“Everything [this year] is about making fitness fun,” said Jenna Autuori-Dedic, senior fitness editor at Fitness Magazine, “when you work out with friends, you don’t realize you’re working out…You don’t have to choose between working out and meeting your friends, you can do both.”
Autuori-Dedic also points to Mud Runs as a big 2012 fitness trend, with obstacle-style races competitions like Tough Mudder expected to grow in popularity in 2013.
Another big trend from 2012 and ushering in 2013 is interval-style, 30-minute workouts that train the body for everyday living, like CrossFit, which take the rat out of the traditional gym and put him or her in a hard-core, body sculpting class that gets pretty fast results. And if the numbers tell anything it’s that CrossFit is huge, hooking over 4,000 participants in 2012 and steadily on the rise.
“We’re finally getting smart about what functional exercise actually is,” says Richard Cotton, national director of certification programs for the American College of Sports Medicine. “Simpler and basic, [and] easier to do at home.”
Fitness apps are also a huge draw for 2013, with trainers live-streaming workouts and putting things on Twitter, iTunes, and everywhere online.
“[In 2013], with our smart phones we can log in at any time and see how we’re doing every step of the way,” says Autuori-Dedic.
Source: Reuters
Image source: Shutterstock
