Hilarious Reddit thread on walking in the US vs UK

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Love how this thread started out entertaining and interesting and devolved into mean and competitive.

It’s the DCUM way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:First of all, taking long walks (1+ hours) on pavement is awful on your knees & feet, even if you don’t feel the impact immediately.

Second, if not owning a car correlated with being fitter, those who do not own cars & whom are completely reliant on public transportation (including public buses) for their every need would be the fittest among us. Obviously, that is not the case.

Walking for an hour plus is awful on your knees and feet? The “impact” of WALKING? Is this some kind of troll post? How horrendously out of shape are you? Let me guess, if somebody does any amount of running their knees will explode by the time they are 60.

Unreal. Absent some health condition not of your own making, if you can’t walk 10 miles and you are under the age 65, you are doing life wrong. Most Americans can’t walk FIVE miles to save their life.

It’s not exclusively an American thing. I know plenty of sedentary Brits and continental Europeans. And even those that do walk a lot that just eat and drink poorly.

It’s like idiocracy sometimes. Where is the brawndo?

You missed the “on pavement” part. Versus on soft surfaces.

The fit neighbors I have can't walk 10 miles. Most do less than 5 on their big walks.

If that's all they do, they're not that fit. A 3-4 mile walk for me is a rest day. Walking medium-long distances is nothing for my 44 year old body, if not a relaxing reset.

I tend to be one of the posters on here that snaps back at people being snarky, but I agree with this 100%.

Absent some form of health impediment, a "fit" person under the age of 65 should be able to walk effectively indefinitely and certainly at least 10 miles.

Unfortunately, the percentages of people in both the US and UK that fit into that category are not very high.

NP, I walk a brisk 5 miles daily and enjoy a long hike, but 10 miles on pavement has my feet burning, especially at a good pace. Fitness (meaning muscle and cardio) has little to do with joints and feet, and it's really ignorant to pretend that walking on hard surfaces doesn't stress your support structure.

Re: walkability, let's be realistic about the free time people have. If I walk my kid to school and walk home, thats an hour round trip; another hour in the afternoon. I have to start work earlier and end later to do that. Then let's say I walk to the grocery, that adds an hour or more to my trip. And by then I've only walked like 6 slow miles so I probably need to do another hour, fast, for fitness. That's 4 hours plus work and home life and social life ... it doesn't all fit.

There have been some funny things posted on here, but this one is the best. The sentence itself is contradictory - what structures do you think are surrounding joints that actually make them function properly? Perhaps muscles and ligaments? Physical therapy works because of the adaptations sought to strengthen those structures - around the knee for example.

If your feet are "burning" after 5 miles you may need different shoes. Or, you need to walk more at those distances and it will stop. That is how fitness works. You put stress on parts of your body and it adapts. Nobody is going to discourage walking, even on concrete sidewalks. But if you want to be frail in your 80s by avoiding "stress[ing] your support structure" through something as incredibly low impact as walking, have at it.

Oh honey, not everyone has the same feet and anatomy. So cute that this how small your world view is. It like you have a miniature brain, adorable!

I was a nurse working in hospitals for 25 years and probably clocked 20k steps a day. I absolutely cannot walk 5 miles on concrete. Instead I have to swim to keep fit. My career taught me that you really don’t know everything about everyone and what might cause their body to react differently to different things.

Ah… so some people have the special “non
-pavement anatomy.” How silly of PP not to realize.

I'm not the nurse and yes, healthy people are put together differently in so many small but impactful ways, including for example having their left leg be slightly shorter than their right or their hips be angled in different ways or their arches especially high or low. It all affects movement. Also many have stress injuries, or issues developed in childhood, that cannot be "walked off." Nor are custom shoes a practical solution as PP implied, even in the limited situations where they would help.

It's wild how ignorant you are.

These are all narrow exceptions.

They are not. There are dozens of variations between you and the healthy looking person walking next to you. Slightly asymmetrical legs, for example, are incredibly common. Basically all floor nurses (to use PP as an example) have work related injuries, whether from a specific incident or repeated movement. You may even have issues yourself, which you don't know about but will surface as you age.

I'm a PP who walks, I love walking, I support walkability. But you are just wrong in your insistence that anyone who has foot pain after 10 miles of walking is unfit/fat/an exception.

If you routinely walk 10 miles without pain, I congratulate you and hope your good luck continues. Personally I suspect at least some of the most vociferous posters don't actually do it.

[Anonymous]

Every person I know who was an athlete in their younger years and/or through 20s/30s (ala swimmers, cyclists, runners) now has some sort of joint issue. I wouldn't call any of those people unfit. They all still have low body fat (for their age) but in their 40s and 50s started to get hip or knee pains that mean walking a ton is painful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:First of all, taking long walks (1+ hours) on pavement is awful on your knees & feet, even if you don’t feel the impact immediately.

