Good Neighbor Podcast: Fort Collins
Bringing together local businesses and neighbors of Fort Collins. Good Neighbor Podcast hosted by Nick George helps residents discover and connect with your local business owners in and around Fort Collins, Colorado.
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Good Neighbor Podcast: Fort Collins
Online Fitness For Active Agers With Willow Tree Studios And Yvonne Hanning
What if aging well had less to do with marathons and more to do with small, steady moves you can stick to? We sit down with Yvonne Hanning of Willow Tree Studios to explore how online fitness for active agers turns consistency into confidence, balance, and real-world strength. Yvonne’s clients—ages 65 to 90—join live on Zoom or catch classes on their schedule, making fitness accessible for caregivers, travelers, and anyone who prefers exercising at home.
Yvonne shares how a pandemic pivot became a powerful model for connection and results. We dig into the biggest myths about older adult fitness and redraw the map between two unhelpful extremes: the mountaintop hero and the person who feels stuck. Most people live in the middle—and that’s where progress happens. From balance training and gentle strength to mobility and functional walks, Yvonne shows how even small increases in activity can improve heart health, reduce falls, and boost independence.
This conversation also moves beyond reps and sets. Yvonne opens up about a hard year marked by deep loss and how she found healing “walk by walk” in nature, with a community that showed up. We talk therapy dog training, the joy of pickleball and hikes, and the mental health benefits that grow alongside physical gains. If you’ve ever felt “too old” or “too far gone,” you’ll hear practical steps you can start today, plus smart ways to use Facebook and newsletters to stay connected and accountable.
Ready to rethink what strong looks like after 65? Press play, pick one small action, and build from there. If this story helps you or someone you love, subscribe, share the episode, and leave a review so more neighbors can find accessible, evidence-based ways to age well.
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Nick George.
SPEAKER_02:Welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast. Are you in need of an amazing wellness and health facility that thinks outside of the normal box? Well, one might be closer than you think. Today I have the great pleasure of introducing your good neighbor, Yvonne Hanning, with Willow Tree Studios. Yvonne, how's it going today?
SPEAKER_00:It's going great today. Thanks.
SPEAKER_02:Tell us all about Willow Tree Studios. You were telling me a little bit before we started recording, and it sounds really interesting and outside the box. Go ahead.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, I teach online fitness for active agers, and my clients are people who realize the importance of aging well. They are super community forward and they're leading active and busy lives. So this works out to be very convenient because they can do it like while in real time, like we are here, or they can watch the recording on Zoom later on at their convenience.
SPEAKER_02:Very interesting. So it makes it very accessible for anybody, no matter what they're um how busy they are. What made you get into this business?
SPEAKER_00:My love of movement began when I was a kid. I was like one of those kids that was always outside and later playing all kinds of sports. So fitness was a good fit for me. And since I've been in the fitness industry, I've been working with um primarily older adults. So when 2020 rolled around, I was working at the Fort Collins Senior Center, and we, of course, were out like everybody else. And my clients started calling me up and being like, hey, we can't be sitting around all the time. What are we gonna do? And so we all got on Zoom, and here we are.
SPEAKER_02:That's neat. What are some myths or misconceptions in your uh niche of the fitness industry?
SPEAKER_00:I think the biggest one is that there's two types of older adults: the mountaintop type, here I am at the top of the mountain, or the end of the marathon, and then there's the ones where I've fallen and I can't get up. But there's so much room in between those two ends where all the regular people are, and that's who I address. The other misconception, I have another misconception, which is that people think I've just I'm too old, I've gone too far, I'm not gonna get better, but research really shows that that's not true. That even becoming taking a few steps and becoming a little more active, you can have big health and wellness improvements.
SPEAKER_02:I absolutely believe that as well. How are you marketing yourself to the world right now? And do you market to the world or do you market to a local demographic area just in case they want to come see you? And how are you reaching out to these people uh digitally?
SPEAKER_00:So online, I'm active on all you know, a lot of the social media, but primarily Facebook is where our age group is, and Instagram, and then I have like a weekly news note that I send out to people. So I get um my clients a lot through word of mouth, and then a lot through going to something like the Better Balance Um conference and things like that, where I can meet other people in the industry, and then also meet clients that are coming to learn more about health and wellness.
SPEAKER_02:And who is the age group?
SPEAKER_00:My age group is 65 to 90. So we have a variety of different classes that would kind of address some of those age groups, and we have some different intensities, so that also is would you say that Facebook is uh is the the the most important social media in that age group? Yes. That and news notes, like newsletters that come out that I send out. But a lot of people that work with people in this age group, they like to have something to read and get their information that way.
SPEAKER_02:Right. Uh you're in a very unusual niche for of just I haven't heard of it for some reason. And I wonder would if you would benefit from or have you thought about podcasting?
SPEAKER_00:I haven't thought about podcasting, so that'll give me something to think about, and this gives me a little practice.
SPEAKER_02:What do you do for fun when you're not having fun?
SPEAKER_00:Oh, dog walks, number one, pickleball, number one, hiking, number one, book club, number one. I have a therapy animal. Um, not he's in training, he's 14 months old, so he's semi-sunshine, therapy dog in training, so we have a lot of training that we have to do with that, and then spending time with family and friends.
SPEAKER_02:Nice. Yvonne, what um is there a a life challenge, a struggle that maybe you overcame in your life at some point that made you into the uh the resilient bouncy person that you are today?
SPEAKER_00:Um I think the biggest thing was in 2022. I feel like that was like my hardest year so far. And I just ended up facing a lot of things that that people face. Um the death of a close friend, the death of a beloved pet, um some health issues with my parents. And I think the biggest lesson I took away from that is that deep grief is the price that you pay for deep love. And so you have to, you know, get to a place with that, and everybody gets there in a different way. And for me, it was just getting outside and hiking and just being healed walk by walk. And I think another thing was that just having a group of friends that um everybody you know has been through a hard time at some point, and so just knowing that they're there for you and caring for you.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. Yvonne, what would you like people to take away? What's the big takeaway from this interview? Um, this podcast about Willow Tree Studios.
SPEAKER_00:I think people underestimate the small steps that you can take to improve your health. It seems like being fit in people's minds is about like being looking like an influencer or a bodybuilder, but there's a lot of levels of fitness that are easily accessible to all of us. And you can you can really get um have access to those levels of fitness without spending all your time in the gym.
SPEAKER_02:Agreed. Yvonne, what are all the ways that people can find you again online? Could you repeat the addresses that uh that they can find you on Instagram, Facebook, or whatever?
SPEAKER_00:So on the best way to find me is just going to my website. It's Willowtree Studios, all one word.net. And there it has links to my Facebook, my Instagram, Sammy Sunshines Face um Instagram, and um everything like that. It has class schedules, all the different things you would need right there. And you can sign up for the news note there, very handy.
SPEAKER_02:Well, Yvonne, it's been a pleasure interviewing you, and um we we really appreciate you being on our show, and we wish you and Willow Tree Studios the very best moving forward.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks, Nick. It's been great to be here.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gmpfortcollins.com. That's gmpfortcollins.com or call nine seven zero four three eight zero eight two five.