Sporty rocker Tanel Padar
Rocker Tanel Padar, who trains at Sparta, confirms from experience that being in good physical shape also brings a great feeling and confidence when performing on stage.
Tanel Padar, who recently made TV viewers laugh and marvel on the show “Your Face Sounds Familiar”, is convinced that without proper training, quite a few tricks and acrobatic surprises on stage would never have happened. Take, for instance, singing and dancing as the raspy-voiced Tina Turner in stylish stilettos. “What legs!” was probably the envious, admiring sigh in many homes across Estonia on those evenings.
According to Tanel, that number, too, was the result of years of consistently taking care of his body. “A trained leg simply stays in a heeled shoe better,” he says with a smile today, adding that he was more than happy with the show’s cast and with finishing second.
Whose impersonation was closest to his heart? “The funniest was definitely doing Üllar Jörberg. It was hard not to burst out laughing on stage mid-song – it was all so funny. And of course I also thoroughly enjoyed being on stage as Tina Turner – I felt it worked best as a parody.”
A fan of the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ rock athletes
According to Tanel Padar, he has understood the importance of sport and training since he was a small boy. Studying clarinet and saxophone at the music school in Rakvere didn’t stop him from kicking a football around and shooting hoops with friends for fun in the evenings in his home town of Haljala.
As an armchair sportsman, he followed the success stories of Estonian athletes around the world on TV, and kept his fingers especially tightly crossed for the Nordic combined skiers Allar Levandi and Ago Markvart. “Even then I could see what a hardworking, accomplished people Estonians are.”
Dreaming of becoming a rock star, Tanel was at the time a fan not only of Jean-Claude Van Damme action movies but also of the members of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, who, besides churning out hot hits, were captivating for their attractive looks.
“They were shirtless in the music videos and that was really cool,” he recalls of that time.
In the last years of the previous century, after moving from Haljala to the capital and diving headfirst into the rock scene, the young Tanel took his first steps into the world of the gym, still with those Red Hot Chili Peppers rock athletes in mind. “Coming from the countryside, I was afraid of training in the gym at first, and I didn’t know whom to ask for advice either,” he recalls of the start of his more conscious training years.
According to Tanel, people in rock circles looked a bit askance at his love of sport at first. “What you’re friends with counts for a lot. Back then, exercising wasn’t held in esteem among musicians.”
The young rocker didn’t let that discourage him, though, and persistently kept going his own way. His musical career got a flying start, at least to an outside observer, when in 2001 at the Eurovision Song Contest in Copenhagen, together with Dave Benton, he plucked first place for Estonia like a ripe apple. Tanel’s own view is that the victory didn’t change his life in any way. “If anything, life got more complicated,” he says, leaving it open-ended when recalling that time, which was at times confusing.
Enjoys training in the morning
Whether or not the Eurovision win played a part, sport began to take an ever more important role in Tanel’s life. Tanel’s image has long carried a reputation as a hard partier, yet even after the wildest nights out, he tried to find the way to the gym the next morning.
Now, years later, he admits that his partying has decreased with each passing year, while looking after his health and training have increased accordingly. In between grinding it out in the gym, he has also played football or beach volleyball with various groups, but his passionate and competitive nature has been more of a burden in those sports. “I try to give my all in every game, often forgetting to warm up, and that’s how injuries come easily.”
According to Tanel, his Achilles’ heels are the knees and lower back. These are exactly what he pays special attention to strengthening in the gym.
Tanel says morning is his favorite time to train in the gym. “It gets the day going,” he says, adding that by evening he’s too tired for the gym. At dawn, though, it’s a different story. “I wake up, eat a proper portion of porridge and head to training.”
Often he even manages to pick up the guitar and compose a cool song before coming to train at Sparta. “Music can be made anywhere, but training can’t,” he insists.
“At Sparta there’s air and space”
At Sparta, Tanel was supported with advice at first by the personal trainer Argo Ader, who went over the evergreen truths of the gym, introduced the machines and gave pointers on technique, too. “A pro can see from the side what the sensible interval for doing an exercise is or what the correct posture is. You shouldn’t be afraid of experts’ help in the gym,” Argo encourages trainees to buttonhole the specialists.
According to Argo, Tanel is easy to coach, because his interest and motivation to keep developing are enormous. “Since the collarbone fracture in between, he has recovered strongly, and we’ve already made his training programs heavier,” says Argo.
Instead of grinding away with heavy weights, Tanel prefers a 45-minute toning general conditioning workout that puts the muscles nicely in tone. “I do health-focused exercise in the gym, I’m not chasing records,” he says, and stresses: “The spirit wilts if I can’t train properly.”
Sparta is gradually becoming a second home for Tanel. “There’s air and space in the gym,” he says, also complimenting Sparta’s wide selection of strength machines and the company of fellow trainees. “A great bunch comes together here,” he confirms. Many other musicians have also made Sparta their training spot. Tanel hopes he has infected some younger colleagues with the sport bug through his personal example.
“Let’s be honest, an artist has to look good on stage. If the audience has to choose between two bands, where one has a singer with a big beer belly and the other is a sporty type, it’s not hard to guess which concert people prefer to attend.”
Tanel admits to gradually broadening his training repertoire. Recently, following the instructions of Sparta personal trainer Thea Sei, he tried the vibration-based Power Plate and was amazed by the intensity of the machine. “Unbelievable, in practically 45 seconds it leaves you completely out of breath. True, enjoying a workout on it takes some getting used to,” he says. The same goes for joining in group workouts.
Ready to join in on group training
Tanel says he is now ready to try an aerobics class again, even though the “terrible” experience of years ago still makes him laugh. Back then, he went to try Bodycombat at another sports club.
As a typically self-assured man when it comes to skills and strength, he hit the gas right away, but after a while, “in front of fifteen capable housewives,” he was left standing there gasping, wanting to sink through the floor with embarrassment. “Suddenly my leg just wouldn’t go as high anymore,” he recalls of that group training thriller. No wonder, since even Olympic heroes Gerd Kanter and Heiki Nabi, who have toiled through Sparta’s group training sessions, called their PumpFX debut a real shock.
Today he gives “sporty housewives” their due and reasons that the gentler sex probably just has more inner strength. “Joining in on a group training session is nothing for men to be ashamed of,” he is convinced, and he is ready to try this “path of suffering” again. Now considerably better trained.
Tanel goes to the Sparta gym 3 – 4 times a week. That includes the coming summer tour season, when he travels around the country with friends Ott Lepland and Jalmar Vabarna in the band “Vallatud vestid”, which was born out of an impromptu joke. “I enjoy the pleasant company and the fun stage antics, and I believe our music leaves no one in the audience cold.”
Oh yes, Tanel recently bought special resistance bands for the performances, for a bit of a workout before going on stage. To keep the body nicely toned even when away from home. “We don’t plan to stay anywhere overnight, we’ll drive home to Tallinn, where I can definitely come to Sparta in the mornings,” he says, putting things in perspective.
Indeed, a muscular artist is always a pleasure to watch on stage. Be it the daredevils of the “Red Hot Chili Peppers” or our own sporty rocker Tanel Padar.
Author: Sparta sports club
Source: WHO – physical activity.
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