- Go for Bold is a health initiative launched by Healthy Washington County to address high rates of chronic illness in the area.
- The program aims to help residents lose a collective one million pounds by 2030 through fitness, nutrition, and community support.
- Hub City Nutrition partners with Go for Bold to offer free workouts, nutrition coaching, and wellness workshops.
- Sandy Alton, a participant in the program, has lost 40 pounds and experienced significant improvements in her health and energy levels.
In late 2023, Sandy Alton realized she had a problem.
“My health started declining,” said the community navigator with Meritus Health. “I was gaining a lot of weight. My energy level was bottoming out.”
According to a community announcement, feeling sorry for herself and not knowing what to do, she turned to a program she’d actually been sharing with patients and co-workers: Go for Bold.
The Go for Bold initiative was started by Healthy Washington County, a coalition of public and private organizations, including Meritus, with a mission to strengthen the health and wellness of the community and its residents.
The initiative was sparked after a Community Health Needs Assessment found Washington County residents had high rates of chronic illness, such as diabetes, heart disease and high blood pressure, among others.
The goal of the initiative is to lose 1 million pounds as a community by 2030 by encouraging activity, healthy diet and accountability. So far, more than 163,000 pounds have been lost, according to the program’s online weight tracker.
Alton started by clicking on the link for fitness classes, which advertised a free fit camp held twice a week.
Greg Alton, who has had heart surgery himself and needed to get into better shape, agreed to join his wife.
It was at the fitness classes where they met Sheriff “Reef” Taiwo and Jetaine “Jet” Hart, who operate Hub City Nutrition.
The couple partnered with Healthy Washington County to offer the free community workouts about two years ago.
Taiwo and Hart left Prince George’s County for Hagerstown with the goal of making the community healthier. Using statistics compiled by the state, they learned that Washington County was at the bottom of most Maryland counties’ lists when it came to health.
Hub City Nutrition also provides nutrition and wellness coaching. For example, they have a 21-day challenge that is meant to provide accountability along with nutrition coaching by offering meal guides, prizes and workouts. It all fits in with Go for Bold.
Hub City Nutrition recently started hosting monthly wellness workshops. This not only offers meal and workout advice, but participants get on the scale to track their progress.
Sandy Alton said, “I’ve lost 40 pounds and my energy is through the roof. I can’t say enough about the good things it’s done for my life.”
To learn more about Go for Bold, go to healthywashingtoncounty.com/goforbold.
This story was created by Janis Reeser, [email protected], with the assistance of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Journalists were involved in every step of the information gathering, review, editing and publishing process. Learn more at https://cm.usatoday.com/ethical-conduct/.
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