Corporate fitness has lately witnessed an upsurge in collective enthusiasm across cities from employees and their organizations to stay fit. This new wave has transcended beyond closed doors into mega sporting events. The recently concluded "The Fitness Premier League-Corporate Edition" (Corporate Fitness Challenge League), curated in Kolkata had enthusiastic takers. Corporate Citizen captures a glimpse of the event and on the concept with its curator Chinmoy Roy, Fitness and Strength trainer and former Coach at BCCI; along with runners-up, Sujoy Mukherjee, Principal Consultant-Advisory Services, PwC India and contestant Shromona Bose, Operations Head, IT, TCS
Corporate Fitness League - Kolkata"Corporate executives do pound the treadmill or take a leisurely stroll to nourish their health. However, this is a miniscule of the gamut. Although a lot of IT companies have installed workplace gyms, keeping the wellness of employees in mind, most of them gather dust for lack of footfalls”, said Chinmoy Roy, Kolkata-based fitness and strength trainer and former BCCI coach. He speaks from his experiences on the apathy amongst employees for on-going fitness as a way of life; this, despite available equipment and encouragement provided by their employers. The month-long sporting event saw Price water house Coopers (PwC) India, HSBC, Tata Steel, Tata Consultancy Services, Concentrix, Jet Airways vying for the winners’ trophy. “It was mighty competitive in the grand finale. The winner’s trophy went to Tata Steel. PwC were the runners-up and Tata Consultancy bagged the third place,” he said.
The event garnered support from sports personalities-Arun Lal, Jose Ramirez Barreto, Wriddhiman Saha, Sambaran Banerjee, Soumyadip Roy, Poulomi Ghatak, Shyam Thapa et.al. The Fitness Premier League – Corporate Edition is an offshoot of the Club Fitness Hunt that brings together participants from various elite social clubs across the city. Sulalit Biswas, CEO and Founder, Asia Sports Arena, a sports management company along with appropriate sponsors provided the much need thrust to take this event forward.
To fuel up the conceived idea, the ‘Corporate Fitness Challenge League’, a team of Chinmoy’s trainers lay siege at their designated corporate houses and held short workshops on health and fitness. “The workshops were on managing metabolic issues like diabetes, blood pressure, cholesterol and joint pain. Post the workshop they would conduct fitness tests based on very simple and easy exercises such as push-ups and jumping jacks for every employee to take a plunge," said Chinmoy. The workshops concluded by selecting the fittest male and female employees based on their test scores. The selected duo would then team up to represent their company in the grand finale. “On an average, 30 employees took part from each corporate in the prelims. In the second edition of the league (2018), we had 16 corporate houses as against 10 in the previous year of the corporate fitness challenge,” he added.
The grand finale comprised of a running and strength and endurance section. “In the running section, each of the selected corporate pairs -one male and a female had to run a distance of 10 meters from opposite ends carrying a small hoop. While they crossed each other, they had to exchange the hoop from one person to the other within 30 seconds. In the strength section, they had to rotate and throw a swiss ball (55 cm diameter) for 45 seconds. The male had to stand with his female colleague at a distance of 10 meters apart. The summation of the two exercise points determined the winning scores for the participants,” Chinmoy said.
On what kept the participating teams and corporate executives on their toes for the event and on their overall health and wellness, Chinmoy said, “One could see the exuberance of the employees during the month-long preliminary round-the teams were trained hard.”
Feedback from participants pinpointed on their realization that fitness training could be fun and that fitness could bring recognition and rewards. “To achieve that recognition, they had been training at least five days a week. Participants said that once they entered the office with their trophies, their colleagues would go berserk; their bosses flashed their pictures on their websites, and many felt that this yearly competition would definitely motivate them to stay in shape.”
“I believe people who love being fit and live a healthy lifestyle can always take out time to exercise for at least half an hour. If that doesn’t work out they can always take a step forward and start running every day for half an hour”
-Shromona Bose
Shromona Bose - Operations Head, IT TCSSujoy Mukherjee, Principal Consultant – Advisory Services PwC India and Shromona Bose, Operations Head, IT at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).
Sujoy Mukherjee: I became aware of the Corporate Fitness Hunt concept in 2017 when I worked-out under Chinmoy Roy and was completely impressed by the idea. Initially, I thought that engaging corporates in such an initiative would be challenging, considering their time constraints, willingness and availability. I think, convincing 20-odd corporates to participate in a large-scale fitness initiative, conducting fitness workshops at their facilities and enriching people with such great fitness knowledge is a unique initiative.
Shromona Bose: The Corporate Fitness Challenge is truly an amazing concept. Being fit and staying healthy is of utmost importance. It motivates you to come forward and do something for yourself too.
Sujoy: I always feel that physical fitness should be a very important aspect of one’s life. No matter how busy we are or professionally occupied in our lives When my co-workers call me “the fittest guy in our office,” I get motivated and always try to remain fit and healthy so that my mental and physical co-ordinates always work well.
Shromona: Yes, it did. Physical and mental fitness play very important roles in our lives and people who are both, physically and mentally fit are less prone to medical conditions as well. I’ve always been a fitness enthusiast. It always feels great and it’s also fun to participate in such competitions.
Sujoy: Honestly, I had never done such unique and brilliant exercises in the past and would definitely want to continue doing them in the office to remain fit and healthy. Last year I could not qualify due to a small margin but this year I secretly vowed that there will be no stopping me and I will make sure to bring the cup for PwC.
Shromona: Yes, I did, and think such exercise regimes can help employees improve their physical strength, stamina, and general wellbeing.
Runners-up - Sujoy mukherjee - Principal Consultant Advisory Services - PwC IndiaSujoy: Our organization emphasizes a lot on health and wellness initiatives. We have a fairly huge and modern gym with equipment and facilities. A dedicated trainer comes in daily to guide us on the right kind of posture and exercises. Apart from this, our HR and Business Services team too conduct various monthly health and wellness initiatives.
Shromona: These days corporate houses are coming forward and taking the initiatives for employees to keep fit.
Sujoy: Most of us work to tight timelines and because the nature of our work does not permit us to miss our deadlines, having a gym at our own office is undoubtedly a boon. We, therefore, do not have to additionally dedicate time to visit a gym and train ourselves
Shromona: I believe people who love being fit and live a healthy lifestyle can always take out time to exercise for at least half an hour. If that doesn’t work out they can always take a step forward and start running every day for half an hour. I’m sure they can do this much at least.
Sujoy: My colleagues and internal Sports Council Committee Chief, were highly overwhelmed and happy about our victory and encouraged others to participate in such initiatives in the future. The trophy occupies a deserving position in the Awards and Accolades section in our office.
Shromona: They all were quite excited, and it really feels great to motivate people to do something good for themselves.
By Sangeeta Ghosh Dastidar
