Families circled the track at the city’s newly refurbished Finlay Park on a warm Tuesday evening, while music spilled from the main stage.

At the center of the stage, instructor Jackie Edwards led a crowd through an hour of high-energy Zumba, one of the free, outdoor, weekday fitness classes the city launched this year.

Finlay Park officially kicked off its new program March 16, in partnership with the city’s Drew Wellness Center. The free classes will run through Oct. 30, offering a complete lineup of weekday workouts aimed at making movement accessible to anyone who shows up.

The lineup stretches across the week: High intensity interval training on Mondays, sunset yoga and Zumba on Tuesdays, chair fitness and Pilates on Wednesdays, line-dancing on Thursdays and Tai Chi on Friday mornings.

For Edwards, who has taught at Drew Wellness Center and coached running and step-aerobics for more than two decades, the Finlay Park class feels like something she’s been waiting on.

“I’ve always wanted to have a free class for the community,” she said. “So many moms don’t get to work out because they don’t have childcare. Here, the kids can just play.”

Edwards jogs some 2 miles from Drew Wellness to the park each week, finishing with a four-mile loop before class begins.

“Every time I come, I see such good energy,” Edwards said.

People are having fun and being healthy, she said.

That energy was easy to spot Tuesday.

Harry Williams, a fellow Zumba instructor, jumped into the session with the same enthusiasm as the first timers.

“At the end of Zumba, you’ve got to stretch,” Williams told some folks nearby.

He danced along with participant Kellin Jones, who said she comes out every week. Jones also joins the Thursday line-dancing class and recommends it to anyone who’s looking for something fun and might be nervous about trying something new.

Edwards said she didn’t expect the program to take off so quickly. The first class was held in some unconventional conditions – 40-degree weather.

“I didn’t advertise it at all, so I thought no one would come,” she said. “But five or six people showed up, and it has just grown from there.”

Between teaching sixth-grade and coaching cross country at Crayton Middle School, Edwards’ schedule is packed. But she said she couldn’t turn down the chance to be part of something that brings people together.

“I love the meaning behind it, and seeing all of these smiling faces,” she said. “It really is an honor.”