Trim to Win for a healthier Mat-Su Valley

As your hometown newspaper, the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman challenges you on many levels. We challenge you to consider the facts behind local issues before voting. We challenge you to support your local sports teams, and hopefully we challenge you to care more about the community you live in.

Now we’re challenging you to lose weight.

The first Trim to Win community weight loss challenge begins today and we’re dangling a $3,000 carrot stick for the local person who loses the most weight by percentage. Second place will win $2,000 and third place, $1,000.

Television has tapped into America’s overindulgence with hit programs like “The Biggest Loser” and “Celebrity Fit Club,” where we watch as regular people and celebrities work to slim down and become healthier. Unlike a television program that can be consumed in 30- and 60-minute weekly bites, losing weight and achieving good health is not a spectator activity.

At the Frontiersman, we know many people use the start of a new year to renew commitments to lose weight and live healthier lifestyles. With an interactive Trim to Win community online at www.frontiersman.com, you won’t be alone in your efforts to lose weight. Follow Publisher Kari Sleight and Managing Editor Greg Johnson as they blog about their thoughts and experiences, and join other Trim to Winners on the community blog-spot.

Although designed to be fun, there are some very serious and real benefits from developing healthier lifestyles.

In Alaska 64 percent of the state’s adult population is either overweight or obese, reports Karol Fink, the state’s nutrition specialist for the Obesity Prevention and Control Program. It’s an epidemic that grows worse as the population ages. Of kindergartners and first-graders surveyed in a 1998-2003 study, 22 percent overall were found to be overweight or obese; for high schoolers, the figure was 27 percent.

“What we’re seeing nationwide is kids aren’t growing out of being overweight,” Fink said. “If they’re overweight when they’re young, the chance they will be overweight when they get older is greater.”

Sponsored by the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman, Mat-Su Regional Medical Center, AT&T Sports Center and Mat-Su Health Foundation, Trim to Win can be a great resource to begin or continue working toward your fitness goals. It’s free. Take advantage of the online community support and a weekly lecture series.

In this newspaper’s Friday health pages, look for updates from the online Trim to Win site and other helpful health and weight loss tips.

To borrow Nike’s famous catch phrase, just do it. There is still time for you to Trim to Win. Registration runs through Jan. 13 at www.frontiersman.com, Mat-Su Regional Medical Center Urgent Care Facility and AT&T Sports Center.