Bandura's (1997) SCT outlines the importance of self-efficacy as the key to understanding behaviour and behaviour change. It also acknowledges that decisions about behaviour are undertaken within a social context and that there is an intimate relationship between self-efficacy and the social environment. The project outlined in this paper set out to explore self-efficacy and social support within a community-based cardiac rehabilitation program. The interviews undertaken provided a rich insight into the quality of the experience of attending the HeartSTART track. In particular, it found that while the attending staff were important in welcoming participants, it was the other participants of the program that provided an environment that was inviting and supportive, an environment that made it easier for people to integrate lifestyle changes into their everyday lives. This social environment has developed because of the long-term attendance of many of the participants who have built up a rapport with each other over many years and who actively encourage new participants. Such an environment is not possible to achieve within a traditional cardiac rehabilitation program that constantly transitions participants. The HeartSTART program does not conform to traditional cardiac rehabilitation because it does not have an exit point and thus has merged the 'rehabilitation' and 'maintenance' phases together. In doing so, there is the potential for new participants to observe people who have similar conditions to their own exercising in a safe manner; to experience physical activity at a level that is appropriate for their cardiac capacity within a supervised setting and to be able to gradually increase the intensity of that exercise as their capacity improves; and to do this within a social context that is supportive and encouraging. These are the fundamental conditions for improving self-efficacy, which underpins self-management. Thus, further investigation of this type of cardiac rehabilitation program needs to be undertaken, particularly as this is an aspect that may be readily developed in other community-based programs.