Barton Pond's First in Fitness Team will compete on March 12, 2025 (rain date: March 18, 2025) at Southeast Raleigh High School. 

Students were selected based on their performance, participation in PE, and demonstrated character. The school may take no more than one boy and one girl per grade-level for each event. 

More information is available at the links below:

"First In Fitness" began in 1982, involving eight elementary schools. Cary Senior High School was the initial site location and Terry Gannon (NC State basketball player) was the first guest speaker. Approximately three hundred students puffed, pulled, and sprinted through the six fitness events. In less than ninety minutes, the event was over. The message was clear - youth fitness was given community impetus through "First In Fitness" and was accepted as a meaningful educational experience. 

For years, we have tried the same fitness philosophy; that is, trying to achieve fitness goals by compelling children to exercise. As professional physical educators, we must recognize that "getting children fit" by itself is not the answer if children and youth do not develop the lifetime habits of physical activity. Our three program goals are listed below:

To help our students learn to be intelligent consumers who are active for a lifetime, we should: 

1. Develop Health-Related Fitness: Continue to provide students with in-class activities which are of sufficient frequency, intensity, and duration to build the health related components of fitness. 

2. Develop a Personal Fitness Plan: Focus on higher order objectives of physical fitness, including the development of fitness knowledge and personal fitness programming skills. 

3. Develop Skills for Advocacy: Education for fitness is the primary goal of "First In Fitness." Developing students into intelligent advocates of physical fitness implies more than simple physical stimulation. Students must be educated to make intelligent decisions about the quality of physical activities that will contribute to their health for the rest of their lives.