The Fun Side of Fit

The last thing you’d expect to hear when starting a conversation with a devoted health and fitness guru is recommendations for the best local donut shops. “Having lived in California, where there are specialty bake shops in abundance, I have donut standards,” she says. “But the rule in our house is, to get a donut, you have to walk to the store to get it.” Not just any old lump of fried dough will do, though. Only the hand-made confections from old-school specialty makers do the trick, and she’ll choose six different varieties, taking only a single bite to taste each one. As it turns out, this is just one of the quirky habits of Erin Oprea that make her so much fun to be around.

If you haven’t heard of Erin Oprea, chances are you aren’t up on the latest wellness trends, as she is literally everywhere in that arena. Best known for her work with super-fit celebrities like long-time devotees Carrie Underwood and Jennifer Nettles, Oprea has also penned a book, developed an app for following a diet and commands a large and growing audience on social media channels. And those are just her side hustles. The main focus of her career is in personal training, which takes up the bulk of her time. After eight hours of working with 8-11 clients daily, she still manages to record inspiring and humorous clips to share with her curious audience as well as multiple sessions of her online streaming workouts for those not fortunate enough to work with her personally. As she shares the details of her schedule, plans and habits, there is so much enthusiasm in her voice—it’s as if she’s about to jump off the chair. My thoughts keep going back to one question: Where does all that energy come from?

Erin Oprea photographed at the Thompson Hotel in Nashville

Photo by Alaina Mullin

As it turns out, Oprea has always been extremely active. This started when she was a child, escalated into competitive sports throughout her high-school years and continues, unabated, into the present day. In fact, to push herself physically when she was 20, she joined the U.S. Marines and went on to serve two tours in Iraq. What most would consider a grueling pace of activity is one of the backbones of her popular 4x4 programs. “Movement is everything,” she says. “Yes, the specific and targeted workouts for toning and staying fit are important, but the key is to constantly be in motion, or at least as much as possible.” She quickly cites dozens of ways that this can apply to those of us tied to computers or offices, most being simple schedule adjustments that turn into ongoing habits for being mindful of the practice. Her suggestions are to start by simply walking. Taking the stairs, walking to stores and appointments, parking further away from destinations and even stepping in place when doing mindless chores like teeth-brushing or talking on the phone make a difference, she promises. Adding three 30-minute walks to your daily routine—the last being after dinner—is a strategy that she believes leads to continual improvement of physical health and wellbeing.

But she and her glamorous clients like artist Maren Morris didn’t get this fit just from walking around the block. Those incredibly toned bodies benefit from movement but are developed from her constantly changing Tabata workout routines focused on specific muscle training. Compared to many other workout regimes, the approach is actually quite doable and the majority of those who’ve tried it find it enjoyable. The phrase “you can do anything for 20 seconds” definitely applies, as the system is based on doing repetitive exercise circuits in four-minute increments. Each exercise requires targeted action for 20 seconds with 10 seconds of rest. By arranging the sequence this way with a Tabata timer app (there are several to be found on any app via your smart phone), there’s no counting to keep up with and it feels like a bit of a competition with little bells and whistles every few seconds. Participants can also push harder in short bursts, ending in even better results.

It’s those hard-to-miss results that thrust Oprea into the position of well-known celebrity trainer, which was the last thing she expected. Her first client in the music business was Aubrey Sellers, daughter of LeAnne Womack. The country star soon signed up and then began to share with her industry friends, and the rest is history. In a very short time, she was on the map not only in Nashville, but nationally recognized as people grew curious about the incredible physiques of their favorite artists. Underwood is likely the most well-known Oprea devotee, and even wrote the foreword to her book. There are also endorsements from other famous faces including Alan and Denise Jackson and Lauren Alaina, who has completely transformed her body in recent years.

