Walk90 Challenge Motivates Over 1,400 to Walk
Healthy Central Florida’s Walk90 Challenge, a fun, friendly 90-day walking program, kicked off October 1 with more than 1,400 signed up to participate. This included more than 100 teams from schools, businesses, local municipalities, and residential facilities like Westminster and the Mayflower. Some teams were even made up of families eager to participate.
From the Mayflower, with nearly 60 members comprised of both staff and residents, to Hadley & Lyden, a 50-year-old Winter Park insurance company with 13 members, the Walk90 Challenge has motivated a number of diverse groups and individuals to get up and moving.
At Hadley & Lyden, April Whitaker, a customer service representative and mom of a Lakemont Elementary School student, decided to organize a team at her company after participating last year with her son. This year, she said she needed some extra accountability and decided to recruit co-workers from her company to join her.
In the past, Ms. Whitaker said, “Our employee group activity primarily consisted of our annual holiday party. The Walk90 Challenge has offered a healthy employee activity that gets us motivated together to walk before, during and after work.”
The team from the Mayflower was spear-headed by Wellness Coordinator Sarah Burke. Sarah said it has been a great way to engage residents and staff to get healthy together and she indicated residents and staff are both walking and participating in other activities to get their steps in.
The Challenge, which kicked off “Walktober” on October 1 and runs through December 29, is rewarding participants with weekly prizes like Track Shack and Publix gift cards. The grand prize winner is the person with the most steps walked at the end of the competition. That winner will win a one-year membership to RDV Sportsplex.
Of course, the greatest prize of all is better health and more energy. Kudos to all the teams and individuals who are walking, talking and getting healthy together!
Jill Hamilton Buss, Executive Director of Healthy Central Florida, shares more about the benefits of walking in “Walking and Talking — Just What the Doctor Ordered” an article recently published in the My Word column of the Orlando Sentinel.
