Men’s Health Ranks Sioux Falls as One of Strongest Cities in US

The concept of strength can be defined a lot of different ways by a lot of different people.

At its most basic level, it's about lifting the heaviest weight, but there is so much more to strength than just having muscles and knowing how to use them.

When Men's Health set out to identify the strongest cities in America, they looked well beyond just the physical aspects and, using data from 500 Cities Project, American Fitness Index, Centers for Disease Control, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, U.S. Census Bureau, World Well-Being Project, and city, state, and county records, they ranked the 100 biggest cities in America on the strength each exhibited in body, mind, heart, and community.

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And when they combined a communities' sense of well-being, sleep levels, physical activity, access to exercise, social connections, and high ratio of registered voters, Sioux Falls emerged as one of the strongest cities in America.

STRONGEST CITIES IN AMERICA (Men's Health)

Madison, Wisconsin
Anchorage, Alaska
Washington, DC
Burlington, Vermont
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Denver, Colorado
Sioux Falls, South Dakota
Lincoln, Nebraska
Raliegh, North Carolina
Bridgeport, Connecticut

Men's Health said South Dakota's largest city was 'well connected to community organizations' and cited the more than 770 volunteer opportunities available through the Helpline Center.

They were also impressed that Feeding South Dakota had seen an increased engagement since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

As for the weaklings out there, despite all of the boasting over the years about 'everything is bigger in Texas', that apparently doesn't translate into strength, as a trio of towns (Laredo, El Paso, Corpus Christi) from the Lone Star State are in the bottom ten.

WEAKEST CITIES IN AMERICA (Men's Health)