlyoJam was born.

Students did not dread these plyometric movements, but rather embraced and welcomed them as a part of the routines and a way to shred calories and sculpt their bodies more effectively. The addition of plyometric movements to follow along dance routines continues to be an ingenious way to allow students to continue experiencing their love of dance, while achieving the level of workout they desire.

 

Dance Fitness …. Cardio Made Fun!

Ambassador Program - PlyoJam affiliates earn money for referring new members

A note from PlyoJam co-founder Stacey Beaman. I want to take a minute and share my story of how dance fitness, and PlyoJam in particular, revived my level of fitness and helped me stick to a cardio workout that I actually enjoy. But first, let’s go back to a younger Stacey. In my teenage years I was highly involved in sports and never had to think about how I would fit in my exercise. Drills, running and swimming, were just naturally built into my rigorous practice and game schedule and I was fit as a fiddle. I never even thought about “working out.”

In my twenties I became a bit more aware of weight gain and the need to exercise to stay in shape. However, it was pretty easy for me to maintain my fitness level by playing recreational volleyball, and on off days going to the gym and spending hours on elliptical machines and treadmills. At that time I knew nothing about dance fitness. The volleyball was fun, but those cardio machines were a major snooze fest! It was so boring, which of course lead to the frequency of my trips to the gym becoming less and less.

As I made my way into my thirties, I had given up rec volleyball and I could not stomach the thought of going to the gym. It was at that time I took my first cardio dance fitness class and realized that dance fitness might just be the thing that could help me attain a desired level of fitness once again. I needed to get back into shape! But as it does for so many people, life got in the way. Several challenging life events led to forty pounds gained, dance fitness was forgotten, and I was left out of shape and miserable.

Little did I know what was right around the corner. Jason Layden, creator of the PlyoJam format, was a friendly acquaintance of mine. When I attended his birthday party in June 2014 he asked me what I was doing for the summer. I was a school teacher at the time, and I had just been released for summer break. Even more exciting was the fact that I had a sabbatical planned and in the Fall I was going to Europe for five months. I had the whole summer to plan for my trip and work on my fitness. Jason invited me to his dance fitness class and it sparked my memory of the one dance fitness class I had taken years earlier and how much I loved the idea of dancing to stay in shape.

I decided to attend Jason’s dance fitness class, something called PlyoJam, and even though I was terribly out of shape and feeling a bit chagrined over my poor condition, I was hooked! I had no idea how fun a dance fitness class like PlyoJam could be. And PlyoJam was so much more special and amazing than that other dance fitness class I had taken years earlier. I felt like a kid in a candy store and was soon obsessed. I quickly saw that dance fitness could truly be the answer to my cardio needs and weight loss prayers!

I adopted the PlyoJam lifestyle and have never, ever looked back. I knocked off fifty pounds, became highly involved with the brand and the format, and am now COO and co-founder of this dance fitness brand that I adore so much. And I can say from personal experience that dance fitness is truly a way to get in fantastic shape while actually having fun! I have lived and breathed it, and I am thrilled to see dance fitness, and PlyoJam, changing lives as it has changed mine.

 

 

 

ABC 7’s LORI CORBIN TRIES PLYOJAM

ABC 7 Health and Wellness reporter Lori Corbin tries PlyoJam and chats with creator Jason Layden about the amazing health benefits of PlyoJam!  She even jumps in the action and gets her dance on!  To read more and see the clip click HERE

THE 30 MINUTE WORKOUT YOU CAN DO ANYWHERE

PlyoJam as seen in Glamour magazine

“It incorporates plyometric exercises to get your heart rate up and burn serious calories in a short amount of time.” says Los Angeles-based celebrity trainer Jason Layden, who created the routine based on his wildly popular class Plyojam. To read more click HERE