West Virginia University helps its students get in shape for spring break with a fitness competition. But the contest formally known as Body for Break has now been completely revamped.
Patrick Henry said spring break is drawing near, and it’s time to get in shape. “Once you get to college and you don’t have the motivation of sports to push you, sometimes you need a little something extra to get you motivated to come into the gym,” he said.
He is participating in WVU’s new program to help students get fit. It’s called Physique 7, and it stresses the importance of overall fitness, not just weight loss. It also tracks your progress online to measure your success.
The students seem to like it. “They can actually see their changes, kind of have an idea of where they are compared to everybody else,” said Nancy Oliverio, manager for fitness and wellness at WVU’s recreation center. “And I think they like the fact they just don’t have to worry about their body fat. because you can’t go down a lot of body fat in seven weeks.”
The process is easy. Once you finish your workout, you step onto the body composition scale, and your body mass index is sent right to Physique 7’s website. There you can track your personal fitness, and also see how you rank among other participants. After seven weeks, the top participants get a prize.
“Your progress is tracked every day, and I think that’s a lot more convenient . Also, just to see other people that are coming in and getting theirs tracked is a huge motivator,” Henry said.
Physique 7’s fitness tracker was created by the local software company Videntity. They said tracking your health online is an up and coming trend. “When you see the data, it’s more effective in behavior change than just saying ‘hey you should eat broccoli, hey you should work out’ to actually say ‘here’s where you are, here’s the results of what you’re doing,’” said the company’s president and founder, Alan Viares. “Being able to see that visual feedback is shown to be more effective in causing healthy behavior change.”
Many students like Patrick said Physique 7 is not only a healthy competition, but also a way to keep them coming back to the gym.
This article was originally posted on WDTV’s website.
Posted by Matt Livengood on February 1, 2011 at 11:48 am in the following categories: Videntity Systems
