BARRY’S BOOTCAMP

Legend has it that you can burn 1,000 calories doing a £23 class at Barry’s bootcamp, which has outlets in both London and Manchester. A modern take on circuit training, it’s a high-intensity workout using several pieces of gym equipment to thumping rock music. ellie goulding (left) and Jools Oliver are big Barry’s fans.

THE WORKOUT: Today I’m doing a live 30-minute class via Barry’s Instagram account (instagram.com/ barrysuk)with emma. emma is young and so slim that her waist must measure about the same as my upper arm. She tells me that I will need water and a mat. I’ve got a feeling I might be needing oxygen as well. We start off doing squats. The basic ones I can do, but the more challenging ones, on raised toes, I can’t manage. Then we drop on all-fours to perform different types of planks. I can barely manage a regular one, so you can forget the high planks, the rotating planks and the one-armed planks that emma is performing.

My monitor tells me that 428 of us are taking the class and I wonder if any of the others are quite as old and unfit as I am. But there’s no time to dwell as I lie on my back doing the bicycle and reverse crunches. Participants can post messages but how do they have the energy?

I notice ones from ‘Anya’ popping up every few seconds about how much she is ‘loving the burn’. Anya is someone you’d never want to be next to in a class. ‘We’re holding, we’re pulsing,’ shouts emma as we squat.

With five minutes to go I feel drained: I can’t imagine how I’d ever handle a 60-minute class. emma has us working on our glute muscles with a series of lunges before finishing with some energetic burpees.

‘You’re on fire!’ shouts emma. I am. But I doubt she’s referring to my menopausal overheating.

At the end of the class there are 395 left, including me — lying in a pool of my own sweat unable to muster the energy to get back up again.

VERDICT: Hardcore and intense. Perhaps best left to those who are already as fit as the average Olympic athlete.