Welcome to the World of peerFitting

With school and work taking full speed once again, we must all say goodbye to summer until next year. But what we must hold on to is that time we set aside for ourselves each day. A group fitness class can last 30 minutes long, if that is all the time you’ve got in a busy day.

This week, I found myself busier than usual and so I challenged myself to make fitness fit into my schedule each day. I lifted weights for 30 minutes on Sunday, followed by a quick jog around my neighborhood. On Monday, my roommate and I did a number of different exercises on our living room floor. On Wednesday, I squeezed in a 45-minute spin class at Gainesville Health and Fitness and on Thursday, I did a 30-minute “lower body blast” at UF’s Student Rec and Fitness Center followed by some abdominal exercises I did on my own.

With a short group fitness class, you can push yourself to even greater limits, and you can get the most out of your free time. Especially during these busy times of year, it is important that we all remember to include that time for ourselves each day. Group fitness classes are the perfect added element to that busy schedule. They relieve stress, burn calories, and increase endorphins, to help get you through the day!

Check out peerFit to find the class that will best fit your busy schedule this week! Now, you can send yourself a text message reminder for the class, so you really can’t forget!

Last Sunday, June 3^rd, the peerFit team took on the University of Florida campus with a bucket of chalk and a mission to get the peerFit word out on the street, literally.

Throughout the week, the Builders team worked on composing city profiles for several cities in the United States, as potential targets for the next peerFit invasion.

Columbia, South Carolina is currently one of our top choices. With a diverse population in terms of ethnicity and a large percentage of 18-65 year olds in the city, Columbia proves to be an active city. The 18-65 generation is typically found at the gym and in fitness classes, which is exactly what peerFit is looking for. Not to mention, this city has quite the selection of chain gyms that are centrally located.

Minneapolis, Minnesota is another top choice of the Builders’ team. University of Minnesota, located in Minneapolis, is the fourth largest university in the country, with five different recreational centers on campus. This city is also said to have the highest amount people are willing to pay for a gym membership, this speaks strongly to peerFit, as we search for our group fitness experts.

Austin, Texas also serves as a top choice for group fitness experts. As the 14^th most populated city in the United States, with more than 700,000 people, Austin is home to a wide range of types of people. With several chain gyms in the city, as well as privately owned studios, the opportunity to engage in group fitness is readily available to Austin’s large population.

As the peerFit team moves on the research process, we will consider cities such as, Charlotte, North Carolina, Wilmington, North Carolina and Tallahassee, Florida. We know from experience that private gyms in cities such as these are more likely to push peerFit to their members because they are competing with other gyms in the area.

In other news, the Socialites team is busy working towards their long-term goal to create one big engine for social media, so that peerFit’s Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr accounts work together as one. With that goal in mind, they have created five distinct categories of posts to abide by.

Last, but certainly not least, the Storytellers are here to give you the scoop. This past week stories were written on the general group fitness buzz in Gainesville, and also what fitness junkies are saying about competition. Look out for some new ones next week!

That’s a rap for this week’s peerFit update. Check out next week’s to find out what’s happening.

With a strong presence in the weight room, Brian Gaputis never considered himself out of shape. That is until he attended Body By Boris boot camp.

“It was truly eye opening my first day when I realized that I couldn’t even come close to keeping up with some of the other people who had been doing the program for a few months,” Brian said.

Brian said the workout was so intense; he almost quit and walked away on his first day.

“The only thing that prevented me from doing that was saving myself the embarrassment of looking like a total wuss in front of all the cute girls,” Brian said.

Brian realized that all the work he had done prior was not really making him fit, and group fitness would be inky way to really get a good workout and get in shape.

Body By Boris ignited a passion for group fitness in Brian.

“Just realizing how much I looked forward to going to boot camp each day made it easy to see that this was truly something that I loved doing and was passionate about,” Brian said.

Brian now works as a personal trainer at Body By Boris, and just received a degree from UF in Applied Physiology and Kinesiology, with hope to further his career in fitness and training.

Brian said his advice for future group participants is to just jump in and try it.

“I thought I had nothing to lose and that one simple decision to just get my butt out there and try it truly changed my life,” Brian said.

Brian said the opportunity to make friends along the way has made his group fitness experience really come full circle.

“You will make some of the best friends you might never have had as well as push yourself harder than you ever would,” Brian said, “You have nothing to lose and everything to gain, so get after it.”