As a way to kick off American Heart Month and hoping to break a Guinness World Record, hundreds of students at Van Nuys Middle School took part this Monday in the "Jamba Jump Day". Across the state, more than 500 other schools and some 83,000 people took part in the event, said organizers of the event, which included Jamba Juice and the California Association for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance
Just before 9 a.m., students and their teachers poured out onto the basketball courts at Van Nuys Middle School and formed groups of twos. Then, as P.E. teacher Barry Bialik counted down from 10 the shortest member of the team took a jump rope and began jumping.
The idea was for the students to solo skip, double dutch and jump for 10 minutes.
Kids at the school took to the event with "heart." As loud, high intensity music blared from speakers, 11-year-old Marc Rodriguez took a rope handed by his teammate and rapidly began jumping without stopping for about three minutes.
When his turn was over, panting after the effort, Rodriguez said it was fun taking part in the event.
"It's good, but it was hard to jump all that time. But I like to jump," said the sixth-grader.
With the event, CAHPERD hoped to jump ahead of Australia in the Guinness World Record category of "Most People Jumping/Skipping Rope at the Same Time". Australia's record was 59,000 skippers and was set in 2008.
It was also a way to promote health and fitness, said Marci Coulson, spokesperson for the event.
"With jump rope optimizing cardiovascular conditioning, maximizing athletic skills, burning calories and allowing jumpers to get their heart pumping in a fun, entertaining, enjoyable way, CAHPERD and Jamba Juice hope to remind people that this is an easy activity that doesn't require a lot of money or athletic skill and you can do it anytime, anywhere", she said.
Jumping, she noted, is an easy way to tackle one of today's major health crisis childhood obesity. In California, over 28% of children are considered severely overweight or obese; 32% among ethnic populations, according to CAHPERD. Being overweight makes those children prone to serious health problems, including diabetes, high blood pressure and asthma. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) scientists recently predicted that 30 percent of U.S. children born in 2000 will develop Type 2 Diabetes in their lifetimes. If left unchecked, Diabetes can lead to complications such as heart disease/attacks, kidney failure, blindness, strokes, and amputations.
Van Nuys Middle School teacher Jim Clemmensen, who helped organize the event at the school, echoed those words.
"We want to show kids there are many different ways to get your body healthy," he said. "And jumping rope is very appropriate for kids this age. It promotes agility, coordination and gets the heart beat going."
