8 Million Miles?
That’s right. All in one year?
Thaaaat’s right. Last week our PATH participants hit the 8 million mile mark together.
How far IS that exactly? Well, it’s about 320 trips around the world. If we stood holding hands with our arms outstretched we’d need 8.5 billion people to make a chain that long (assuming an average arm span of 5 feet). That’s more people than there are in the world (6.8 billion).
Put another way, it’s about 17 trips to the moon and back again. What do you think of that, Buzz?
If steps were calories, what would it mean?
If walking one step on flat ground at 2 miles per hour is equal to 2.4 calories, and the average step is 2.5 feet… 2.5 divided by 2.4 calories equals about 1 calorie per foot. There are 42,240,000,000 feet in 8 million miles, thus that many calories were burned at the bare minimum. That’s equivalent to:
- 120 million Donuts (average 350 calories each)
- 72 million Venti (20 oz) Chocolate Lattes (with 2% milk average 580 calories)
- 35 million Big Mac meals (burger, fries, soda 1200 calories)
- 13 million Thanksgiving Day meals (3200 ave calories)
With just under 40,000 PATH users, that means people burned an average of one million calories each.
Get Out! That’s a daily average of 2,900 calories. More than enough to enjoy good, healthy food, guilt-free!
And the woman who crossed the finish line (“Ding, ding, honk, honk, clang, clang… You’re the 8 millionth mile!”) is a retiree who lives every bit of what we love about PATH – she’s in our village, pumping up others, walking the talk, living her best life (way to go Pauline A.).
Do you want a part of that? Are you living it?
To start (and continue) your PATH today, spend 10 minutes on the “Burpee”trail with Olga. Burpees are an old boot-camp or calisthenics exercise that has never lost it’s fervor with fitness folks. We also call them “squat thrusts.”
Simply squat to the floor then jump your feet back so your body is in a plank position. Then jump your feet back underneath you and stand up.
To make it harder, do a push-up before you return to standing. You can also add a hop as you stand up – i.e. don’t just stand up, jump up! But make no mistake, these are quite hard to begin with!
Avid exercises will often do these in a pyramid style. This means do 20, rest for 30 seconds by jogging in place, then do 19, jog in place, then do 18, etc. Working your way down to 5. You can use any number you want but the overall effect should be a few sets of 10-20 with light cardio in between.
Here’s to another 8 million and then some on the PATH Ahead! It all begins with a single step (Lao Tzu).