Bootcamp training for beginners in SE16

Bootcamp training is a good place for a beginner to start, and in SE16 it is often an easier place to start than a gym. Sessions are coached from beginning to end, every exercise has a gentler version, and nobody is keeping score. If you have not trained in years, this is the sort of thing you can start without months of preparation.

Most people who join Bootcamp SE16 at Stave Hill Ecological Park arrive with the same worry. They picture shouting, press-ups in the mud and being the slowest person there. What they find instead is a mixed group of neighbours from Canada Water, Surrey Quays and Rotherhithe, working through the same hour at very different levels.

What beginner friendly actually means here

It is an easy phrase to put on a website, so here is what it looks like on the grass.

• The coach asks about injuries and sore spots before you start, and remembers them the following week.
• Every movement is shown two or three ways. A press-up on the ground, on a bench, or standing against a tree. You choose, or the coach chooses for you.
• Weights are picked for you at first. Nobody hands a beginner the heaviest kettlebell to see what happens.
• There is no fitness test, no weigh-in, and no standing up to introduce yourself.
• You can stop, drink water and rejoin at any point without anyone commenting.

Why training outdoors suits nervous starters

Gyms are full of mirrors, machines you have to work out how to adjust, and people who look like they have been there for years. Stave Hill has none of that. You are on grass and woodland paths between Canada Water and Rotherhithe, in the open air, and the only equipment is whatever the coach puts in front of you.

The ground does some of the coaching too. Uneven turf, a hill and a flight of steps ask your ankles, hips and trunk to stabilise in a way a flat gym floor never does. You tend to notice it in the things beginners actually care about: the stairs at Canada Water station, carrying shopping home from Surrey Quays, getting up off the floor without using your hands.

Your first month, roughly

Week one is mostly about getting into the routine and learning where things are. You will be sore, and you will probably move slower than you expected. That is ordinary, and it settles.

By week three or four most people notice something small. They finish the warm-up jog without dropping off the back, or they hold a plank for the whole round, or they stop dreading the hill. The change is rarely dramatic. It is a run of small things that stack up, which is exactly why it tends to last.

Aim to be a little better than you were last month, and still be there in a year.

What to bring

Trainers, clothes you do not mind getting muddy, and a bottle of water. Layers if it is cold, and gloves are worth having for ground work in winter. All the kit, meaning kettlebells, bands, mats and tyres, is carried into the park and carried out again, so there is nothing to buy before your first session.

Sessions run mornings, evenings and weekends, and that is deliberate. Beginners fall away when training does not fit the shape of their day, so the timetable is built around the school run and the commute rather than against it. Once you join, sessions are from £9. Most people start with the Trial Experience so they can try more than one time slot before committing to anything.

If you live in Canada Water, Rotherhithe, Surrey Quays or Bermondsey and you have been putting this off, the first session is the hard part. Everything after it is easier than you are imagining.