Maria Shriver and Equinox Sports Clubs, the high performance lifestyle leaders in health and fitness, have a newly expanded MOVE FOR MINDS experience scheduled for Sunday, June 4, bringing together women across the country to increase awareness of Alzheimer’s as a women’s disease and raise necessary research funds to find a cure for it.
“Women have worked for centuries to be recognized for our minds, and now we’re losing them to Alzheimer’s,” said Shriver, founder of Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement. “That’s what makes Alzheimer’s the ultimate women’s empowerment issue. Women’s minds matter, and we must mobilize now to save them.”
“As leaders in high performance living, we are tremendously proud to once again partner with Maria and MOVE FOR MINDS,” said Scott Rosen, President and Chief Operating Officer, Equinox. “Our members live a high performance lifestyle and are passionate about keeping both their bodies and minds in the best shape possible, and MOVE FOR MINDS reflects that passion.”
For the first time Equinox clubs in Dallas and Miami join those in New York, Los Angeles, Orange County, San Francisco, Boston and Washington, D.C., as epicenters of the nationwide initiative. Sign-ups for the June 4 event at are now underway here.
In this year’s event, participants will take part in a brand new, specially designed and fully integrated workout that will challenge them physically while sparking neural activity in the brain. The MOVE FOR MINDS WORKOUT was created by Equinox top tier coaches with deeply vetted expertise on how the brain learns and grows. It’s a breakthrough program designed to deliver not only results, but dramatic improvements in quality of life.
Leading journalists Maria Shriver, Andrea Mitchell, Hoda Kotb, Jackie Nespral, Sonia Azad, Jessica Aguirre, along with national Alzheimer’s activists Leeza Gibbons and Lisa Genova will host panel discussions in each city with over 40 of the nation’s top experts in fitness, food, nutrition, stress, sleep, meditation and caregiving. Panelists include brain scientists Reisa Sperling, Daniel Amen, Dena Dubal, Adam Gazzaley, Josh Grill, Richard Isaacson and Wendy Suzuki, among others. Move for Minds also assembles brain healthy lifestyle experts including Bob Roth, Katy Bowman, Moll Anderson, Mallika Chopra, Dr. Pamela Peeke, and Kimberly Snyder, among dozens of others.
In addition to the unprecedented gathering of experts and a specially designed workout, this year’s event features an interactive MARKETPLACE with brain healthy snacks and beverages, and a bookstore of best-selling resources in all areas of brain health, lifestyle, and caregiving.
MOVE FOR MINDS 2017 also features a first-ever respite care program from Home Care Assistance, the nation’s only science-based provider of in-home senior care, where caregivers can apply for a Respite Grant so that they can take some much-needed time off to care for themselves. Sixty family caregivers will be chosen to receive a weekend, or two consecutive days, of respite care through the online program. For more information on the contest, click here.
“It’s incredibly exciting to see corporate America stepping up by stepping into the Alzheimer’s space,” added Shriver. “I’m so grateful that these companies are recognizing that Alzheimer’s is one of the greatest health issues facing women today.” In addition to Lifetime and Home Care Assistance, MOVE FOR MINDS 2017 is generously supported by platinum sponsor smartwater as well as NuStep, Cole Haan, Koral, American Senior Magazine, Axovant Neurology Solutions, Beats by Dr. Dre and angel donor Carole Middleton. Corporate partners providing additional support include Lyft, Truist Skin Care, Rivet Revolution, Hall Wines, Bandolier, Headspace, Thrive Market, Juice Press, AAFA and Belmont Village, with others soon to be announced. Additionally, this year companies are engaging in the initiative by sponsoring employee teams to participate in MOVE FOR MINDS. Corporate teams include OWN, Blaze Pizza, Brillstein Entertainment Partners, PMK*BNC, Atria, FFO and more.
The facts and figures of Alzheimer’s are staggering. Per the Alzheimer’s Association, every 66 seconds someone in the United States — a family member, friend, neighbor, work colleague — is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and two thirds of them are women. A woman in her early sixties is about two times as likely to develop Alzheimer’s than breast cancer over the remainder of her life. Alzheimer’s, the 6th leading cause of death in America, kills more people than breast and prostate cancers combined.
“As a doctor treating patients and a researcher working to prevent Alzheimer’s disease, I recognize the critical importance of what Maria Shriver has created in MOVE FOR MINDS,” said Dr. Reisa Sperling, Director, Center for Alzheimer Research and Treatment at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School. “The initiative raises awareness of Alzheimer’s, arms participants with tangible ways to maintain good brain health and provides funding for more women-based brain-science research, three incredibly important elements to help us wipe out this disease.”
To be part of the 2017 MOVE FOR MINDS experience or to donate to an individual participant, click here. If you want to learn more, please go here.
