Fit City Project wants to make Winnipeggers healthier

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/02/2022 (1419 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CFL legend Milt Stegall and workplace health and wellness expert Jordan Cieciwa have a dream: they want Winnipeg to be one of the healthiest cities in Canada.

The two have teamed up to launch a program called the Fit City Project. They offer weekly challenges to encourage healthier habits, access to a library of content from wellness professionals, a Q & A session every other week with local experts, and more.

The project has no out-of-pocket costs to Manitobans with a valid health card, thanks to a partnership with MD Lifestyle Solutions.

To complement their mission, Cieciwa and Stegall will be writing a twice-monthly column that reinforces their message.

In this introduction, Cieciwa sets out some of the column goals.

● ● ●

If you are a football fan, you look forward to the first home game of the season almost as much as the players. Consider this our home opener for the Fit City Project. Former Blue Bomber great Milt Stegall and I have been working for years to build programs that get workplaces excited about taking care of the basics of health. Those programs, seminars and time engaging with people have taught us a lot about the state of the health and fitness field.

Milt and I are also committed to constantly learning. We admittedly have a small focus when it comes to health. It helps us reach our goals in certain privileged settings, but we intend to learn and grow when it comes to community health. We are grateful to Dr. Laura Bee, who will be proofing some of our articles and helping us with inclusive language and ideas. Dr. Bee has a PhD in medical microbiology, and is passionate about ensuring equity, inclusiveness and diversity in research design.

We are putting pen to paper to push back against the misconceptions that we see, misconceptions we feel are making healthy living more difficult than it needs to be.

You don’t need a gym to be fit, unless you love going. A walk will do more for your health than it gets credit for. It’s important that as a community we create safe, accessible spaces for everyone to be able to move.

The best bet for your health is to consult a professional. Creating access to culturally safe health professionals like your family doctor or the Aboriginal Health and Wellness Centre begins to build the base for trusted care. Good information, a safe space and support are the starting points for healthy living.

Food is fuel; that’s it. There are no heroes or villains in nutrition. We are going to focus on this a lot in our articles. Your best bet is to make an appointment with a registered dietitian, who will guide you in the direction of health.

We fully acknowledge that there are geographical barriers and financial challenges that many face that make our recommendations impossible. We acknowledge that our information-sharing on nutrition will assume a high level of privilege to take part in our suggestions.

There are many ways to be healthy — always keep that in mind. Our articles will be blending a pro athlete’s experience, such as Milt’s, with the input of a degree-holding healthy-living expert. Both of us consult experts in specific fields, take the information and let that form our daily activities.

We are excited to share our experience, build a community, engage with you the reader and hopefully help a lot of people live “simply healthy.” As we said, our goal is to grow from this as much as you. We are open to learning how to support more of the community we live in. We will be giving tips that fit into a typical 9-to-5 lifestyle, and assume access and means to engage specific health experts.

For more information check out fitcityproject.com and join our community. We are here to support you, connect you with passionate health professionals and challenge you to live “simply healthy.” You can also tweet at us; we love taking the discussion to social media: @FitCityJordan @MiltStegallTSN.