What Are Fitness Challenges?

Whether it’s from your gym buddies or just a colleague or friend, chances are high that you’ve heard of a fitness challenge before. Do you really know why people participate in them, and what they’re all about?

First thing’s first: there is no one specific fitness challenge. It isn’t a brand, or even a specific sport or activity — it’s a concept which spans all forms of movement and athletic abilities. It’s generally a significant undertaking (and not particularly easy!), but it’s a fantastic way to hone skills and performance as well as get into pretty incredible shape.

Different Types of Fitness Challenges

There are countless fitness challenge ideas being put into action every day. Whether you prefer to practice yoga, swim laps, or lift weights, there’s likely an existing fitness challenge that ticks the boxes you need. Otherwise, you can work with a personal trainer to create your own!

Some of the more popular forms of fitness challenges are:

• 30 Day Fitness Challenge

This is perhaps the most well known of today’s fitness challenge ideas. With a 30 day challenge, athletes have the opportunity to double down on a specific exercise, sport, or routine for a set period of time — 30 days is common, though some challenges use 14. Usually, that means working out every single day during that period. It’s a big undertaking, but an incredibly rewarding one.

• Holiday Fitness Challenge

During the festive season, lots of people vow to make big life changes — and those resolutions often revolve around physical health. It’s for this reason that lots of athletes enjoy undertaking a holiday fitness challenge as January 1st approaches; it sets the groundwork for a more disciplined daily routine in the coming year. Some gyms even organize these challenges for their clients — we have our annual “Marathon Before Christmas” at Jack City!

• Summer Fitness Challenge

Summer is a great time to get in shape — generally, it’s a little less busy than the “school year,” the days are nice and long, and you likely have a closet full of warm weather clothes that you want to look your best wearing. If you think these are all valid reasons to try a summer fitness challenge, we agree — we even host one!

What Are the Benefits of Doing Fitness Challenges?

Aside from the obvious physical benefits of participating in intensive, disciplined exercise, there are plenty of other benefits as well. For starters, participating in these challenges can be a fantastic way to build friendships and your social circle — nothing creates camaraderie quite like working through an intense experience together. It’s also a great way to practice responsibility, routine-building, accountability, and discipline.

Can Gym Newcomers Try a Fitness Challenge?

For those who haven’t spent a ton of time at the gym, trying a fitness challenge can seem really daunting. However, these activities are open to everybody, from first-time gym goers to longtime athletes. Either way, it will build and sharpen skills and show impressive results.

The exercise can be very intense, and it’s generally performed at a high frequency. This can be overwhelming for someone who hasn’t worked out much in the past. It’s important to remember that these challenges are only short term — it will simply give you a stronger foundation to then incorporate a more relaxed workout routine into your life.

Does Jack City Fitness Offer Challenges?

We sure do! Our team is always up for a challenge — and we’re happy to share them with our partners. In fact, one of the longest running traditions at Jack City is our annual holiday fitness challenge. Each year, we invite our partners to participate in our own Marathon Before Christmas challenge, where they can race each other on their preferred form of equipment: a rower, the versa climber, woodway treadmill, or the bike. Whoever goes the furthest will win a hefty prize, and all participants are entered in our festive-season raffle. We’ll also be offering weekly challenges throughout the month of December, and handing out more raffle tickets, so get stretching.

Best of all? A portion of your participation fee will be donated to the Idaho Foodbank, so it won’t just be your own health you’ll be looking after — you’ll be providing someone in need with a nourishing meal.

Looking for a summer fitness challenge? Stay right where you are. No matter what the time of year, we always have a challenge for you — our quarterly Fitness Summits will let you test your skills in different areas… can you make it onto our Records Wall?

Not a Jack Fitness Partner yet?

What are you waiting for? Sign up or call (208) 999-1111 to speak with our team — we’ll book you in for a free fitness consultation, where you can meet with our passionate staff, tour our modern facility, or peek into a class. Once you join, the sky’s the limit — you’ll have 24/7 gym access, options for custom, group, or personal training, and plenty of opportunities to challenge yourself and feel amazing.

Come and show us what you’re made of — we can’t wait to see.