Second, if not owning a car correlated with being fitter, those who do not own cars & whom are completely reliant on public transportation (including public buses) for their every need would be the fittest among us. Obviously, that is not the case.

Walking for an hour plus is awful on your knees and feet? The “impact” of WALKING? Is this some kind of troll post? How horrendously out of shape are you? Let me guess, if somebody does any amount of running their knees will explode by the time they are 60.

Unreal. Absent some health condition not of your own making, if you can’t walk 10 miles and you are under the age 65, you are doing life wrong. Most Americans can’t walk FIVE miles to save their life.

It’s not exclusively an American thing. I know plenty of sedentary Brits and continental Europeans. And even those that do walk a lot that just eat and drink poorly.

It’s like idiocracy sometimes. Where is the brawndo?

You missed the “on pavement” part. Versus on soft surfaces.

The fit neighbors I have can't walk 10 miles. Most do less than 5 on their big walks.

If that's all they do, they're not that fit. A 3-4 mile walk for me is a rest day. Walking medium-long distances is nothing for my 44 year old body, if not a relaxing reset.

I tend to be one of the posters on here that snaps back at people being snarky, but I agree with this 100%.

Absent some form of health impediment, a "fit" person under the age of 65 should be able to walk effectively indefinitely and certainly at least 10 miles.

Unfortunately, the percentages of people in both the US and UK that fit into that category are not very high.

NP, I walk a brisk 5 miles daily and enjoy a long hike, but 10 miles on pavement has my feet burning, especially at a good pace. Fitness (meaning muscle and cardio) has little to do with joints and feet, and it's really ignorant to pretend that walking on hard surfaces doesn't stress your support structure.

Re: walkability, let's be realistic about the free time people have. If I walk my kid to school and walk home, thats an hour round trip; another hour in the afternoon. I have to start work earlier and end later to do that. Then let's say I walk to the grocery, that adds an hour or more to my trip. And by then I've only walked like 6 slow miles so I probably need to do another hour, fast, for fitness. That's 4 hours plus work and home life and social life ... it doesn't all fit.

There have been some funny things posted on here, but this one is the best. The sentence itself is contradictory - what structures do you think are surrounding joints that actually make them function properly? Perhaps muscles and ligaments? Physical therapy works because of the adaptations sought to strengthen those structures - around the knee for example.

If your feet are "burning" after 5 miles you may need different shoes. Or, you need to walk more at those distances and it will stop. That is how fitness works. You put stress on parts of your body and it adapts. Nobody is going to discourage walking, even on concrete sidewalks. But if you want to be frail in your 80s by avoiding "stress[ing] your support structure" through something as incredibly low impact as walking, have at it.

Oh honey, not everyone has the same feet and anatomy. So cute that this how small your world view is. It like you have a miniature brain, adorable!

I was a nurse working in hospitals for 25 years and probably clocked 20k steps a day. I absolutely cannot walk 5 miles on concrete. Instead I have to swim to keep fit. My career taught me that you really don’t know everything about everyone and what might cause their body to react differently to different things.

Ah… so some people have the special “non
-pavement anatomy.” How silly of PP not to realize.

I'm not the nurse and yes, healthy people are put together differently in so many small but impactful ways, including for example having their left leg be slightly shorter than their right or their hips be angled in different ways or their arches especially high or low. It all affects movement. Also many have stress injuries, or issues developed in childhood, that cannot be "walked off." Nor are custom shoes a practical solution as PP implied, even in the limited situations where they would help.

It's wild how ignorant you are.

These are all narrow exceptions.

They are not. There are dozens of variations between you and the healthy looking person walking next to you. Slightly asymmetrical legs, for example, are incredibly common. Basically all floor nurses (to use PP as an example) have work related injuries, whether from a specific incident or repeated movement. You may even have issues yourself, which you don't know about but will surface as you age.

I'm a PP who walks, I love walking, I support walkability. But you are just wrong in your insistence that anyone who has foot pain after 10 miles of walking is unfit/fat/an exception.

If you routinely walk 10 miles without pain, I congratulate you and hope your good luck continues. Personally I suspect at least some of the most vociferous posters don't actually do it.

+1, I am a fitness trainer and work out for a living. I used to be a professional aerialist (aerial silks and trapeze) and I definitely understand the meaning of full body fitness.

If I walk 10 miles on pavement while sightseeing or something, even wearing my most supportive and comfortable shoes, my feet hurt at the end of the day, and often I have hip and knee pain (partially from rehabbed injuries). I'm very healthy and fit and have a healthy gait (literally was re-trained how to walk and run to reduce joint stress by my PT!) but that's just a lot of repetitive use of the same joints in the same way on an unfriendly surface.

