Articles in FIT – Fitness Improvement Training

By: Gabrielle Magee, SOIA Intern 

As a part of the FIT program, “Fall Into Fitness” is back for a second year! Fall Into Fitness is a 10-week walking program aimed at helping Special Olympic athletes stay active and lead healthy lifestyles.

The program began on September 12 and will end on November 18. The program includes a grand total of 175 participants, including Special Olympic athletes and Unified Partners. The participants are members of 12 separate delegations that compose the walking clubs. The goal of the walking clubs is to meet at least once a week to walk together to build healthy habits, stay active and maintain motivation. Along with the walking program, each athlete will complete the FIT Program pre- and post-assessments in order to monitor their fitness improvements.

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“Fall into Fitness” is a walking club designed to enable Special Olympics Iowa athletes and Unified Partners opportunities to become more active.  It is a flexible program that will be easy for teams to maintain. Each club will meet at least once per week to walk together.  More activities can be added to give variation to your fitness program.  Miles/activity will be recorded on a bi-weekly basis.  Miles will be used in a competition and incentives-based format. Individuals and teams with the highest average miles will receive awards at the conclusion of “Fall into Fitness.” In addition, the 5-station FIT Program pre- and post-assessments will be completed to record fitness progress.

Fall into Fitness Flyer

The next FIT (Fitness Improvement Training) Program will begin September 12 and run for 10 weeks, through November 18. “Fall into Fitness” is a Unified Sport Program and each team needs to have at least 20 percent of their team members as Unified Partners. Unified Partners can be family members, friends, peers, coaches and/or staff. We encourage communities coming together to walk together to improve their fitness levels.

SONA has provided a limited supply of Moveband activity trackers that will be able to automatically track the team members’ physical activity. The data from the Movebands, as well as data from Fitbit, Garmin and Jawbone can automatically be downloaded onto the Special Olympics Iowa site to assist in tracking your team’s physical activity data.

If interested in registering a team for “Fall into Fitness” please contact Bruce Wilson at bwilson@soiowa.org or Gabrielle Magee at gabrielle.magee@drake.edu.

“March to Summer Games” is underway and will be continuing through May 15. Eleven delegations have joined the program with a total of 110 Special Olympics athletes and Unified Partners participating.  Four Special Olympics athletes have walked over 100 miles in the past 6 weeks. “March to Summer Games“ is a Unified Walking Club, which has the goal of developing healthy daily exercise habits. Special Olympics athletes and Unified Partners work together to compete for awards and to gain new friendships. …

As a continuation of the FIT Program and the goal of helping Special Olympic athletes build healthy habits, March to Summer Games will begin March 1 and will include 250 participants. March to Summer Games is a walking club that allows Special Olympics athletes and Unified Partners opportunities to build a habit of moving and becoming more active. It is a flexible program through Special Olympics Iowa that should be easy to maintain.

Each club will meet at least once per week (or more if desired) to walk. Miles will be added up and used in a competition format where Special Olympics athletes and teams with the highest average miles will receive awards at Summer Games. The FIT Program pre- and post-assessments will be done to record fitness improvement.  The 11-week program will begin March 1 and end May 15.  If you are interested in March to Summer Games contact Bruce Wilson or Stephanie Boylan