Nidhi Kulkarni is a Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) graduate and the co-founder of a top fitness mobile application, Spitfire Athlete.
“Being a longtime athlete, the perspective I have towards health and fitness has always been performance related,” Kulkarni told a leading website. “I was dissatisfied with the quality of fitness products on the market, especially those geared towards women because the overriding focus of these products was aesthetic instead of athletic goals.”
When Erin Parker offered her the prototype of her fitness app Spitfire, Nidhi felt that she now has got the perfect combination of her skills and passion. The main thing which the creators of the app kept in mind was that they will not create just another fitness app but an app that gives an athletic figure to women.
“The concerns for women’s fitness products are typically how much you weigh, building a certain physique, or whether you have a six pack or not. I knew of nothing that was focused on how fast you can run, how much weight you can lift, or how to get better at your particular sport,” Kulkarni explained. “That is why, until starting Spitfire, I never viewed the fitness industry as even being related to athleticism or sports. So when Erin first pitched to me her idea of Spitfire, I was immediately interested.”
Spitfire was launched in 2014 as an iOS app and just within two years, it has gained more than 107,000 women athletes looking to improve their fitness. “Being an athlete has given me a lot of joy,” Kulkarni said. “I wanted to share that with other women and give them the tools to experience the same.”
Nidhi also wants that her app to serve as a way to break through from the stereotypes women are subjected to. “We are told we are not as strong as the boys, can’t run, throw or lift. We are told we are weak. We are told we have to be thin. Our power and strength are never celebrated, and very often the women who display these qualities are ridiculed,” she explained to the leading daily.
“At Spitfire Athlete, we think the first step towards becoming a badass is to start taking back our power and strength,” she continued. “This means to build ourselves up. To celebrate our bodies for what they can do rather than what they look like. To practice the athlete’s mentality. The warrior’s mentality of strength, mental toughness, grit, and dedication.”
Spitfire has 4 to 12 week – bodyweight as well as weightlifting — for various goals including warm-up, workout, and cooldown, as well as rest days. The progress is traced using plans.
The Spitfire athletes are always seen in the app with confident body language so that the women too feel confident about themselves seeing them. “A lot of fitness advertising towards women would be directly in conflict with Spitfire Athlete’s ideals because the point of such advertising is to make women feel inadequate so that they will purchase the product being sold,” Kulkarni said. “We wanted our app to be infused with a sense of female strength and power,” Nidhi concludes.
Image – Erin Parker and Nidhi Kulkarni (right) Source
Spitfire is one of the most loved and highly rated fitness app on Apple App Store. We wish Spitfire team congratulations on their success and we wish them good luck with their Android app too.
If you have missed the story of Erin Parker, the founder of the app, READ IT HERE!.
