Walk Across Arizona Encourages Team Fitness

Walk Across Arizona Encourages Team Fitness

By Amy WilliamsUniversity Relations - Communications
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Employees are invited to sign up a team for the fitness challenge, sponsored by UA Cooperative Extension and UA Life & Work Connections.
Employees are invited to sign up a team for the fitness challenge, sponsored by UA Cooperative Extension and UA Life & Work Connections.
Walk Across Arizona kicks off Feb. 28.
Walk Across Arizona kicks off Feb. 28.

UA employees are invited to engage in a friendly fitness competition with their campus colleagues this spring.

Walk Across Arizona, sponsored by UA Cooperative Extension and UA Life & Work Connections, challenges teams to engage in physical activities like walking, swimming, horseback riding or any other type of exercise, which can be converted to "miles walked." UA employees are encouraged to join the challenge, which is open to anyone in the community.

"You make the effort to essentially walk across Arizona in that six-week time period," said Jodi Charvoz, senior coordinator for employee wellness and health promotion with Life & Work Connections and a registered dietitian. "It's kind of a competitive thing in terms of the different teams on campus, but it's really just a campaign to get out there, get walking and get healthier."

Walk Across Arizona was started in 1997 by UA Cooperative Extension and the Mel & Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health and is offered throughout the state in multiple counties. Collectively, UA teams have walked 68,712 miles.

The competition starts on Feb. 28 and will run until April 10. A final celebration will be held on April 19, when the team that has walked the most miles will win a prize.

Teams can have up to 10 people and may include co-workers, friends, family members and students. Each team must choose a captain and a team name.

A sign-up meeting for captains to register their teams will be on Feb. 9 from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Ventana Room at the Student Union Memorial Center. Captains are to collect and bring with them $10 per team member, which will go toward the prize awarded at the end of the program.

"The goal is for teams to virtually walk the 410 miles across our state of Arizona within the six-week time frame," said Christine Wilson, coach for employee wellness and health promotion with Life & Work Connections and head of this year's Walk Across Arizona.

Participants in Walk Across Arizona will be provided information about campus walking paths and possible exercise ideas to help keep their fitness environments new and interesting.

Life & Work Connections also will host events in order to help participants get their steps in. One of those events is Walks With Campus Leaders, a program designed to help employees meet new people in the UA community and get some fresh air during the lunch hour with a 20-minute walk.

"The ultimate goal is to increase satisfaction with the community and decrease social isolation of residents within communities," Wilson says.

For more information or to sign up, visit the Walk Across Arizona website.

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