November Project aims to remove financial, motivational barriers to exercise

It's7:32 a.m.The hour-longNovember Projectworkout is over. My chest is wet and dirty from doing burpees. My shin is bleeding from falling on the hill climb. But it was well worth it: Endorphins are flowing, I saw the sunrise, and I just hugged a dozen strangers. Together, more than 150 of us worked hard to get fit in Victoria's Beacon Hill Park.

The November Project is a free, group-fitness program that started in Boston as a way to stay fit during cold-weather months.

Biologists say we experiencean increase in feel-good hormones through group activities like laughter, exercise, music and dancing.For example, a2010 studyin Biology Letters showed that rowers who exercised in a group had a higher level of pain tolerance compared to rowers who exercised alone. The theory isthat group exercise heightens the production of certainchemicals. But scientists only tested athletesafterthe exercise was completed.

On this chilly December morning, I'm not feeling my endorphins kickin. My current circumstance involves 25-year-old girls in yoga pants and 45-year-old men sporting headlamps kicking my butt on the hill climb. Every former high-performance athlete gives a special gift whenever they enter anything mildly competitive. It doesn't matter if I lose a rowing race, a running race, a darts game or a French spelling bee the victor can exclaim, "I just beat an Olympic gold medallist!" I digest a slice of humble pie as I grind towards the body in front of me, grateful for some extra group motivation.

Rumon Carter, atrained lawyer and a wilderness running enthusiast, encouraged me to join the group.He founded this local sweat project with Jason Ball, a local boot camp leader, and Shannon Kane, a former Canadian national team rugby player.Their goal?To build a greater sense of community.

Bojan Mandaric and Brogan Graham, the November Project's founders from Boston,led this morning's workout.The former collegiate rowers came up with the idea on aNovember night in 2011 while looking for motivation to stay fit following their varsity years.

"I'm a fat-ass," Mandaric explains candidly when I ask how the November Project got started. "I wasn't rowing for the (Serbian) national team anymore. I was just sitting on my ass, playing video games and eating my wife's delicious cooking. I would gain 20 to 30 pounds [over the winter]. Spring would roll around, and I would start working out again."

Concept spread quickly

To break this cycle of flabbiness, Mandaric and Graham made a pact: To meet for a workout at6:30 a.m.every day. "We went through the whole month of November, and we were like, 'This is kind of fun,'" Mandaric recalls in his faint Serbian accent. "As you know, rowers have to track everything they do, so we created a Google spreadsheet. Brogan called it the November Project. That spring, we started inviting friends. Those friends brought friends. Four years later, here we are in Victoria, our 27th city."

After the first Boston "tribe" took shape, other cities soon followed: San Francisco,Madison, Wis.,andEdmonton.

Part of the November Project's success is that is addresses some fundamental barriers that stop us from exercising, like weather or financial cost. Arecent studypublished by the American Heart Association showed that heart failure patients had more success maintaining health when they had lower barriers to exercise. All November Project workouts are free. They're also "weather-proof", encouraging all participants to show up rain, snow or shine.

Former physicist and national-class runner, Alex Hutchinson now writes ablogabout the science of training and fitness. "Exercising with partners or in groups has all sorts of benefits that have nothing to do with neuroscience, from the simple act of committing to meet someone to the pleasures of gossiping during a workout. But the endorphin findings help explain how exercise is transformed from a chore to a lifelong habit."

"Last fall in Boston we had a workout where we had 1,400 people before work," Graham adds. "We just hosted our third November Project Leadership Summit in Utah, where we had 26 city leaders and 600 people overall."Endorphinproduction or not, this movement motivates large groups of people to healthier lifestyles.