Friendly Fitness

With self-isolation and social distancing becoming the new normal, people are finding new ways to stay fit outside the gym.

Photos & Text By Nicole Ezeagwu

The closing of businesses except for essential services due to the corona virus has made the job of staying fit all the more difficult.  In two Georgia towns, people are turning to their local parks as a substitute for now shuttered indoor gyms, turning quiet trails into make shift aerobic studios.

At Stone Mountain Park in Dekalb County, Kalynne Coates, 23, a student at Georgia State University, and Faith Duffy, 22, a student at the University of West Georgia, meet once every other week to do a high-intensity interval training (HIIT) workout.

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USA, Stone Mountain, GA, April 17, 2020. Kalynne Coates and Faith Duffy participating in a partner workout that Kalynne put together for this week.

"It is important to get out in the sun with friends, but safely so that there is no risk to myself or others; especially my friends," said Duffy. Duffy wears a face mask for activities that don't require a sustained elevated heart rate. For the activities that do require Duffy to have an elevated heart, she positions herself far way from her partner and directs her breathing to one area.

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USA, Stone Mountain, GA, April 17, 2020. Kalynne Coates and Faith Duffy participating in a partner workout that Kalynne put together for this week.

Meanwhile, gyms and other workout facilities across the country are standing behind their members and pushing them to stay active during this time by offering live online workouts that can be done with little to no equipment necessary.

Kalyn Breeding, 27, a third grade teacher at a charter school in southeast Atlanta, used to attend Effect Fitness spin class and bootcamp three times a week. Now the gym provides live online workout sessions multiple times a day every day.

With workouts becoming virtual, Kalyn and a group of friends decided that every Saturday, they would meet at Kenwood Park in Fayetteville, Georgia, to conquer their brick bootcamp together with some fresh air.

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USA, Fayetteville, Georgia, April 18, 2020. Kalyn Breeding [left front row] and a group of friends who usually spend their Saturday mornings at Effect Fitness in Atlanta have since been meeting at Kenwood Park in Fayetteville, Georgia, to live stream the workout via Instagram to still get their workout in and socialize with one another.

Although they are less than six feet away from one another, the group place their bricks in a formation where no one is directly next to or behind another person. The group also picked a place in the park where they would be far away from where majority people pass by or socialize at.

Being that the park is one of the few places that have been left open for people to use as a way to come together and get out, it has also been the same place where suspicion and separation await.

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USA, Fayetteville, Georgia, May 3, 2020. Park goers wearing face mask while exercising to protect themselves.

"People's behavior has changed a lot. Many individuals have literally distanced themselves, physically and socially. Nobody speaks when passing next to each other. It can be a causal hey, hello, good morning, but instead, people walk with their head down holding their breath and trying not to breathe when passing bye. I typically speak when passing by people, but the same energy is not reciprocated all the time with others," said Coates.

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USA, Fayetteville, Georgia, May 3, 2020. Basketball courts in the park closed with the rims taken down.

Fayette County Parks and Recreation Athletic Coordinator, Matthew Powers stated that the county has taken all the necessary precautions to ensure social distancing rules are being followed. In addition to the measures that have been taken, the county has implemented officials to monitor the parks during its hours of operation.

So far, turning park space into temporary gym space has been permitted by park authorities, while officials have ruled other areas of the park off limits. After taping off the entrances to the courts, playgrounds, and picnic tables officials went as far as removing the basketball rims from the courts.

USA, Atlanta, Georgia, May 7, 2020. Gyms like Effect Fitness in Atlanta, Georgia have been hosting virtual workout sessions for their members during the pandemic. Photo © Nicole Ezeagwu 2020

USA, Atlanta, Georgia, May 7, 2020. Gyms like Effect Fitness in Atlanta, Georgia have been hosting virtual workout sessions for their members during the pandemic. 

For those who haven’t always used the parks, the experience with the pandemic has opened up a new vision of the importance of these outdoor spaces. With gyms opening back up in the foreseeable future, Breeding stated, "I do plan to incorporate outdoor workouts consistently.”