On December 14, 2022, I wrote a post saying that I had been on my walking program, which started on December 15, 2019, for three years.  My walking posts have been some of my most popular posts.  They seem to resonate with many people, some my age, some older, and some younger.  A number of readers here and on LinkedIn have said that they have been motivated to begin regular walking programs.

As the feature image suggests, let’s walk into the future.

At the outset, I set a goal of a minimum of 10,000 steps per day.  Given my step stride, that level was just short of 5.0 miles per day, so I changed the goal to walk a minimum of 5.0 miles per day.

Today marks 1,175 days for my program.  I’ve missed the goal only 16 days since starting.  The last missed goal day was June 17, 2022 when I was coming back from a nine day bout of some non-Covid grunge.  That was 259 (consecutive) days ago.  My long-term average is 6.1 miles per day.

The streak was nearly broken yesterday.  On Wednesday (March 2nd), I played two-plus hours of pickleball in the morning.  I was sitting and reading after lunch when I got a call from Pictona reminding me that I had signed up for a pickleball clinic with Scott Moore, who is certainly one of the best players in the nation.  So I got redressed and headed back to Pictona, where I drilled with Scott and several other players for another three hours.

Did I mention that I spent too much time on Tuesday lifting weeds from my small yard here in Port Orange (think Daytona Beach)?  My lower back was protesting, but I put the play time in on Wednesday, foolishly walking some 19,300 steps and 9.0 miles.

Which brings me to the point of this post.  Yesterday, Thursday, I was hurting to the extent that I did not take my usual 2-3 mile early morning walk.  And I didn’t play pickleball.  By 5pm, I had managed to walk 1.3 miles.  I tried walking in the early afternoon and that was not going to work.  So I went out on the porch and ran slowly in place for a long spell, with brief breaks.  Somehow, there was no pain in that activity, so I continued, ending the day with 10,400 steps and 5.1 miles for the day.

I’m glad I was able to reach the goal yesterday.  But I was willing to accept a miss if I couldn’t get my steps/miles without hurting myself more.

This morning, my lower back was much better.  I took a slow 2+ mile walk, and am at 2.9 miles as I’m writing at 10am.  Barring something unexpected, I’ll reach the 5 mile goal as the day progresses, but without any pickleball!

I’m grateful that I have been granted good health and good motivation. I think the walking helps to maintain good health and weight, and my plan is to keep on keeping on.  There will be days in the future when I’ll miss my walking goal.  But while I can, I will keep on moving.

I spoke with a friend yesterday who has been walking regularly for a long time.  He has an issue with his ankle that may require surgery and he is not able to walk any distances.  I hope and pray that things work out for him.

I’ve talked about the benefits of a regular walking program in previous posts,  including here and here.  Whoever you are and wherever you are, I encourage you to get out regularly and move, whether you walk, run, play pickleball or another racquet sport, or whatever.

Let’s walk into the future.

If any reader wants to talk about walking on a regular basis, give me a call or email.

Until next time,

Chris