Alicia Keys’ Trainer Says Singer Loves a ‘Challenge’ When Working Out

Alicia Keys’ personal trainer Anna Kaiser says the singer loves a “challenge” when it comes to working out.

Kaiser told Us Weekly exclusively that she focuses mainly on “interval based” workouts with Keys, 43, to build endurance for her stage shows.

“I created a program with intervals that alternate between power and strength. And we’ll use a Pilates box. And it’s a workout that I call STEP. So, we’re working with athletic conditioning moves — like box jumps, and near Peters and burpees and jacks — and then we’ll pause and do a series of four strength exercises,” the personal trainer explained. “I like to focus on full body strength exercises.”

Kaiser explained that “we are not accommodation of parts, we are one whole body,” so the full body workout is “more challenging for your heart rate.” She noted that Keys is “really advanced.”

Keys “wants to feel like she is pushed to her max” Kaiser continued, adding that she will have the singer doing upper and lower body workouts simultaneously.

“If she’s doing shoulder presses, she’s also holding a curtsy lunge and I’m adding a torso rotation with an extension of the shoulder press,” she explained. “While they’re separate body focus, we’re still creating a balance challenge with her lower body and working in a transverse plane.”

Kaiser wants her workouts to be “challenging for your brain, your body and your heart at the same time.”

“When you’re thinking about endurance exercises, not just thinking in the front of backplane like burpees or running or cycling, you want to think about moving laterally, moving across your midline,” the trainer added. “I’m incorporating all of those planes of motion during power sections of conditioning and power and then we’ll do another round of strength focus more on lower body.”

For Keys, specifically, they’ll work out “before a show” as a way to warm up her voice.

“There is no speaking, it’s just allowing the cardio to warm up your voice before going on stage,” she Kaiser gushed. “A great way to feel strong in your skin and ready.”

Other than training her A-list clients, Kaiser provides workouts with everyone with Anna Kaiser Virtual Studios, which gives people access to work out with a celebrity trainer no matter where they are — at home, on the road — with a weekly curated program of classes for $39 per month.