Walking is the Literal Best Exercise for Fitness, Not Just Fat Loss

I started doing 1-2hours daily about 2months ago and my mood has done a 180 from hating life to thinking life is good and beautiful

I’m in Spain on vacation, walking all day long and swimming, feeling great eating healthy and having ocasional ice cream that I love here! Just finished my day with 14,091 steps, didn’t even feel it. 😊

I live in a high desert plain. It can get to 20 below zero in the winter and over 100 in the summer. I tend to switch off to walking in the late spring through most of the fall and do my HIIT workouts indoors during the winter. I much prefer walking, but the workout confusion helps me out overall with fitness. I also lift several days a week and practice martial arts. Forgot to mention that I'm 70 years old.

I’m 65 and I’ve been retired for three years, now. Back in March, on the urging of my girlfriend to get a part-time job and get out of the house, I became a parking enforcement officer for my municipality...aka, meter maid. Three days a week, I walk between 23,000 and 26,000 steps during my shifts. Sometimes I achieve 29,000 to 30,000 steps. I’ve lost over 15 pounds and am one pound over my weight in high school! I feel great and still walk most of my off-duty days.

Good News. I have been walking a lot the past few years. At times I do sprinting for about a minute. 😊

As my life grew more complicated, I simplified my way of being. I gave up driving my car over 15 years ago after coming back from my postdoc in Germany - and have been walking everywhere since. This has resulted in a lot of unintended "rucking" - which is me basically carrying loads of my groceries and other staples home. On days I go in to work to meet with my team, it can easily be a 20 km day. As a result, I am a woman in my mid to late 40's who has more lean mass than I did when I was in my 30's (5% more lean mass and equivalent reduction in fat mass - and I used to run)! I have been the same weight for over 25 years now. My stress levels, blood pressure, and wallet are also benefitting significantly from making walking a wonderful way of life. You can only win when you make walking a way of life.

As a distance runner it also took me a long time to accept that walking is a good exercise too! Thanks, Thomas for this video. You rock!

This is exactly on point. We are designed to walk.

stair climbing is my favorite exercise - i wear a backpack heavy with books - and climb for an hour - listening to early REM these days.

I have been walking to my gym club for about six months now. It is almost three miles, each way, and I carry a 35-pound pack. I really enjoy it. I get to watch the plants change with the season. I am lucky that I do not have to walk on any streets. I enjoy staying in touch with the seasons. In the winter I can usually get by with crampons but in fresh snow I sometimes use snow shoes. I live at 8000' elevation and I am 69 years old so don't give me any excuses. It makes me happy. I cannot imagine being any luckier in life. Often I just shower, steam room and jacuzzi and do not even work out at the club anymore. I am in the US but just for fun I won't tell you where. Can you guess. I will respond.

Amen Brother Tom. Walking has completely changed my body. Thank you for your work. We love you brother. Keep on doing what you do. Your content is a constant motivation for me daily. Peace be with you brother 🙂

I've gone from walking almost nowhere to doing 2-3 hour+ walks 3 or days per week as well as 30-60 on incline treadmil after workouts. Feels good.

I just finished 12,000 steps from walking back from the gym. And it feels good

I did a good amount of swimming yesterday and today i just felt like taking a walk. Then (with wonderful synchronicity) Thomas drops this video And thats why we need to stay tuned to this channel ~God Bless

I walked 26000 steps yesterday. It’s great for getting in great distance without doing much damage

22k steps a day in the Rocky's...can't beat it😊

Variety- I experimented and was doing 3-4 miles jogs, tried some VO2 max alternating with a jog sprint and the. Stopped all of that for 6-8 weeks to simply walk. What did I learn… Variety in workouts is important. Walking reduced stress, was easy, but I tried jogging 8 weeks later and about croaked. I lost so much minimum heart rate threshold. Going back to mix it up weekly with intervals with VO2 max, slow jogs, incline walking and then just walking 8-10k steps each day. Great video! I learned a lot. Got to do a few things, not just one and walking is such a great base.

Walking is incredible. but remember to walk with purpose. try to raise your heart rate just a little more than just poodling along. just below marching pace. purpose. Walk with purpose!

I've been an endurance athlete pretty seriously for the past 12 years. I started walking a lot more in the past couple of years and my HR has lowered noticeably since then!

Basically, you need to do as much variety as possible, within the time you have budgeted to fitness.