Not up for lifting weights, running laps or chewing up miles on a bike? Fitness can come in the form of fancy footwork, too.

In Austin, you can swirl your belly, swivel your hips or stomp your feet to good health. Dancing burns calories. It's also a good way to meet people. And who knows when the ability to tango (or clog, hip-hop or hula) will come in handy.

It doesn't matter if you're uncoordinated. The point is, you're moving.

"I'm definitely getting some good exercise," says Angie Edwards, 45, who signed up for clogging classes at the invitation of a co-worker. The part-time gospel radio show disc jockey known as "Sister Hallelujah" has even lost a few pounds since September, when she started the 12-week beginner class offered by Clickety Cloggers.

Edwards moonlights as a security guard. Sometimes, she hones her clogging steps in the wee hours.

"I practice that one when I'm doing rounds in the garage," Edwards says of the vine step.

Whatever style of dance appeals, classes abound. We picked a few to sample.

A conga beat

Few can resist the rhythms of the Afro-Haitian dance classes taught at the Austin Recreation Center, where a conga drummer keeps the beat.

Martha Perez teaches a broad range of folkloric dances, whose movements range from fluid and stately to just plain playful — and they all tone the body and reduce stress.

"It's very much like ballet — it really works your torso a lot," Perez says. "I'm sore all over my body after every class. You never stop toning something new."

Classes last an hour and 15 minutes, and students focus on isolating different parts of their bodies.

"You're syncopating the abdomen," Perez says. "You work from the sternum and abdomen and do a rhythmic contraction. The feet are doing different steps at different times, and the arms are doing something else."

But fear not. The class is multileveled. Beginners can start by learning just the footwork, then add the other layers as they grow more comfortable.

A good rap

Check out the latest hip-hop videos by Missy Elliott and Kanye West and you'll see why hip-hop is a great form of exercise.

"It's an all-over workout," says Liz Walter, owner of The Dance Zone, a dance studio located in the bottom floor of the Castilian Apartments, a dorm near the University of Texas campus. "It's very cardiovascular. It doesn't require flexibility or any real technical training — it's more just feeling the beat and getting a low center of gravity."

Smaller arm movements can make your arms sore, and a lot of moves are done with bent knees. There's floor work, too, so your quadriceps get exercised.

"Part of the mission of my studio is dance as fitness," Walter says. "I want it to be more 'Everybody can come whether you have training or not and have a good time.' "

From hip to square

According to Robert George's pedometer, a single square dancing session is roughly equivalent to a 3 1/4-mile walk around the neighborhood.

George and his wife, Judi, vice presidents of the Waterloo Squares, dance at least twice a week (although they logged six times in a recent five-day span). And the exercise, they add, isn't just physical — keeping up with a square dance caller takes mental dexterity, as well.

Another sign they're working hard?

"A lot of times we'll start out with the air conditioner on, and you walk into the club room and it is cold — we're sitting there with sweaters on. After the first (few dances), I'm shedding the sweater and we're definitely sweating," says Judi George.

Aloha to your health

Anyone who's tried to master the precise, stomach-rolling moves of hula knows it takes plenty of control and training.

Kanani St. James and her son teach Hawaiian dance through the Hula Halau Kaepa Dance Company. One class is even called "Hula for Health."

"Hula is a very excellent form of exercise," St. James says. "It's a difficult form of dance. You get an upper respiratory workout, and it works your torso area, posture, abdomen, thighs, calves, feet and hands."

Classes last about an hour, long enough to work up a sweat. "People are so surprised, they're like, 'Oh my God, I'm sweating even though I'm moving slowly."

Follow your gut

Does bellydancing make you sweat, too?

"Oh my goodness, yes," says Bobbye Dee, leader of Bobbye Dee's "Kiss the Sands" Dance Production, which offers classes and seminars and has its own performing troupe.

"It tones the hips, glutes, upper legs, abs, thighs and hamstrings, which all women want to improve," Dee says. "It's also upper-body strength."

The hour-long classes, which begin with a warmup and stretch, are designed to improve muscular and cardiovascular endurance, plus flexibility. It's all done to Middle Eastern rhythms. Sometimes the dancers use finger symbols, other times they dance with bells or swords.

"Classes are nonstop, so you get a great cardio workout," Dee says. "We're working the entire body."

It takes two

You're having such a great time when you tango that it doesn't feel like work. But make no mistake — it takes muscle to execute those graceful and dramatic moves.

Argentine tango can also improve posture and balance, because the abdominal muscles have to be engaged. "This helps you become more aware of your body and your habits, and of course it improves your strength as well," says instructor Monica Caivano.

Sometimes tango dancers move only from the waist up. Other times they move only from the waist down. "This makes for a great form of exercise for your waist, abs, chest hips and legs," she says.

So far it's worked for students Denis and Deena Kohl, who could never stick with walking on a treadmill, but are now addicted to tango.

"In the beginning, we had no idea how difficult and intricate tango would be for two golden-agers whose bodies were not as limber as they once were, whose balance was not that of a young person and whose physical stamina was limited," they say. "Monica became both our tango teacher and our personal trainer."

Go clog wild

It sounds like a team of carriage horses is trotting through the studios at D'Ette and Co. Dancers, but it's just the cloggers, practicing.

Angie Edwards, the gospel radio disc jockey, is standing at one end of a line of students, trying to follow the fleet footwork of instructor Virginia Pohlmeier.

"That's as slow as it goes, guys," Pohlmeier says, adjusting the recording of "Louisiana Saturday Night." "If you were doing this for an intermediate or advanced, you'd be doing it twice as fast."

Edwards, wearing a pair of borrowed white clogging shoes, looks down at her feet in mild confusion. The line of dancers fumbles a bit, like toddlers in their first ballet recital. But then they catch on, stomping and twirling to the beat.

According to lore, the dance started in England in the mid-18th century, when steel mill workers competed to see who could make the greatest variety of sounds with their heavy wooden shoes. Eventually they switched to leather shoes, tacking pennies to them to make up for lost sound.

Clogging moves are built around eight basic steps, and the sequences have names like Rocking Chair, Outhouse and Samantha. The dancers wear a sandwich of two steel plates on their shoes, which clang together with each step. The clogging is almost always done in a line, without partners. ("That way if you break down, you don't break down the whole group," says club cobbler Jon Durbin, 56.)

During one number, the dancers throw their hands into the air. Edwards shouts out, "All right!" then heads out the door, wiping her brow. "I need a drink of water," she says, twisting the cap off a bottle and wiping her brow.

She's dancing her way to fitness.

pleblanc@statesman.com; 445-3994