Live Healthy Iowa's annual 10-week wellness challenge will be starting soon and the Mahaska Wellness Coalition wants everybody to get involved.

Live Healthy Iowa is part of Governor Branstad's initiative to make Iowa the healthiest state in the country. The 10-week challenge is designed to help Iowa start the year out on the right foot, by encouraging people to get active.

"The majority of our larger employers participate.  We're also reaching out to some of our smaller employers and asking them to participate.  Last year, Mahaska Health, Clow, Oskaloosa School District and Musco all ranked in the top employers across the state for employee participation," says Dawn Collins of the Mahaska Wellness Coalition.

Last year more than 650 adults participated in the challenge, and that's not counting the more 1,500 students involved through their schools.  Oskaloosa Elementary even got a cash prize for getting so many kids involved.

"The Mahaska Wellness Coalition is pleased with our results from last year.  We had over 11 percent of county residents participate in the challenge last year.  We ranked 6th in the state for percent of participation."

The cost to sign up is $20 per person, which gets you a t-shirt, access to online tools, and a chance at prizes.  The challenge runs from January 28th to April 5th.  To sign up a team from 2 to 10 people or for more information go to livehealthyiowa.org.