Photo by Alaina Mullin

The exercise program is constantly evolving, although the set-up always revolves around the short bursts of activity. People love the flexibility and Oprea’s endless enthusiasm throughout the process. But the real secret of her 4x4 program stems from the starting point of her personalized programs, nutrition. “No matter how much you exercise, you can’t out-train a bad diet,” she observes. “What you’re putting into your body has everything to do with what it looks like on the outside, and also on your overall health.” This is a lesson she learned the hard way. Like his daughter, Oprea’s father was what most would consider extremely fit. He was constantly active and engaging in all sorts of sports-related challenges, so it was a complete surprise when he died of a sudden heart attack just as he was entering his 50s. The tragic event actually occurred at a going-away cookout for Oprea as she was preparing to leave for her first Iraq assignment. Devastated, she took a few days of emergency leave before deploying and then went on to fully immerse herself in her duties. It wasn’t until she returned to Nashville that she really started looking into more detail on nutrition, studying everything she could get her hands on trying to figure out what went wrong with her dad. His was a classic case of eating anything he wanted for pleasure with no thought to eating for health. Faced with that fact and arming herself with knowledge, she started making personal changes and developing programs and eating habits for overall health and ultimate energy.

The program is simple, very common-sensebased and not complicated or expensive. In her book she outlines four basic changes in eating habits that will work for almost everyone in any lifestyle.

A big part of that lifestyle for many of her clients, including executives, busy parents and touring artists, is travel. When we first started talking about doing a magazine feature along with a 4x4 series on NashvilleEdit.com, we circled around the concept of “Making the World Your Gym” as a focus. Even if most of your travel is just long bouts of time in the car on a daily basis, this seems to be a topic that we all can relate to. She showed me how to do multiple effective Tabata moves in any hotel room (which in our case was a gorgeous suite at The Thompson Hotel in Nashville). She also suggested that instead of planning vacations that just involve lying on the beach, it’s more beneficial to seek out walking cities where you’re constantly on your feet. Yes, more walking! But even more important than getting those steps in every day is planning ahead on how to eat on the go. Oprea practices what she preaches to others, as in many ways she’s constantly in travel mode during her own daily routines. Each morning (if you can call it morning—she rises at 3:30 AM and goes strong until her last client at around 8 PM), she packs up various meals and snacks to load into her car for the day ahead. Staying fueled is paramount with the amount of stamina it takes to get through her schedule and she never comes unprepared. In her book, she shares dozens of easy snacks and meals to consider that fit the nutritional requirements of the program. Some involve quick recipes, and others are simple combinations like apple slices and peanut butter. Overall, I would describe the choices as diverse, easily accessible and nutritious. “If I can do it, anyone can,” she adds. “Being too busy is just an excuse to ourselves, and I don’t do excuses.”

While her bust-a-move approach and diet guidelines are the core factors of her concept and programs, what’s caused the rise in Oprea’s stardom is more than just the obvious success evident on the famous bodies she sculpts. It’s her contagious smile, twinkling eyes and bouncy demeanor that keep online eyes glued to her handles by the thousands. She not only logs on to share new moves and routines, but lets her audience see her other daily practices. She and her husband, Sean—also a trainer as well as a helper with all of the back-end facets of the business—can be seen having fun cooking cauliflower pizzas or even out dancing each week at Whiskey Row, where Oprea indulges in her only alcohol of the week, invariably two tequilas.

She’s warm, personal and transparent. Her online sharing of all of life’s crazy moments is one of the reasons her followers cannot get enough of her. She brings fun and enthusiasm to the practice of staying in shape rather than typical rules or hard-to-process facts. Watching her is almost addictive and it certainly brings more power to the “just do it” mindset. The urge to get up and dance is the best way to describe her impact according to comments from viewers. Nashville is lucky to have such a celebrated talent encouraging us to take better care of ourselves and we can’t wait to see what she comes up with next. And, if that includes walking to get the occasional donut, count us in!

Photo by Alaina Mullin

OPREA’S SECRET WEAPONS

SHOTS OF BEET JUICE

A concoction of 3 parts beet juice to single parts lemon and ginger. Easy to make yourself with a juicer using her online process, but also available at any Juice Bar location. Nothing gives as much energy to your cells!

UP TO 30 EGGS EACH DAY

To get through intensely active days, she has only a few yolks but uses egg whites in various ways to fuel her workouts.

HAVE FUN

Instead of meeting friends for coffee or cocktails, do something active — go dancing, take a hike, play tennis or soccer.

THE BEE’S KNEES

When the skin above the knees seems to be wrinkling with age or skin is loose from weight loss, try microneedling right about the kneecap for instant and lasting toning effect.

4x4 Diet by Erin Oprea