Late-night TV is full of dance-style ab workouts that make exercising more fun. Now, Creighton students can get this for less than the cost of buying one of those DVDs.

For the first time, a zumba class is being offered at Creighton. Zumba is a latin-style aerobics class, combining both dance and aerobics.

Incorporated into zumba is the merengue, salsa, flamenco and reggeatone. It’s taught by Arts & Sciences junior Michaela Cantral, an exercise science major, who brought Zumba to Omaha.

The class is part of Group Fitness at the Kiewit Fitness Center, so there is a fee of $25 per semester. This includes four classes per week – three of them taught by Cantral on Monday, Friday and Saturday – for an hour per day.

“Zumba was designed around the idea that life is a party. Going to work out is a party,” Cantral said. “You don’t want to be thinking about it while you’re doing it. You want to feel like you’re a big group of girls going out to the club on a Friday night. And you’re just going out and dancing, when actually you’re exercising, but you don’t know it.”

Part of dancing is having tunes to put moves to. Cantral said she knows music gets everyone involved and excited about the routine, thus it’s a vital part of zumba class.

Cantral will sometimes put off homework for hours while she and her roommate listen to different kinds of music. She said half the fun of dancing is just listening to the music and embracing in the way it makes you feel.

“I love music. I’m very into how a song makes me feel, like I want to go out and go crazy,” Cantral said. “So I’m going to use it because you get into the music more, and that makes you get into the routine more. The more you’re into the routine, the more calories you’re going to burn. The less you’re going to be thinking about the calories you burn because you love the music and you love the dance. And then it’s just, like, insane.”

Cantral has been dancing since she was four years old and has continued her passion into her college years. She was a Jay’s dancer her freshman year, and is now part of the Creighton Dance Company. She’s taken part in the ballet the “Nutcracker” and “West Side Story” as a part of her dance minor. Dancing from these has led to her zumba class.

Each class focuses on about 10 routines. Cantral puts together the routines from her beginning routine mixes and from the new routines she gets on a monthly basis. What makes this class so fun, Cantral said, is how the students only work on a routine for about five weeks, so they master it, then when it starts getting old, they suddenly get something new thrown at them.

“What keeps people coming back is that it’s not the same thing. It’s not the same music every week,” Cantral said. “I want to keep doing zumba because I love the fact that it’s dancing and I’m still getting a work out.”

For most people, the hardest part is the dancing. People are afraid they aren’t coordinated or choreographed enough, or they simply don’t think they can dance. But that is not the point of zumba.

“No one’s going to be watching you. People are going to be focused on themselves because they want to figure out the routine. And you may look like a nerd doing it,” Cantral said, “But in Kearney, where I’m from, we had 50-year-old women in my class. My mom is 47 and she was doing it. And then there was my sister, who just turned 17, and she was doing it. There are no requirements and there are no limits, which makes it that much better.”

Cantral’s students have noticed that same concept. A person doesn’t have to know how to dance, but rather finds how to follow along and have a good time.

“I always feel like I’ve gotten a good workout, but sometimes I’m just like, ‘I can’t do this. I can’t dance. I don’t know why I’m here,'” second year pharmacy student Katie Nedley said. “But one of the nice things is that even if you can’t dance, you can still do it. I like that it’s a fun way to get cardio exercise.”

Getting a good cardio workout is half the battle, but the main goal is to have fun.

“I have so much fun doing it that I want other people to have fun and completely forget about everything else for an hour,” Cantral said. “When they tell me, ‘Oh my god, that was the most fun I’ve ever had,’ then it’s just like, ‘mission accomplished.'”

Nursing freshman Erica Arkle can attest to that.

“I think it’s a lot of fun and it’s a really good workout. You work hard, but you’re having a good time,” Arkle said.