New Britain, CT Health and Fitness

Paul Carson and Jack Banks started teaching fitness classes 30 years ago in a small abandoned dairy. Since those humble beginnings, they built Malibu Fitness—a modern gym where they help people build rippling muscles. Their trained group fitness instructors lead classes in yoga and Pilates, as well as more high-energy Zumba classes that set Latin dance moves to international tunes. Meanwhile, you’ll hop on a stationary bike for the spinning classes, which rely on intense climbs and sprints to elevate heart rates and burn calories. There’s also the option of one-on-one workouts with personal trainers, who can tailor workouts that shed girth, strengthen muscles, and improve athletic performance.

There are a number of nice bonus amenities at Malibu Fitness—it has flat-screen TVs, locker rooms, and a SunDome stand-up tanning booth. And if you’re hungry after a workout, there’s a shake bar that doles out Island Oasis protein shakes. The well-staffed team here even provides child care. And each year around Thanksgiving, the owners sponsor a road race that donates thousands of dollars to charities to offset America's turkey footprint.

Since its 1965 founding in Venice Beach, California, Gold's Gym has dotted the globe with more than 600 locations where professional athletes and exercise newbies gather under the umbrella of personal strength. Nearly 3.5 million Gold's members chart and aim for their fitness peaks, perspiring beneath the gaze of certified personal trainers or pedaling beside peers at cycling sessions. In a diverse lineup of group classes, patrons strengthen cores, finger-paint pictures of ninjas in martial arts, and amp up heart rates along to the pulsating soundtracks of Les Mills routines. Many Gold's Gym locations stockpile futuristic amenities, such as cardio machines with individual iPod docks and televisions that help keep patrons motivated.

My Fit Mommy owner and director Mary Damato is passionate about giving moms a place to get fit while they spend quality time with their kids. A mother of three herself, she saw a need for a laid-back, mom-focused workout space, where moms could interact with other adults while still participating in an intense workout. Each outdoor, boot-camp-style class is led by a certified instructor and focuses on burning calories through circuit training and toning the body using small weights.

Blue Back Dental's pair of presiding dentists, Drs. Edward Molyneaux and Theodore Wu, lead their team of teeth technicians in keeping mouths pristine with a wide range of preventive, restorative, and cosmetic dental services. Treatment options range from simple routine cleanings to restorations of cracked teeth with an onsite ceramic tooth fabricator, and dental aligners, such as Invisalign or Six Month Smiles, can straighten teeth. The dentists keep patients well informed and in control of their own health, ensuring that each patient understands that the fate of their dental well-being may hang on more than a single thread of waxed floss.:m]]

The instructors at Accelerated Fitness Solutions create workouts with a scientific approach to fitness that helps clients achieve dramatic fat loss. The center’s crew of nationally certified trainers challenges bodies through high-impact, results-driven workouts that are available in a group setting or one on one. During a standard session, exercisers can be seen hurling medicine balls into the air, pulling cargo ropes, or gnawing on iron ore to make their own kettlebells. Bolstering the sinew-shaping workouts is the FirstLine Therapy program, a holistic 12-week nutrition plan run by a certified nutritionist and tailored to each student.

The Strike Zone II gives parents a positive place to bring their whole brood for athletic, academic, or musical enrichment under one polymathic roof. While one child raises a joyful tune during music lessons, another can enlist a tutor for help with memorizing multiplication tables or searching the Gettysburg Address for hidden emoticons. For the athletically inclined, Mark Stevens—formerly a coach at the Division I, II, and III collegiate levels—heads up a staff of baseball and softball instructors who help cadets hone hitting, pitching, and fielding prowess during four-packs of lessons. The onsite batting cage lets hitters practice churning out frozen ropes within a safely confined space, and the practice pitching mound offers young hurlers a place to practice building moats for protection against charging batters.