How to Design an Outdoor Fitness Course

An outdoor fitness center is a welcome addition to many communities. They provide residents in a variety of age groups with a space to exercise and keep fit while enjoying all the benefits of being outdoors. Among these benefits is a chance to connect with nature, enjoy fresh air, and spend time in the sun.

Whether you’re looking to set up an outdoor fitness course in a park, along a jogging trail, outside an apartment complex, or strategically within a neighborhood, the following tips will help you design an outdoor fitness course that supports the health and wellness of your entire community.

1. Identify Your Audience and Their Fitness Goals

Outdoor fitness stations and exercise areas in public spaces are open to all community members. However, a proper design accounts for the specific demographics you’re targeting. You must define what fitness equipment and products each group needs.

For instance, if many children will frequent the outdoor fitness area, then it’s best to include child-friendly exercise equipment. If you expect older adults to use the park most often, it’s best to provide spaces that facilitate socialization. It’s also ideal to speak to your target audience to get their views and equipment recommendations before diving fully into the planning and design phase.

Further, outdoor gyms should be accessible and inclusive to people with disabilities, and they should allow space and include accommodations for wheelchairs and other mobility devices.

2. Evaluate the Location and Space

Outdoor fitness areas can technically be any outdoor space with gym equipment, but they are generally categorized into two main categories based on the location and placement of equipment. These include:

• Centralized outdoor gyms: These fitness courses are located in open public places such as parks with multiple equipment pieces and amenities like comfortable seating. They’re also near parking lots and children’s play areas for convenience and to encourage more people to work out.
• Trail fitness stations: These are more spaced-out gym options where equipment pieces are lined along a jogging, running, biking, or hiking trail. They motivate people already exercising to take a break, stretch, and practice strength training for a more comprehensive workout.

The location of your outdoor gym determines the traffic you’ll be getting and how helpful it is to the community. The routing and zoning of the gym, therefore, should follow the natural flow of foot traffic and leave ample space for the equipment and people to exercise comfortably.

Consider the following points and steps when building your outdoor gym area:

• Provide easy access: Build the gym near parking lots or other workout facilities, like trails, pools, tennis, and basketball courts.
• Level the ground: Ensure a relatively flat surface and good drainage to prevent water ponding, which may ruin the equipment and be a safety hazard.
• Install surfacing: Add comfortable and shock-absorbing surfaces, such as rubber surfacing or loose-fill surface material.
• Provide shade: Keep some nearby trees and add shade structures to help protect the equipment and people from the sun.
• Include site amenities: Add site furnishings like benches, picnic tables, and bike racks for maximum comfort.

3. Find the Right Fitness Equipment and Products

With so many fitness equipment options, you must choose the best products and equipment for your target audience.  It’s best to choose fitness equipment and products that target different muscle groups, including the back, shoulders, core, and legs. You also need to make sure the equipment is durable and able to withstand exposure to sunlight, rain, snow, and wind.

Overall, your selection should promote whole-body fitness and accommodate various fitness and skill levels. Some examples of fitness equipment worth including in your outdoor fitness course are:

• Muscle fitness equipment such as endurance, strength, and resistance machines
• Balance and stretching machines such as balance beams
• Upper-body training equipment like monkey bars, pull-ups, challenge ladders, traverse bars, and parallel bars
• Body weight exercise equipment such as cargo nets and arch ladders

4. Keep Safety and Ease of Use in Mind

When planning and designing fitness spaces, you must prioritize the users’ safety. One of the main ways to enhance the safety of an outdoor gym is to include proper signage. The signage should inform users of the rules of the outdoor fitness area and directions for equipment usage. It’s best to include signage interpreted in different languages and use images to overcome language barriers and confusion.

Install safety barriers around the outdoor gym, especially if it’s in close proximity to a playground. Barriers also help protect the equipment, discourage unauthorized access, and discourage vandalism. Finally, be sure to include proper lighting, like floodlights, to provide security, especially if people could be working out after dark.

5. Market Your Outdoor Fitness Course

Once your outdoor fitness course is up and running, the next step is to find ways to invite the community to get fit and healthy. A good place to start is by organizing a grand opening celebration that you promote to the local community and encourages people to come, see, and test out the equipment. Your marketing efforts should continue after the grand opening on your website and social media pages and distribute flyers to the residents of the community you’re targeting.

Hosting group workouts and organizing community events and fundraisers are also effective ways to attract more clients and retain the current ones. Providing the best services to your outdoor fitness and exercise trails also helps you leverage word-of-mouth marketing. With the right equipment and safety standards in place, more people will gladly speak about your gym to their friends and family, encouraging them to come to train there.

Build Healthy Communities With Little Tikes Commercial

The quality of your outdoor exercise equipment will help attract and maintain consistent traffic to the course. By providing your community with a variety of well-made equipment options, you can give them more of a reason to visit your outdoor gym.

At Little Tikes Commercial, we’re experts in designing and manufacturing outdoor equipment for recreational areas for kids and adults. We can help you create an outdoor fitness course that encourages your community to get healthy and spend time outdoors.

Check out our fitness equipment options today to find the perfect fit for your space. Contact us to request a quote or find a rep near you to get started creating an inclusive outdoor fitness course.