That's Fit

When playing sports as a kid, the same piece of advice was always dished out by coaches if I was hit by a wild pitch, twisted an ankle running for a loose ball, or got the wind knocked out of me after a hard tackle: "Walk it off." The sport didn't matter, the type of injury seemed inconsequential, and the amount of pain involved seemed to not be a factor, either. Walk it off ... the panacea for all childhood sports injuries.

The fact of the matter is, the coaches weren't sure what to do, so Walk it Off became the most accepted piece of worthless advice in all of youth sports. However, this very same advice would have produced much better results if they had instead offered it to guys like Big Larry, the resident scorekeeper at KC Field, who for years tried unsuccessfully to lose weight. For people like Big Larry, Walk it Off is actually sound advice.

And you don't have to go far (not nearly as far as I went with this post to simply make a point about the benefits of walking); start off with a distance you can handle, although it should be far enough to get your heart rate up a bit. You can also perform intervals by walking at different speeds at various point along your journey, just as you can also designate points along the way to perform a set or two of push-ups, body weight squats, pull-ups (tree branches work well for this), and various ab exercises. The pounds may not come off right away, but stick to your workout for long enough and you'll see results soon enough.

Man, I hope Big Larry's out there reading this.