During our annual team meeting in January, we talked about the importance of exercise and how this has a profound impact on our daily lives.  We all decided that we would like to do more exercise and to also make sure that we are getting some fresh air during the working day.

Now that we are located in the heart of Cirencester, our choices to enjoy nature are endless.  We have access to several parks and fields – just taking a walk around the town can be refreshing sometimes, especially on Monday’s and Friday’s when the markets are on as it’s quite nice to have a nose around all the different stalls.

To try and make this a bit more fun, we decided to create a challenge to each complete 200,000 steps in 31 days.  This sounds like a huge number but when you break it down, it only equates to around 6,500 steps a day (easy peasy right?).  We started the challenge on the 20 January 2020 and whilst the completion date wasn’t until the 19 February 2020, we had all completed the challenge by 16 February 2020 – 4 days ahead of target!!

We used an App called ‘Stridekick’ where we were able to sync all our devices (FitBit, Apple Watch, Garmin etc) and monitor our progress.

It was great to set a goal and complete it, especially together as a team! Pretty much all of us had to change our routines to ensure that we achieved a minimum of 6,500 steps a day.  Whether that was getting to work earlier to walk in the mornings, or parking further away or even walking/running later in the evenings (picture Huw in his hi-vis jacket).  Despite this, everyone was determined to achieve this goal – no matter what that took! We even managed to capture some really awesome photos on our travels, from beautiful skies to frosty lakes to the eerie night sky.

Since doing this challenge, we have all felt much more energised and are keen to start the next one which is to…. complete 10,000 steps a day (gulp)! If any of you would like to set up your own challenge with your friends or family members, simply search ‘Stridekick’ on your smartphone app stores, create your accounts, sync your devices and away you go.  Please note that you will need to have compatible devices etc for this to be achievable.  If not then, head outside and enjoy the outdoors anyway!

Happy Stepping!