Big shoutout to Alanna from our Pompey Bloggers group for mentioning this event a couple of weeks ago. I had not seen anything about the event, and to be honest I still hadn't until I arrived at the venue today to see a few banners and posters. Yay for the group and sharing ideas and events!
The Southsea Fitness Festival was held at Castle Field in Southsea today (Saturday 3rd June). I arrived earlier than planned, I think about 9.30am. At that point the event was quite, however it really picked up at about 11am. It was interesting to see the range of fitness stands and activities of offer throughout the day. Im never too sure what to expect with Castle Field based events, you can fit a lot in that field, its quite deceptive. Im always expecting 5 stands and a little stage and thats it. So it was great to see not just stands around the outside of the field, but also activities going on either in the middle or near to stands.
Walking around you were able to see many healthy and alternative food and drink options. Not all were local, but most had local distribution. I had lunch from the Food Cycle, I peddled my own smoothy and had a veggie burger. Both were good, though unfortunately not good enough to make me think about giving up meat. I have had veggie burgers a few times before and I really need to pay more attention to some things, because one of them was amazing! But I can't remember if it was branded or a local business or anything... dammit! So there are good and great veggie burgers (and I'm sure other foods) out there.
There were a few charity stands with activities. Rowing seemed quite popular there were 2, possibility 3, rowing competitions going on. That along with the other activities I think meant there was a good range of things to look at and try. Additionally you could try tennis, volleyball and football. Not to mention the array of fitness class intro sessions being delivered.
It was nice to see Portsmouth FC there and with the League 2 championship too! These guys and gals had a large dartboard you could kick large tennis balls at (hopefully hitting the bulls eye and not kicking it over the bus) along with a small sided game in the centre of the field. Good community involvement.
Up on the stage there were fitness classes through the day, Sarah, Alanna, Vicky and myself may have joined in with one or two. We also did HotPod Yoga. This was...great... It was so HOT! It was too hot to worry about the fact this would only be my second ever yoga session. While the other people in the group seemed like experts. I was more worried about my hands getting sweaty and not being able to balance. But actually it was really good, I would defiantly recommend giving it a go. I also got to meet Alanna's friend Magdalena after sweating in front of each other for 45 minutes. After a brief chat Magda showed us a yoga pose that made me feel good about my HotPod efforts, because yes I am calling her an expert!
Our Pompey Bloggers group outing also involved meeting Hannah Anderson, Fitness Blogger. It was lovely to sit and chat with Hannah for about 20 minutes to hear how she started blogging and little about some of her current projects. Hopefully we talked Hannah into maybe attending a future Pompey Bloggers meet up.
I gave muscle therapy a go, receiving a 10 minute free session from Compass Muscle Therapy. It reminded me how much I don't like sports massages (hahaha, not meant in a bad way *nearly falls off chair laughing*) and how nice 'normal' massages are. Even after just 10 minutes though my back felt a bit looser and less tight. So its more about the benefit after I guess, haha. I suppose it shows how tense I have been?
It was lovely to walk over the hill at the back of castle field and look back at the event, with the Spinnaker Tower in the background. It really felt like this was a great Portsmouth event (sorry, I did this walk / though at a very non busy time, hahaha).
