Celebrity Trainer Autumn Calabrese Talks Country Dance-Inspired Workout, ‘Country Heat’
"Anybody can do it. Anybody can have results from it," Calabrese tells Sounds Like Nashville of Country Heat.
Celebrity trainer Autumn Calabrese, who created the popular 21 Day Fix and 21 Day Fix Extreme workouts, has a new workout coming, and it’s one that Country music fans will go crazy over.
Country Heat, Calabrese’s new cardio, dance fitness workout, combines easy-to-follow moves with today’s top Country hits (as well as fan favorites) for a super fun workout. The program, releasing July 28, includes five dance workouts plus one full-body dance-conditioning workout, a quick-start guide, a 30-day program calendar, Autumn’s patented portion-control containers and nutrition program, plus a bonus line dance.
Calabrese, a Country music fan herself, didn’t think twice when Beachbody CEO, Carl Daikeler, brought the idea for a country dance-inspired fitness program to the table.
“He called me in his office,” Calabrese recalled to Sounds Like Nashville over the phone. “He was like, ‘How do you feel about a country line dancing program?’ I said, ‘I love it, as long as we don’t make it cheesy. I’m a true country fan. We’re not going to make it in a way where it’s mocking it. It has to be good.'”
That’s exactly what they did. Calabrese and her team worked tirelessly developing the program over the course of about eight months. After several different versions, they landed on Country Heat.
The best thing about the program, Calabrese says, is that anyone can do it, no matter their level of fitness, or even if they have “two left feet.”
“This program was really designed to reach the masses, to reach more people,” she explained. “Anybody can do it. Anybody can have results from it. It’s just a great cardio workout. It has really basic steps, and absolutely no equipment necessary. You put your DVD in and you push play.”
She also wanted to create a program that people would look forward to doing.
“I wanted it to be something where you could get up in the morning, and be like, ‘Oh, I get to do that today,’ like, ‘I’m going to go dance,'” she shared. “Yes, you’re working out. You’re going to end up sweaty as can be, and torching calories, and re-sculpting your body.”
While Country Heat won’t be released to the public until late July, some Beachbody fans have already gotten their hands on a trial. The feedback has been great and some people are even getting their kids in on the fun.
“Already in our test groups, we’re seeing people with their kids dancing along, and their kids picking up the moves,” Calabrese told us. “It’s like, ‘If your kids can get it, if your three and four-year-olds can get it, you can definitely get it.’ That’s how easy the footwork is.”
Songs like “Kick the Dust Up,” “Crash and Burn” and “All About Tonight” pop up throughout the workouts and each song was hand-picked by Autumn.
“I just wanted to hear the top charting songs. I wanted it to be songs that people would know, some of the bigger crossover artists. Then I dug back deep into the archives a little bit. I’ve got ‘John Deere Green’ on there, which I absolutely love and the ‘Watermelon Crawl.’ I just wanted to give people who love country music everything that they love, in terms of what they were going to hear on the playlist.”
The program also features a line dance to a new song called “Night Crawl” from Jo Dee Messina, who is actually a Beachbody coach and a big fan of 21 Day Fix. Messina and Calabrese met at Beachbody headquarters in Los Angeles and kept in touch afterward. When the idea for Country Heat came up, Autumn immediately thought of Jo Dee and asked her to take part in it.
“We talked, and I was explaining to her what the program is,” Autumn said of her meeting with Jo Dee in Nashville. “I was explaining to her what my thoughts were for the line dance that I wanted to create. She went, sat down, and wrote, and would send me rough cuts of music.”
The final result can be heard in the 30-day program. Check out a preview of Country Heat below and stay tuned to Sounds Like Nashville for your chance to win a copy!
