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In the high-tech digital world of BlackBerrys, digital video recorders and video games galore, it was only a matter of time before fitness jumped on the bandwagon.

Local gyms and personal trainers are starting to use active gaming – also known as interactive fitness, exergaming, or virtual fitness – as a way to encourage more people to work out. The concept involves working out with systems such as the Wii Fit, Dance Dance Revolution and bicycles with television screens that lead you down virtual paths, where the exerciser’s movement with a control device or on a special electronic mat is mimicked on screen.

Hubbell Realty Co. has gone the furthest in this direction in Central Iowa, dedicating an entire room to interactive exercise games at its new 7 Flags 24/7 X-Press franchise in the company’s GreenWay Crossing development in West Des Moines. Its eight pieces of interactive equipment include a treadwall, kickboxing game and an XRBoard that allows users to skateboard or snowboard down a virtual route.

Personal trainers, such as Jen Childress of Patina Esprit Wellness, also are starting to incorporate virtual fitness systems such as the Wii Fit into their routines, but more traditional gyms are reluctant to follow the trend due to the space needed and cost. However, many experts in the fitness world believe this is where fitness is heading in the future.

“I think it’s a big part of how people are moving, because it’s meeting people where they’re at, what grabs their attention,” Childress said.

A moving force

Video game software sales in the United States rose 15 percent last year, with the Wii Fit being the third top seller with 4.55 million units sold. As of October 2008, Espresso Fitness had sold 4,000 of its bicycle systems with television screens.

The concept of active gaming began as a way to get children to exercise while playing video games instead of just sitting. But the systems also are becoming attractive for adults, especially people who don’t have the motivation to work out on traditional machines and are looking for an easy and fun way to burn calories.

“They come here and it’s new and fresh to them,” said Jamie Daum, manager of the 7 Flags 24/7 X-Press in West Des Moines.

Hubbell and 7 Flags worked with iTech Fitness Inc.., one of the largest manufacturers of active gaming equipment, to create an XRKade, becoming one of more than 50 recreation centers, private clubs, schools and YMCAs in the nation to have a licensed XRKade.

“We were trying to do something that was very different in the marketplace,” said Kelly Sharp, vice president of retail operations for Hubbell. “There’s lots of fitness centers out there, and how can we be different, and this I think fits the bill.”

The 1,000-square-foot room is part of a 6,400-square-foot gym that has the traditional treadmills, elliptical machines and weights. The XRKade is separated with doors that are locked when a supervisor is not present. Anyone can get an orientation on how to use the games, and as a personal trainer, Daum has started incorporating some of the equipment into his routine, such as using the treadwall for upper-body strength training, the kickboxing station for cardio and flexibility, the Espresso bikes for endurance and the XRBoard for balance.

With about 300 members signed up so far at 7 Flags, Daum said all age levels use the room, from a 63-year-old client who wants to work on balance on the XRBoard to a 6-year-old girl who uses Dance Dance Revolution. The Espresso bikes are popular with avid cyclists, and one family has started having a “family night” at the gym every Wednesday. Daum also is trying to sell the idea to businesses that they can rent out the room for team-building activities, as well as to families for birthday parties.

Sharp said Hubbell and 7 Flags chose equipment that was the most popular. Though some of the games were more expensive than traditional equipment, Sharp said adding more traditional pieces to fill the space would have made up the difference in cost.

Wii Fit revolution

The Nintendo Wii system helped bring the active gaming trend to the forefront by creating one of the first interactive gaming consoles. As the Wii Fit system becomes more of a staple in people’s homes, Childress, who founded her in-home wellness and exercising business last summer, has seen it as a way to boost her personal training routines.

“A lot of times, my clients say they feel selfish for working out and not including their kids or taking time for themselves,” Childress said. “It’s a way to bring your family into it and a way to just add variety.”

However, after trying a Wii Fit last fall and buying one for herself this winter, she realized that much of the strength training, yoga, balance and cardio exercises don’t provide an intense workout. So she created a routine where in between strength training exercises, she has clients do bursts of cardio such as a boxer shuffle or jumping jacks.

She uses the system with two of her seven clients right now, one of whom, Lucinda Sperry, has been using it once or twice a week.

“It’s fun and it’s for all levels,” Sperry said. “In the end, I get a workout, and my daughters get to have fun and play and work out with me.”

Drawback

Some more traditional gyms are reluctant to invest too much in virtual fitness systems because of the amount of space the units take up, the cost to purchase them and because it is hard to get more than one or two people involved in the systems at a time.

Terry Feldt, director of the Walnut Creek YMCA, said his gym has four traditional and two recumbent bikes with the television screens, but otherwise the gym is “sitting back and seeing what happens with some of that stuff.”

He said the cost for each bike was more than a traditional stationary bike but less than a treadmill. Though families and avid cyclists seem to prefer the new bike systems, Feldt said he was hesitant to buy more active gaming devices, because most of the systems can be used by only one person at a time. “I think as the technology evolves and fits into what we’re trying to do, we’ll definitely look at it,” he said.

Space is a big issue for a lot of the equipment, with an article published in the Florida Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation, Dance & Sport Journal saying that gyms need 1,500 square feet of permanent space to fit in 25 stations to create an exergaming room. Costs for start-up equipment can range from $60,000 to $70,000, according to the article.

Luke Aduddell, vice president of sales at fitness at Aspen Athletic Clubs, said cost and space were the two biggest reasons his club hasn’t gone that direction yet.

“Our clubs are not built to have spaces for all that stuff,” he said. “We may look at it for new facilities we put up, but for our current ones, not at this time.”