Quiet dedication to going that extra mile soon adds up
IN THE fitness world, sharing your progress on social media is almost a given. From MapMyRun to the gym selfie, marathons to Tough Mudder, social media can help create community and healthy competition. But a quieter movement is under way. A Facebook group comprises 25,000 people and counting who are united in the same goal: to walk 1,000 miles in a year.
It’s a big, round figure, but a doable one, breaking down to an average of 2.74 miles a day. Some people already cover 1,000 miles in a year without even noticing. For others, the challenge has been life-changing. Michelle McDonald, a 33-year-old dental nurse, walked off nine stone in a year when she took up the challenge two years ago.
“I’d been verbally abused in public one day about my weight when buying ice creams for my family,” she says. “I thought then ‘I’m not doing this any more’. And almost immediately, the challenge made me fall in love with the outdoors. Combined with healthy eating, the weight started to fall off.
The #walk1000miles campaign was the brainchild of Guy Procter, editor of
Country Walking magazine. He thought it might sell a few more magazines, but had no idea how popular it would become. The campaign has been championed by BBC presenter Clare Balding and actor Brian Blessed, and spawned an entire community, with participants last year ranging in age from seven to 86.
“A thousand miles is the sort of number that stops people in their tracks,” he says. “But when you break it down, it’s only little under an hour every day. It’s just a question of doing it.”
Britain is a country of two halves when it comes to walking. Organisations such as the Ramblers have helped make walking accessible, millennials are taking to the trails and even hiking boots are in fashion, yet we are still largely a nation of couch potatoes.
A recent YouGov poll commissioned by Cancer Research UK found that 52 per cent of adults were walking a mile or less a day – and almost a fifth walk less than a quarter of a mile.
But anyone can find time to get the miles in, if this 25,000-strong group is anything to go by. The execution is simple: walk as often as you can, recording your progress on a fitness tracker or app, or using the magazine’s progress tracker. Or go analogue with a map and a piece of string.
Participants undertake it for charity or for themselves, alone or with family or friends and for many like 48-yearold Francis Lawler, the challenge has meant so much more than clocking up the miles. Stabbed, beaten and left for dead by four attackers on New Year’s Eve 1998, he had struggled with anxiety ever since.
“The attack left me scarred mentally,” he says. “For 18 years I’ve been scared of walking in the dark and being in quiet places on my own. It meant I wouldn’t go out much in the winter months. I was overweight, fearful and down.”
Francis started the challenge on January 1 last year. “I was determined to finally face these these anxieties. I knew it really would be a challenge not only because I’d have to balance working life, children and also supporting a disabled wife at home, but I’d have to walk on my own in the dark.”
Soon, he began building up the miles, and says support from his friends and family made it feel like a “team effort”.
“Every day it pushed me to get out of the house, and even when I could feel my fears rising, overcoming them made me more and more positive,” he says. “I reached my 1,000 in November, a fitter, lighter, happier, calmer, more fearless person – more grateful for what I have in life.”
For more details visit walk1000miles. co.uk.
It is fast emerging as the latest fitness craze and the quiet challenge to walk 1,000 miles in a year might just be one that delivers real health benefits. Siobhan Norton reports.