Game Time!
Interactive games and fitness are becoming a
hit with kids.
But how will they with adults in clubs?
April 1, 2007 – The school children, dressed
neatly in collared shirts and khaki slacks, line up
in rows of four with foam noodles in hand, patiently
awaiting their next drill.
When they get their cue, these well-mannered children
flip the switch and go into attack mode. The first kid
in line runs up to one of the four brightly colored
walls and takes aim.
Whack!
Later, after everybody's had their turn, the kids attack
the wall with rubber balls, a la dodgeball. The good
news is no children are harmed in this game.
In another room in the school, a group of younger children
try to keep step with an image on a TV screen. Other
kids pedal as fast as they can on interactive bikes.
One kid throws haymakers in an interactive boxing game.
The children are partaking in physical education classes
as part of the PE4life Academy at Woodland Elementary
School in Kansas City, MO. The way these kids exercise
now may be how they exercise in the future. And as this
active gaming trend grows, fitness club owners may have
to take a long look at incorporating interactive games
in their facilities.
“It is our contention, within three to five years,
there will be an interactive fitness area or room next
to every strength and cardio room in as many facilities
in the country as possibly can afford,” says one
gaming manufacturer, whose company expects its business
to more than triple this year.
Bringing video games into the fitness world appears
to be a no-brainer. According to the Entertainment Software
Association (ESA), computer and video game software
sales in the United States grew to $7.4 billion in 2006.
ESA also says that 69 percent of American heads of households
play computer and video games, and the average game
player is 33 years old. But for the time being, interactive
exercise equipment is being used primarily in kid-only
centers or the kids club sections of larger for-profit
clubs.
School children have been the focus of the importance
and usefulness of interactive gaming with fitness. Naperville
(IL) Community Unit School District 203 began using
interactive bikes hooked up to a video game about seven
years ago.
Phil Lawler, a Naperville middle school physical education
teacher and the district's physical education coordinator
at the time, wouldn't even buy video games for his own
kids. Now Lawler, the PE4life academy director, uses
the “enemy” as his ally.
“It is a total body workout, but the kids get
into it,” Lawler says. “You watch the kids
work out on this stuff, and they're laughing and smiling
while they do it. You go into a health club, and why
do we have TV screens in the health clubs? We're just
trying to distract them from their exercise. Well, this
really distracts them from their exercise.”
Naperville Central High School offers a learning readiness
physical education class to its freshmen in the first
hour of the day. The class has most of the latest interactive
equipment.
The early morning active gaming classes may be helping
to improve their brain skills and test scores. The school
studied how well 15 freshmen did in a second-hour literacy
class after exercising on the interactive equipment
compared to 15 freshmen who took literacy class in the
eighth hour of the day, long after their interactive
physical education class. The first group of freshmen
did far better in the second-hour literacy class than
the second group did in eighth hour.
“The improvement in the semester is about a half
year difference between those kids,” says Paul
Zientarski, the instructional coordinator for Naperville
Central's physical education, health and driver education
department.
Cross-lateral movements during these games are especially
important to brain improvement.
“We have lots of brain research that shows that
anytime you do a cardiovascular workout, you manufacture
new brain cells,” Zientarski says. “Anytime
you incorporate music and rhythm, that helps make the
neuro connections up in the brain. We're starting to
see improvement in test scores in reading and math as
a result of the kids using [interactive equipment] in
relationship to our P.E. classes. Besides being physically
fit, mentally, it's preparing them for the learning
process.”
Naperville isn't the only school district that's going
interactive. Sierra Vista Junior High School in Canyon
Country, CA, raised money in March for new interactive
equipment for its fitness center.
“We're hoping that other schools and other districts
will model what we're doing,” says George Velarde,
the Sierra Vista Junior High physical education department
chair.
Research from one interactive gaming equipment manufacturer
shows that its product can help children with autism,
attention deficit disorder and dyslexia. Children develop
these conditions, according to the research, from inactivity
in the early stages of life. This type of equipment
can help re-stimulate children or help them “catch
up” to where their development needs to be.
Besides brain function and classroom improvement, using
interactive equipment in exercise for school-age children
helps in other areas as well. Woodland Elementary saw
a 59 percent decrease in discipline incidents and a
67 percent decrease in out-of-school suspension days
from the 2004-2005 school year to the 2005-2006 school
year after PE4life introduced the active gaming equipment
to the school.
Lisa Witherspoon is a doctoral student at the University
of South Florida in Tampa, FL, researching interactive
equipment with elementary school children. Her subjects
often leave the lab, which substitutes as their P.E.
class, with faces red from exertion and making comments
about it being “the best P.E. class ever,”
she says.
“I've seen kids come in that are overweight or
maybe not the most athletic or maybe not the most competitive
and they have found success,” Witherspoon says.
“They're able to be in the same room with these
athletic kids that are great at team sports and be just
as good if not better at these interactive games, so
they can socially fit in with all ability levels.”
The fight against obesity is the primary objective
for most people associated with helping kids learn and
use interactive games with fitness. The obesity issue
is the main reason Ernie Medina, a preventative care
specialist, co-founded the XRtainment Zone in Redlands,
CA.
