Ramadan is a time of reflection and contemplation – but it can also be a great time to reboot your system and get in great shape for the year ahead.
The perfect place to get into shape fast is The Spa and Gym at the Fairmont Dubai, where personal trainer Joao Batista Gonsalves will tailor the exact fitness programme to suit your needs.
Sport360° recently had the chance to try one of Joao’s innovative and revitalising workouts.
Joao starts off with an evaluation to find out exactly where you are at in terms of your well-being and overall fitness.
He then helps you identify your goals and best of all, designs a personal plan for you to reach those goals on a realistic timeline.
Your trainer at the Spa Fairmont Dubai – Joao Batista Gonsalves .
Joao is very clear from the outset that you need to be precise about what exactly your goals are.
My long-term goals were to get fitter, tone and maybe lose some kilos, while my short term was to get more toned.
Quickly and expertly Joao then came up with a workout plan to help me achieve my goals. He then guided and monitored my workout to make sure I got maximum effectiveness out of each exercise.
Joao realises that many people in Dubai have hectic work-life schedules and only have a certain amount of time during the week to workout. He wants to make the maximum use of every second.
I started off with some push ups, then wall squats, TRX row, triceps dips and hammer curls.
Joao (left) after putting Will Smith (centre) through his paces.
Joao then smoothly increased the intensity in complexity of the exercises with a squat and chest press, side plank and row, wall squat and lateral raise bicep curl, skull crush on the ball and jump squats followed by plank.
Throughout he made sure that every second of my workout was fully utilised so in just an hour I produced maximum effort for maximum reward.
The session ended with a quick stretch to finish off.
Afterwards I felt like I had an intense workout, in the minimum time, with all muscle groups worked. I could literally feel the session doing me good and was already looking forward to the next one.
Joao explains that “by designing a work out based on the clients goals, and if the clients goal is to lose weight, I always make sure to utilize fatty acids as a source of energy for the work out and then by also checking what the client ate the whole day. based on training them in a way which will digest all that food so there’s no backlog for the body the next day.”
A treatment or massage in the Fairmont Dubai is the perfect way to end your workout.
“If the client ate a lot of protein and a lot of carbs in order to digest the carbs we’ll make sure the client does a good amount of weight training and so in this way we digest all the food and there’s no chance of it getting stored as fat.”
I ended my workout with the perfect cool down – taking a dip in one of the Fairmont’s stunning pools – just outside the gym.
Another post-workout option is to book in for a Spa treatment such as a Dubai Muscle Melt massage, delivered by highly qualified staff, which will leave you floating on air. Or even a Luxury Caviar Anti-aging Facial for her or a Refinery Facial Deep Cleansing for him.
Joao’s sessions start from AED199 per person for hotel guests, residents and Health Club members.
10 session passes and group rates are also available so book now for your Ramadan transformation.
The Fairmont has two superb pools.
What: Personal Fitness Training with
Where: The Spa and Gym at the Fairmont Dubai
When: Anytime that suits you
