Hula hoop clinic fun and relaxing

A dozen participants unhinged their hips and reconnected with their childhood through an Outdoor Pursuits hula hooping clinic July 22. The clinic used a modern incarnation of the classic children’s toy as a fun and relaxing exercise tool.

Jessica Johanson, a 23-year-old native of Lake Geneva, Wis., ran the clinic. She picked up hooping in October while a senior at the University of Minnesota and brought the activity with her as part of her summer internship at North Idaho College.

“I needed something different to do, something feminine,” Johanson said. “Since the first time I did it, I loved it.”

Now Johanson teaches everyone she meets how to hoop. She said it’s a fun social activity with excellent health benefits. But she emphasizes that modern hoops are a bit different from what many people remember.

“These are different than the regular hoops you can buy in the store,” she said.

Johanson makes her hoops by hand out of 3/4-inch irrigation tubing that’s finished off with a tape wrapping. The heavier plastic tubing and larger size slows the rotation, making it simpler for beginners to learn and easier for experts to do tricks. The tape wrapping adds a bit of decoration and fine tunes the weight.

“I try to give them away, sell them, anything to get people doing it,” she said.

Games with hoops have been enjoyed throughout history, but twirling a hoop around the hips became a widespread fad in the 1950s, entertaining the baby boom generation and spawning national competitions. Since then, hooping has undergone periodic revivals as adults rediscover a touchstone to their past.

That was the case for 22-year-old Rachel White of Bakersfield, Calif., who helped Johanson run the clinic.

“I’ve always enjoyed hooping,” White said. “You get to relive your youth a little bit.”

Almost everyone who stopped to watch the group grabbed a hoop from the pile and gave it a whirl, smiling as they gyrated their hips or spun the rings on an arm or leg. Most of the participants were female, but a couple of guys grooved with the hoop, too.

“It does help if you have hips,” Johanson said, but added that people of all shapes and sizes can learn the motions.

Johanson extolled the calorie-burning benefits of hooping, but she said the primary motivation is the fun of it.

“We had fun when we were kids and it’s just as fun – more fun – now,” she said. “(And) it gets exponentially more fun as you progress and learn more tricks.”