The highlight of the year for every fitness instructor and enthusiast in the North of England is the International Fitness Showcase, known as IFS, held in Blackpool. At this event, many of the best exercise instructors (known as "presenters") from the UK and around the world congregate to present the delegates with a feast of classes, whether your interest is aerobics, step, salsa, hip hop, dancing, yoga, pilates, spinning, boxercise, circuits, body conditioning or anything else. There are also lectures held on a variety of subjects, if you feel that seven aerobic classes in one day is more than your body can take. There were 19 sessions in total - seven on the Friday and Saturday and five on the Sunday.

In total I attended four lectures on topics that I wanted to know more about - building up freestyle choreography, how to become a national presenter (watch this space), exercise for the over fifties and exercise in pregnancy. I also attended three Pilates sessions as I am currently studying Pilates at College. The rest of my sessions were filled with Step and Aerobics classes, which are my main passion. In general, I chose to attend sessions presented by international presenters as opposed to those in the UK, as events such as Blackpool are the only way you usually get to see presenters from other countries. (The international presenters are also better looking).

The quality of the classes was in general excellent, although obviously some presenters were better than others. Some of the step presenters did not cue the next move as well as I thought they could have done, which made learning a brand new and technically difficult routine harder than it would otherwise have been. However, I must take this opportunity to praise the two step presenters Roy Avraham and Yoav Avidar who taught their technically demanding routine so beautifully that even I could pick it up. Yoav later presented another Step routine on his own, and that too was a joy. I spoke to Roy Avraham the next day, wished him "Shalom", and I have to say, if I were not a happily married mother of two I would be on the next plane to Israel - he was gorgeous. Instead, I contented myself with his DVD.

Choreography

When you go to an event such as Blackpool, you have two choices regarding the choreography. You can either sit to the side of the class ferociously scribbling down the routine, or you can do the routine and ferociously scribble it down afterwards. Some of the presenters were kind enough to provide free choreography handouts with their classes, or direct you to their websites. Others direct you to their stalls where their DVDs are available for purchase.

I decided to do as many classes as possible, and just see what I could remember. After all, I personally don't want to copy choreography step by step - I'm just looking for new ideas to integrate into my own choreography. Incidentally, we saw a couple of girls with a camcorder - one was filming and one was performing the routine she had just learnt. I think this was a great idea - although if you want to do the same, you must remember that camcorders and cameras are forbidden in the studios whilst the routines are being taught. You should bear in mind, however, that a lot of the choreography displayed is too complex for the average aerobics or step class, and you should think of your classes needs rather than confuse your participants with too much choreography too quickly.

Music

Mostly, the music played by the presenters was great. However, now and again some of the presenters suffered the nightmare of all aerobics instructors - music that continually skips. For a mere mortal like me it was reassuring to see that even with the finest of professional equipment, music skipping can still be a problem. Whether the equipment itself had inadequate error correction, or the instructors were using faulty or scratched cd's, who knows. I would like to suggest at this point a back up tape. Tapes don't skip, they just wrap themselves around the tape heads from time to time.

Memories

Here are a few of my personal memories of Blackpool:

• Being amazed at the number of people at a fitness convention who were smoking. It just goes to show what an addictive habit it is.
• Wandering around Blackpool in the rain looking for a karaoke bar.
• Wandering around Blackpool in the rain wearing shorts, and have people look at me as if I were weird (which I am).
• Eating lots of free fruit and nut bars.
• Refusing to pay £1.50 for a can of drink containing taurine and "expensive" B vitamins.

In Summary

I enjoyed Blackpool very much. The IFS was generally well organised and I had a lovely time. I will most likely go there again next year.

Useful Links

• Blackpool Tourist Board
• Chrysalis Promotions