Boulder One of Most Fitness-Friendly Cities for 2018

With Boulder’s walking, biking and hiking trails, it’s no surprise the city made the SmartAsset top 10 list of places for physical fitness.

But here’s what is surprising: as fitness and healthy-eating oriented as Boulder’s culture is, the city ranked only No. 10 on SmartAsset’s fourth annual study of the most fitness-friendly places in America.

According to the study, nine other cities are more fitness-friendly than this biking-hiking-running-skiing-walking-climbing loving town.

SmartAsset describes fitness-friendly cities as those that tend to be walkable, offer few fast food eateries and plenty of healthier eating restaurants, and present plenty of places to workout in. Having ample workout facilities overcomes crowded or far away gyms that can deter people from exercising regularly.

Boulder scores in the top 15 for the percent of residents who walk or bike to work and the number of fitness professionals per 10,000 residents. In fact, Boulder has a top 25 score in the number of fitness businesses. However, the cost of getting fitness help from a professional lowered Boulder’s overall score. The city ranks 337 out of 340 for the affordability of professional fitness help.

In No.1-ranked Missoula, Montana, residents walk or bike to work at a rate of around one in 11. The city’s transportation design makes walking or biking not only possible, but enjoyable.

With two Iowa cities in the top 10 – No. 3 Iowa City and No. 9 Ames – it’s clear that Iowans are doing a lot right when it comes to fitness. Around 11 percent of Iowa City residents walk or bike to work – the fifth-highest rate in the study, according to SmartAsset.

The top 10 cities are:

1.       Missoula, Montana
2.       La Crosse-Onalaska, Wisconsin-Minnesota
3.       Iowa City, Iowa
4.       Ocean City, New Jersey
5.       Bend-Redmond, Oregon
6.       Napa, California
7.       State College, Pennsylvania
8.       Harrisonburg, Virginia
9.       Ames, Iowa
10.      Boulder, Colorado

Data for 340 metros was analyzed by SmartAsset to determine America’s most fitness-friendly cities. Metrics include the percent of those who walk or bike to work, number of fitness jobs, cost of hiring a personal fitness instructor, number of fitness establishments and prevalence of fast food restaurants. The final factor – fast food eateries – is calculated as a negative.

Get all the details on each city at https://smartasset.com/mortgage/fitness-friendly-places-2018

Originally posted here by Tom Kalinski Founder RE/MAX of Boulder on Friday, April 20th, 2018 at 10:40am.