Also, since hitting my 40s I'm more prone to water retention/bloating, and on a hot day where I'm on vacation and probably consuming somewhat more salt in my diet than normal, my feet are going to swell with all that walking, rendering even my most comfortable shoes a bit tight. I'd be putting my feet up or soaking in a tub after a day like that.

There are many practical measures of physical fitness, but walking 10 miles on pavement with "no pain" isn't one of them!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:First of all, taking long walks (1+ hours) on pavement is awful on your knees & feet, even if you don’t feel the impact immediately.

Second, if not owning a car correlated with being fitter, those who do not own cars & whom are completely reliant on public transportation (including public buses) for their every need would be the fittest among us. Obviously, that is not the case.

Walking for an hour plus is awful on your knees and feet? The “impact” of WALKING? Is this some kind of troll post? How horrendously out of shape are you? Let me guess, if somebody does any amount of running their knees will explode by the time they are 60.

Unreal. Absent some health condition not of your own making, if you can’t walk 10 miles and you are under the age 65, you are doing life wrong. Most Americans can’t walk FIVE miles to save their life.

It’s not exclusively an American thing. I know plenty of sedentary Brits and continental Europeans. And even those that do walk a lot that just eat and drink poorly.

It’s like idiocracy sometimes. Where is the brawndo?

You missed the “on pavement” part. Versus on soft surfaces.

The fit neighbors I have can't walk 10 miles. Most do less than 5 on their big walks.

If that's all they do, they're not that fit. A 3-4 mile walk for me is a rest day. Walking medium-long distances is nothing for my 44 year old body, if not a relaxing reset.

I tend to be one of the posters on here that snaps back at people being snarky, but I agree with this 100%.

Absent some form of health impediment, a "fit" person under the age of 65 should be able to walk effectively indefinitely and certainly at least 10 miles.

Unfortunately, the percentages of people in both the US and UK that fit into that category are not very high.

NP, I walk a brisk 5 miles daily and enjoy a long hike, but 10 miles on pavement has my feet burning, especially at a good pace. Fitness (meaning muscle and cardio) has little to do with joints and feet, and it's really ignorant to pretend that walking on hard surfaces doesn't stress your support structure.

Re: walkability, let's be realistic about the free time people have. If I walk my kid to school and walk home, thats an hour round trip; another hour in the afternoon. I have to start work earlier and end later to do that. Then let's say I walk to the grocery, that adds an hour or more to my trip. And by then I've only walked like 6 slow miles so I probably need to do another hour, fast, for fitness. That's 4 hours plus work and home life and social life ... it doesn't all fit.

There have been some funny things posted on here, but this one is the best. The sentence itself is contradictory - what structures do you think are surrounding joints that actually make them function properly? Perhaps muscles and ligaments? Physical therapy works because of the adaptations sought to strengthen those structures - around the knee for example.

If your feet are "burning" after 5 miles you may need different shoes. Or, you need to walk more at those distances and it will stop. That is how fitness works. You put stress on parts of your body and it adapts. Nobody is going to discourage walking, even on concrete sidewalks. But if you want to be frail in your 80s by avoiding "stress[ing] your support structure" through something as incredibly low impact as walking, have at it.

Oh honey, not everyone has the same feet and anatomy. So cute that this how small your world view is. It like you have a miniature brain, adorable!

I was a nurse working in hospitals for 25 years and probably clocked 20k steps a day. I absolutely cannot walk 5 miles on concrete. Instead I have to swim to keep fit. My career taught me that you really don’t know everything about everyone and what might cause their body to react differently to different things.

Well, that would be an exception wouldn’t be? If you followed what I said you would have found I mentioned exceptional health issues multiple times. Most people sit at a desk all day and have no such problems.

I’m sorry you are dealing with these issues, but to pretend that is normal just isn’t honest.

As someone who worked in the medical community for 25 years you’d be surprised at how common it is for people to work at jobs that destroy their bodies. Be it desk jobs or physical jobs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:First of all, taking long walks (1+ hours) on pavement is awful on your knees & feet, even if you don’t feel the impact immediately.

Second, if not owning a car correlated with being fitter, those who do not own cars & whom are completely reliant on public transportation (including public buses) for their every need would be the fittest among us. Obviously, that is not the case.

Walking for an hour plus is awful on your knees and feet? The “impact” of WALKING? Is this some kind of troll post? How horrendously out of shape are you? Let me guess, if somebody does any amount of running their knees will explode by the time they are 60.

Unreal. Absent some health condition not of your own making, if you can’t walk 10 miles and you are under the age 65, you are doing life wrong. Most Americans can’t walk FIVE miles to save their life.

It’s not exclusively an American thing. I know plenty of sedentary Brits and continental Europeans. And even those that do walk a lot that just eat and drink poorly.

