As The Weekly Fitness Challenge continues its incredible international growth, more and more the question is asked, "What EXACTLY is The Weekly Fitness Challenge?"
The Weekly Fitness Challenge is an international grass roots fitness/wellness campaign that is designed to encourage people to reach out to those they know that need to exercise and are not yet doing so. Those who are not exercising regularly are the ones who fall victim to preventable illnesses and unhealthy conditions. They NEED someone who cares about to them to reach out and mentor them in the importance of exercise! Most programs are designed for regular exercisers. Our campaign is designed for the "not yet fit" as a form of prescriptive intervention designed to get them mooving!
The easiest way to illustrate The Weekly Fitness Challenge target population is through a model like Dr. James Prochaksa's Transtheoretical Model --> READ: http://bit.ly/2czYY
We encourage Regular exercisers (Maintenance types) to reach out to their friends, family members and co-workers and serve as a "mentor" in helping the person take the first steps toward regular exercise! For someone who is not a regular exerciser, there is a strong need for FUN and MOTIVATING exercise options. That is why The Weekly Fitness Challenge engages Group Exercise (some know Group Exercise as "aerobics").
The Weekly Fitness Challenge is run in twelve week cycles. Each week we feature a specific Group Exercise regimine for people to engage their friends, family members and co-workers in. We encourage participants to post results of who they took and what the result was on our FaceBook page (see below) or on Twitter, which is where the campaign began.
The Weekly Fitness Challenge campaign was created by Geoff Hampton as part of an ongoing inventory of lifestyle modification strategies that he has created and implemented starting back in the late '90's. Hampton frequently engages a campaign Advisory Board in order to create a powerful synergistic effect that helps actualize maximum population engagement potential.
Here is an example of a community wellness program he created and implemented with a strong Advisory Board component in San Diego, CA that was designed to target poor and underdserved populations: http://bit.ly/u8hbt
Another important component to many of Hampton's campaigns is an official "Medical Director". The Medical Director helps insure that the folks who have either never exercised before or have exercised before and failed are engaging in safe exercise formats.
Folks who have either never exercise before, or have exercised before and failed need three key elements if they are to have any true hope of breaking their failure cycle and creating a TRUE success cycle:
1. The program must be FUN
2. The program must be at a specific time
3. The program must engage a support mechanism
The Weekly Fitness Challenge has engaged Twitter as a terrific source to reach out to virtually millions of people, most of whom NEED to exercise. There are other vehicles that can help promote this important message of lifestyle modification through regular exercise and we hope that everyone will join us and promote this powerful grass roots intiative!
The campaign Advisory Board has 6 Committee's based on specific target groups that can help fuel the growth of the campaign. Each Committee has a Chairperson and two team members that work together collaberatively with the chairperson to create intiatives and ideas to engage the target group that they represent through their particular committee.
Our hope is that at some point "#weeklyfitnesschallenge" will appear on the trending topics on Twitter. Our hope is also that others will help us encourage folks to join our FaceBook page too. The anticipated outcome? Millions reaching out millions who need to exercise but are not yet doing so and inspiring and leading them to FUN exercise prescriptions one person at a time!
We offer tremendous thanks Advisory Board Member Chris McNeil for our popular FaceBook page. Please join us there and post all experiences for you, your friends, family members and co-workers related to the weekly exercise prescriptions we suggest!
If you are wondering about whether or not YOU should get involved, simply ask youself this question, "Whose job is it to reach out to those who need to exercise and are not yet doing so?" THE ANSWER? It is all of us together! NOBODY else is going to do it! That's right! There is no "RED PILL", there is no "BLUE PILL" that people can take and suddenly become regular exercisers! So JOIN US!
SUPPORT THE CHALLENGE!
Join us on FaceBook ( http://bit.ly/2waQAU ) and Twitter!
JOIN US! Spread the word! Contact politicians, celebrities, news sources, health groups and associations! This is Healthcare Reform on a global basis!
Meet International Campaign Medical Director - Dr. Joe Kosterich - http://bit.ly/UmcNM
Dr. Joe's DIY Health on YouTube: http://tinyurl.com/l7ebpj
Dr. Joe's NEW and innovative book on creating optimal personal health: http://bit.ly/hbWv2
To request additional information about The Weekly Fitness Challenge or provide feedback - Contact Executive Director Geoff Hampton: GEOFFLHAMPTON@aol.com
www.Twitter.com/GeoffHampton
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Feels this is a great initiative and has the potential to be funded at both local and National Government Health department level. Ian do you plan to do this in the UK and if so can the FIA help?
ReplyDeleteBest Regards
David Stalker
David. Great thought! I was also wondering about how to get clubs around the world more actively engaged in this campaign targeting the "not yet fit". Any ideas?
ReplyDeleteMost beginners I talk to are intimdated to walk into a group exercise class because they know they are not as conditioned as the other class members...even if the instructor offers modifications. I'd love to see clubs offer a "beginner" workout class once or twice a month. I think that would fill the other classes on their schedule even more because we would be getting more people involved in group exercise.
ReplyDeleteGeoff, this is really starting to get traction. I cannot thank you enough for this informative site focusing on such a world wide crisis. The world has so many problems from Terror to Global Warming that we tend to spike on Total Fitness needs across the generations. With people like you driving the cause we will get their on block at a time until we have nations re-focused on the importance of Fitness.
ReplyDeleteSteve
Hi Geoff! I definitely agree with David Stalker that this is an initiative with much potential for government funding. I'm tossing around some ideas on this now. For instance, thinking of ways to make outcome measurability more certain (i.e. incentivized rather than simply encouraged self-reporting??), which is critical for attracting government money.
ReplyDeleteThe concept of encouraging everyone to make an impact within their personal spheres of influence is unique and most likely to make a substantial, ongoing impact on the health of this nation--definitively worthy of Health Dept., not to mention private foundation, $$.
I agree with all comments in that it has huge potential! The reason the WeeklyFitnessChallenge program is emerging with such a solid base is due to 3 very important tenets of a proven system for success: Fun, Scheduling and accountability. I have personally seen the results using these key factors in my health program. People can relate to it - They "SEE" themselves succeeding!
ReplyDeleteLori L. Shemek
Excellent Idea Michelle. I'm going to see if we can try this at our gyms. I'll let everyone know how it goes. People are intimidated by group fitness and it would be fantastic to get more new people attending beginner classes so they learn to excercise safely and efficiently and have fun and get to know fellow club members. They also wiil learn easy excercises that they can do at home or outside.
ReplyDelete