Les Mills to offer New Zealanders free access to online workouts

Extending an initiative first offered during the Coronavirus lockdown last year, global group exercise leader Les Mills is to offer free access to its ‘On Demand’ online group fitness workouts to New Zealanders.

From 1st March, TVNZ OnDemand will offer five weeks of Les Mills workouts with TVNZ 2 to follow, airing one Les Mills workout every weekday for the same five-week period.

Welcoming the initiative, Exercise Association of New Zealand (ExerciseNZ) Chief Executive, Richard Beddie stated "it’s not just Kiwis who have been enjoying the homegrown success of Les Mills workouts. Les Mills On Demand was recently voted the best at home workout for 2020, by readers of USA Today, beating nine other finalists from around the globe for the top spot.

“This is significant for New Zealand. The government had a clear message during the COVID lockdown last year, which was an appeal for Kiwis to stay active.

“New Zealand is so fortunate to have a world class exercise product that is globally recognised.

“During the pandemic and various lockdowns, it has been key to keeping active at home, in the gym, or in social-distancing outdoor group activities which were extremely popular as it provided careful social connection as well as physical activity.

“One of the three reasons to leave the house during covid lockdown was to stay physically active for those working from home.

“It was so beneficial to helping people to stay mentally and physically healthy. For many Kiwis it was their first taste of moderate intensity physical activity in years.”

A global leader in group fitness, Les Mills offers 20 programmes available in gyms and fitness facilities worldwide.

Its workouts are delivered by 140,000 certified instructors in 21,000 clubs across 100 countries and are available as live, virtual and immersive classes, as well as streaming.

With the pandemic driving a digital and workout boom during 2020, the at-home fitness sector was one of the zeitgeist categories featured in USA Today’s annual "10Best" Reader’s Choice awards.

In June last year, Les Mills On Demand was voted the best at home workout for 2020, by readers of USA Today, beating out nine other 10Best finalists to take top spot in the popular public vote.

Image credit: Les Mills.