#Fit2Farm – Physical Fitness

And we’re off!

Welcome to the Future Farmers of Yorkshire #Fit2Farm. Over taim is to bring the farming community together, as we consider what it means to be “Fit to farm”. We’ll celebrate and share ways to improve our mental wellbeing, consider our responsibilities as employers and look at farm safety. But to begin we’re considering physical health!

As we all know, staying active is incredibly important for our health. The NHS suggest adults should do 2 hours of physical activity per week. However, we also know that sometimes doing physical activity slips down our ‘to do’ list and our busy lives get in the way. We hope that some of the ideas we share might help.

After Eliud Kipchoge smashed the 2 hour barrier running the marathon, we may feel a little silly celebrating our own, smaller achievements. But we shouldn’t. After all we can’t all be Kenyan superhumans, but we can all take steps to improve our physical fitness (and it needn’t involve lyrca or protein shakes!)

With that in mind we’ve set up a Strava club: Fit2Farm. By downloading the Strava app it’s possible to monitor physical activity (walking, running and cycling) using your phone. By joining the Strava club Fit2Farm you can share your progress, motivate and support one another. Find the Strava club here or search Fit2Farm within the club section of the app.

The couch to 5k program (developed with the NHS) is a wonderful way to begin running. It provides 1:1 coaching by celebrities Jo Whiley, Sarah Millican, Sanjeev Kohli or Michael Johnson. This is the program some of our Management Board be sweating, gasping and cursing their way through over the next few weeks! It’s available as a podcast or as a downloadable app

Before increasing your level of physical activity, it may be a good idea to get a health check from a medical professional. In fact, getting a regular “MOT” is a good way of picking up physical health problems before they become more serious. The Yorkshire Rural Support Network will be running FREE Winter Health check at auction marts and farming events throughout the winter months.

However you aim to improve your health, be it attempting to run 5k, digging the bike out from the back of the shed, or committing to walking the dog an extra half mile, we’d love to hear all about it! Use the #Fit2Farm hashtag on Twitter and Facebook, comment on our posts or tag us in! Let’s support each other to get #Fit2Farm!

28th October 2019