Beacon and Allura came into the Claw Coliseum as part of the "weight loss" classes that came in after Thanksgiving feeling a little bit bloated and embarrassed. Much of it coming from the fact that they had really gorged at the Thanksgiving feast and in ways that they had experience with the prior year. That year, it had been more experimentation and seeing what they could do, but they'd also agreed to not do that again. And yet, after tasting all the good foods that were made and brought to the feast, they just couldn't help themselves, and it left them with rather distended stomachs. It was even more embarrassing when one considered that their children DIDN'T engage in it, which presently had them with their grandparents.
"At least we can work all this off fairly easily," Allura sighed to Beacon, "we've done it before."
"Yes," Beacon agreed and looked at her swollen stomach, "but I'd hoped we'd remember not to indulge so much... why did it have to be so good?"
"Probably good cooking," Allura answered, thinking back on how good the food tasted, even the meat that wasn't fish.
It wasn't long before they were able to get changed into fairly comfortable gear, and the same gear they'd had to wear for a time after last year's Thanksgiving, and then made their way to one of the open exercise rooms. It was open and had no weights or related equipment in it, which was something that played both into the program and the differences between various forms of exercise. Things like weightlifting, while it could build muscle and did take some energy, it didn't necessarily burn a lot of calories to perform those basic repetitions of the specific lift. Things like running and jumping that kept the body in a near constant state motion did more in that regard, and much of the post-Thanksgiving "weight loss classes" focused on the latter.
Most of those present were Human, and that often made sense. Animalians had generally seemed to have such a high metabolism that they didn't necessarily have to worry about losing weight all that much and often didn't put on weight. Some of that happened with females with pregnancy, but it wasn't common for Animalians to put on weight as their metabolism really wouldn't allow for it. Humans, however, seemed to have a lower metabolism and often took more effort to burn calories, and that was just assuming there wasn't some other problem. Thus, when the Claw Coliseum was built, while it served as a workout center for Animalians to work out in a way that wouldn't leave them out in the heat in summer or cold in winter. It could allow them to also push their limits as much as possible, but it also provided similar facilities for Lyre's Human population and many of them often came for aerobics, yoga, and other related things as well.
There were two Animalians there, and who both Beacon and Allura recognized. One was an Eel Animalian with a wide and long head that fit a truly massive mouth and the other was a more modest sized Fish Animalian with a distended stomach that was on par with Beacon and Allura's swollen guts. In fact, both Gulf and Wally were in much the same condition after the Thanksgiving feast, possibly because they weren't as familiar on what all went in with Thanksgiving, yet. Beacon noticed that both of them looked a bit embarrassed as shi and Allura approached.
"Hey, guys, you're both here for the weight loss workouts too?" Beacon offered as they approached and gathered the attention of the Gulper Eel and Black Swallower Fish Animalians to turn toward them.
"Yes," Gulf nodded, "and a bit embarrassed..."
"Don't be, old instincts can be hard to let go," Allura commented.
"And things like Thanksgiving can provide things that lead to all sorts of new instincts that lead to indulging in food," Beacon added, "the food was soooooo good. It's left Allura and I a bit bloated to."
"But thankfully a good metabolism and some exercise will help trim things down fairly quickly," Allura added.
Gulf and Wally both nodded with some agreement to that. Gulf had already learned a bit about things that related to Animalian metabolism being higher than Humans. For him, the embarrassment was more at letting many old instincts come into play, though he was also privately thankful that while he'd eaten a lot, it hadn't all been gulped down without chewing.
"Normally," Wally commented, "all that would be needed to rest and relax after a good meal..."
"Yes, but normally that would mean waiting a few days before eating again," Allura commented, "as Animalians, we don't have deal with that."
Wally nodded, "Yeah... though, I have to agree with your mate. They came up with way too many delicious foods. It was all so good that I couldn't help myself."
"Thanksgiving tends to have that effect," Beacon commented, "things will be alright. And these workouts can be helpful... and to a degree, there's always the energy for them."
"Hopefully it's quick," Gulf said with a sigh, "for the moment, Horizon has asked us to journey around a bit with the various colonies. Learn about them and share what Horizon has been working on with deep sea exploration and obviously uplifting."
"Most of the learning would be at the sister cities for some of these sites," Allura commented, "but... it should still be fun."
"It'll also take some time to do," Beacon added, "we may have a higher metabolism than Humans, but that doesn't make weight loss instantaneous."
Gulf and Wally accepted that, but there were some sighs that went along with it. But they went through with it as the trainer for the "class" then came in and they got started. It started with stretches and things like that. Beacon and Allura went through fairly easy with this, and Wally followed fairly easily. The only one who had a bit of difficulty was Gulf, though that had more to do with the fact that the instructor and the others all had legs. As an Eel Animalian, he didn't have legs and had needed some snake DNA as part of his uplifting just to let him move on land. It thus took him a bit of experimentation to find where and how to stretch out his muscles.
There then followed some other warm up exercises before moving into the main exercises that were taken in the room which got everyone moving. It was a repetition of things done the prior year for Beacon and Allura, but it was new for Gulf and Wally. They ultimately did get into some of the exercises, and given that no one teased them, their level of embarrassment at things didn't go along with it. It made for a good opportunity and activity.