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YMCAs have led community-based health and fitness for more than a century. Research continues to support the approach to health that YMCAs have taken since 1891 when Luther Gulick proposed the red YMCA triangle as a symbol of a person’s "essential unity – spirit, mind and body – each being a necessary and eternal part of man." Participation in Y health and fitness programs offer opportunities for friendship and community, a sense of well-being, self-confidence, and improved mental abilities and cognition – not to mention the obvious benefits of healthy hearts, lungs, bones and muscles.
Youth programs include preschool movement, youth fitness, teen fitness and kids’ gyms. Many Y child care programs incorporate health and fitness, too. YMCA Healthy Kids Day—the Ys’ annual, nationwide celebration of kids’ health in spirit, mind and body—brings family members together to learn how to live healthier lives.