It’s like idiocracy sometimes. Where is the brawndo?

You missed the “on pavement” part. Versus on soft surfaces.

Uh, you know people run on pavement for an hour (or several hours) without issues. Where on earth are you getting the idea that it's bad to *walk* on pavement for ONE hour? One has to be really out of shape (or quite elderly) to feel "impact" from walking for an hour on pavement.

And on your 2nd comment about public transportation... people that take public transportation in cities are generally quite fit and active. People in cities are generally much more fit because of all the walking/stairs they do.

People that are completely dependent on public transportation are generally poor & fat.

Wow, what a deluded post. Tell me you don’t live in a city without telling me.

Living in DC, you can always tell when tourist season starts because there are so many large people around.

People who use public transportation are of all income levels, and are thinner because they have to walk to the bus stop/metro station at both ends of their trip, and for trips of less than about 1.5 miles it’s just not worth it.

I didn’t say “uses public transportation,” I said “completely dependent on it.” Meaning, they take three public buses to their job on the other side of the DMV.

So it’s a rule that if you don’t drive you must have an in person job and work in a different state than where you live?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Every person I know who was an athlete in their younger years and/or through 20s/30s (ala swimmers, cyclists, runners) now has some sort of joint issue. I wouldn't call any of those people unfit. They all still have low body fat (for their age) but in their 40s and 50s started to get hip or knee pains that mean walking a ton is painful.

Weird. I ran 70+ miles a week until my late 40s. Now I don’t run much anymore, but walking 10 miles on pavement is not an issue. My brother and sister in law (also former competitive runners) are the same boat. SIL actually walks ridiculous amounts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Every person I know who was an athlete in their younger years and/or through 20s/30s (ala swimmers, cyclists, runners) now has some sort of joint issue. I wouldn't call any of those people unfit. They all still have low body fat (for their age) but in their 40s and 50s started to get hip or knee pains that mean walking a ton is painful.

Weird. I ran 70+ miles a week until my late 40s. Now I don’t run much anymore, but walking 10 miles on pavement is not an issue. My brother and sister in law (also former competitive runners) are the same boat. SIL actually walks ridiculous amounts.

Weird. Everyone is different. I’m 50 and have ran my entire life and just had a knee replacement due osteoarthritis. My orthopedist said running is the worst thing you can do to your body. Now that I have new knees I can walk long distances again. Before my TRK I could hardly walk my dog around the block.

[Anonymous]

There is a fairly open debate on the impacts of running and links to arthritis that was going to happen anyway. I don’t think I’ve ever heard any doctor anywhere make that sort of link when discussing waking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a fairly open debate on the impacts of running and links to arthritis that was going to happen anyway. I don’t think I’ve ever heard any doctor anywhere make that sort of link when discussing waking.

I don’t think anyone has said that walking leads to OA. What causes people like me (former floor nurse) pain when walking long distances is the battering my body went through from hears of standing and walking on concrete for many many miles each week. My problems are not limited to my feet. Bad pain is my biggest complaint along with hip pain.

I’ve worked orthopedics, OB, ER, oncology, and ICU. I’ve seen more joint replacement that you could imagine and I can assure you folks that you should count yourself lucky if you haven’t had a job, a catastrophic injury, or a genetic predisposition that makes basic movement painful in the back half of life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I love walking and rarely drive but it takes a lot of effort to plan out where you can walk (I don’t feel comfortable crossing highways etc although it looks like some brave redditors have done it).

I don’t live on the east coast where things are close together and you can reasonably walk from one side of the city to another. Unfortunately, I don’t see it as necessarily a suburbs vs city issue here. Even lots of American cities aren’t built around being walkable.

There are large swaths of the District where there are no sidewalks as well as no commerce. I'm not going to schlep a couple of miles to a grocery store if I have to roll a cart back in the street.

But my rules include that there must be a sidewalk in front of the house and groceries, even a bodega-type one, are less than a mile away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a fairly open debate on the impacts of running and links to arthritis that was going to happen anyway. I don’t think I’ve ever heard any doctor anywhere make that sort of link when discussing waking.

I don’t think anyone has said that walking leads to OA. What causes people like me (former floor nurse) pain when walking long distances is the battering my body went through from hears of standing and walking on concrete for many many miles each week. My problems are not limited to my feet. Bad pain is my biggest complaint along with hip pain.

I’ve worked orthopedics, OB, ER, oncology, and ICU. I’ve seen more joint replacement that you could imagine and I can assure you folks that you should count yourself lucky if you haven’t had a job, a catastrophic injury, or a genetic predisposition that makes basic movement painful in the back half of life.

Agree. That's why raising the retirement age is ridic for folks such as PP or others in manual labor.