Unlike most interactive gaming centers such as Nexgym,
which has two locations in Texas, or Fitniks in Santa
Rosa, CA, or even the Energy Factory, a club in Tenafly,
NJ, which has since closed, the XRtainment Zone is available
for use by the entire family and promotes itself as
a family wellness and entertainment center.
In addition to video games, the XRtainment Zone offers
fitness classes, nutrition classes and health studies.
“We're sort of breaking ground in areas that haven't
really been tested yet,” Medina says. “All
of us are testing it all at the same time.”
Kevin Bolden is the president of the Nexgym facilities
in Southlake, TX, and Plano, TX. Bolden, who expects
to open 10 to 15 facilities this year across the United
States, says an owner of an interactive gaming center
could expect a return on investment between 30 percent
and 50 percent.
“It is a very profitable business,” Bolden
says. “The reason that it's profitable for us is
that we are a brand new model that targets a whole group
of kids that haven't been targeted before … only
children from ages 6 to 14.”
Several YMCAs are benefiting from the influx of active
gaming equipment, too. Billy George, the chief operating
officer of the YMCA of South Hampton Roads in Virginia
and North Carolina, says all 13 of his centers have
IZones, or interactive zones.
George credits these IZones for growth in membership.
In 2005, the YMCA of South Hampton Roads reported 28,140
units. In 2006, that number grew to 32,842, an increase
of 14 percent. There were also about half a million
new visits from 2005 to 2006, George says.
Many major fitness clubs have not totally embraced
the active gaming trend. Gold's Gym spokesperson Dave
Reiseman says that in most Gold's Gyms, kids can use
the gym at 14 years old if they are supervised and 16
years old if unsupervised.
“It's not something we've really integrated into
the gyms yet,” Reiseman says about active gaming,
“but by the same token, we're always evaluating
new technology, new equipment. Five years from now,
who knows?”
The XRtainment Zone sits on top of a 24 Hour Fitness,
which announced a partnership with an interactive game
company two years ago for the use of its product in
the 24 Hour Fitness kids clubs.
Spectrum Athletic Clubs, which has 22 clubs in Texas
and California, doesn't invest a lot in active gaming
equipment, according to Matthew Stevens, CEO of the
company.
“We have found that the key to the success of
[our kids clubs] starts with the programming directors,”
he says. “So we've invested significant money into
our people more than into an audio-visual solution.”
Besides, he adds, the active gaming systems are only
used when a club has the right people programming the
activity. That being said, the company does offer an
interactive gaming wall at some of its kids clubs and
offers large play structures at most.
Medina has noticed a problem when club owners or staff
members don't know how to use the interactive equipment.
“They'll get this piece of equipment. They'll
set it up in there,” Medina says. “But because
people are unfamiliar with it or don't know how to use
it, then it doesn't get used and it just takes up space.
People end up returning it, selling it or say, ‘See,
it doesn't work.’
“Because of that learning curve and the novelty
of it, you need to have somebody dedicated that could
either do classes or run people through it until it
finally got to the point where [it would be like] people
know how to use a treadmill.”
Bolden hires mostly high school and college-age people
at his Nexgym facilities.
“They are particularly effective because they
grew up with a lot of this technology, so they understand
it,” Bolden says. “They interact very well
with the age group of 6 to 14. The technology itself
is pretty intuitive. At birthday parties, kids have
to come in off the street and be up and running on this
equipment in seconds. In our design, it's intuitive
enough for them to do that. It doesn't take very long
for kids to pick it up and manage the technology on
their own. It seems to be faster for the kids than it
does for the adults.”
Brian Jaccoma, the fitness director at The Club@800
Squash & Fitness in Rye Brook, NY, is supportive
of the active gaming movement and has been in the market
for a piece of interactive equipment. Jaccoma wonders,
though, whether the cost of these types of games is
too expensive for clubs and schools.
An interactive dancing piece of equipment runs about
$500 to $600. Gaming bikes cost anywhere from $1,200
to $1,800. Some interactive systems could cost as much
as $7,000, and that does not include screens, TVs and
any other additional units. Another thing to keep in
mind: In 12 to 18 months, one manufacturer says, products
will have new technology.
Stephen P. Roma of Work Out World is interested in
putting interactive gaming equipment in the child-care
area at one of his clubs in Middlesex, NJ.
“If we can add value to the experience of the
child coming to the facility when mom and dad drop the
child off, the child is going to want to be there; the
mom and dad will want to be there,” Roma says.
“It's just a good environment full circle for us.”
However, Roma is not sure about adding interactive
equipment to the main part of his club. Roma doubts
that the 20-something or 30-something gamer crowd will
want to join a club simply because of the gaming equipment.
“Unless it's entertainment driven, I don't know
if I'm ready to buy into that,” Roma says. “I
don't think I would invest money in it at this point.”
In the future, though, club owners may have to tailor
interactive equipment for their adult members, many
of whom will have grown up exercising with all the games
they used to play as kids. So instead of the normal
background noise of treadmills running and barbells
clanging at clubs, you might hear more sounds like whack!
“It's not going to be enough that there's a TV
screen in front of them,” Bolden says about future
members. “Over time, I think you're going to see
a lot more interactive technology introduced into the
adult gym.”
Back to Press Center
|
