Every Tuesday and Thursday morning at 6:30, fitness-minded people get together in downtown Chattanooga to work out for free. Hosted by Run Chattanooga, they call it “Tough Love” – exercise meets social media meets community building.
The designated workout location is promoted on Facebook (www.facebook.com/runnooga) and Twitter (@runchattanooga) the day before the workout. They’ve done burpees by the Chattanoogan hotel and pushups at the Hunter Museum, run stairs on Ross’ Landing and done crunches at UTC. Sometimes, they’re in a park, and sometimes, they just pick a street corner with some curbs to jump up on or benches to use for dips. One participant cites his favorite workout they’ve done as the Winter Olympics-themed Sochi-Nooga, which included running up the hill at Renaissance Park and “sledding” down on a cardboard box. Nobody gets left behind because the workouts are done in circuits, and no one gets bored because no two workouts are the same.
Run Chattanooga founder Courtney Bird says joining a gym or a traditional running club can be intimidating, and this is one way they’re trying to break those barriers. Plus, attending a workout costs nothing: parking in metered spaces is free at that hour, and there are no contracts to sign or membership fees to pay. “You don’t have to already be in shape, either, because we can scale the workout to any ability. Everyone is encouraged to just show up and jump right in.”
“You just do what you can do at the speed you can do it. The whole thing has a really positive vibe. Everyone cheers each other on,” says Kim Sissom, a regular participant at the Tough Love workouts since they began several months ago.
To keep track of how their fitness is progressing, once a month, participants race up and down the stairs at AT&T Field and then do a lap of the hill on 3rd Street, seeing how many rounds of that combination they can do in 25 minutes. They’re racing only against themselves, but they use each other as motivation. “The slower people are working hard to try to keep up with the faster people. The faster ones are pushing to go even faster so they don’t get caught,” says Katie Stanford, cross country coach at Covenant College and one of the fastest at the Run Chattanooga events. “Because the Tough Love workouts stay in one area, as opposed to a group run where people can get spread out, everyone gets something different out of it as we work out together.”
Run Chattanooga hosts group runs with the staff of Front Runner Athletics several days a week, but Bird says the Tough Love workouts are her favorite. “I’m not a morning person. None of us are. I’d much rather sleep in. But on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I find myself bouncing out of bed looking forward to doing planks and push ups,” she says. “Not only have I gotten stronger and lost weight, but I’ve made new friends and met interesting people I never would’ve crossed paths with otherwise.”
To find out where the next Tough Love workout is, follow Run Chattanooga on Facebook (www.facebook.com/runnooga) or Twitter @runchattanooga.
Source: Run Chattanooga