How can a person average 80,000 steps in a day?

[prc1977]

I don't mean to call anybody out or question somebody's integrity but there are fitbit users who average better than 75K steps a day over the course of a week. Assuming they get eight hours of sleep, that means they're walking almost 40 minutes each hour every hour of the day unless they're asleep. Every day for a week.

It is possible that they're running or training for a marathon or walking really fast or are really really into this walking thing but it seems like it is too much. Any way you do the math, it is an incredible amount of walking and it is sustained over the entire week.

What's the most anyone has ever walked in a day? How about in a week? 

I wonder what it would be like if I got up at five am and walked all day until midnight? Doing the math, it would theoretically be possible to break 100k but I don't think I could get anywhere near that. And 80k a day for a week seems too much too.

What do you think?

Moderator edit: Clarified subject. 

[prc1977]

According to Trailquest  ( http://www.trailquest.net/ATTrailQuest.html ) most Appalachian Trail hikers

"...hike 8 - 10 miles each day at the beginning of their hike, then slowly work up to 12 - 16 miles per day. Most hikers will eventually have a few 20 - 25 mile days."

The AT is rarely really flat and never easy so it isn't really an indicator of what a person can do on a flat, shaded surface ( Towpath Trail, CVNP etc.)

My daughter thru-hiked the AT and had a few 30 mile days to catch up w friends but certainly never 36 miles or 45 miles in a day.

I appreciate your input and I understand the numbers you posted are records and not what most hikers achieve. And that points back to the original question of how are these incredibly high fitbit numbers are happening?

When the thread started I really did wonder how they managed because I really wanted to get there too. Eventually I realized that for a rare person it is possible and definitely not for me. Still, why wouldn't their feedback on doing better not be helpful?  There are some amazing athletes out there.

[checking]

@prc1977 perhaps you should reread the next to last paragraph. I am not claiming that the records illustrate that it can be done, I am trying to show that 80k/day can be done at HALF-RECORD daily distances, and state (without evidence, except the more apparent case of 5:20 pace marathon vs 10:40 pace 5k), that most any reasonably fit person with sufficient desire can learn to do it. That sufficient desire may well include rearranging you life to make sufficient time.

If your real question was: How can the average off-the-street fitbit user with a (non-walking) job, family and other obligations, go about averaging 80k/day over 7 days. The answer is simple: statistically speaking, they can't! (there may be a few exceptional cases, but as said, statistically speaking . . .).

BTW, I have been over 560k in 7 days once (about 2 years ago) and don't want to try it again. But I know it can be done, and I am sure anyone younger and fitter than I would have an easier time. That week contained 132, 96, and 89k days so I only (lol) had to average just over 60k on the other 4 days. I don't really like talking about it since it was recorded with a no-proof Fitbit; didn't have my Fenix at the time.

Yes there are some amazing athletes out there, but they don't hear you - they don't use Fitbit very much. (Go to an ironman and take a survey of the brands used by those amazing athletes (amazing if they simply finish).

[prc1977]

Thanks for the invite to reread your posting but after reading it again it still seemed worthwhile to point out that record - or even half record - AT hiking mileage is less meaningful than what a typical AT hiker does.

The part of your post I appreciate is in your second paragraph ( wow, I count paragraphs too!) where you point out that it is unlikely for an everyday user to hit numbers like those you mention for yourself.

The information I am most curious about and no one seems to detail, is exactly what a person does in a day to get numbers like you mention. Did you get up early and basically run/jog for sixteen hours? I can  believe you got to 132,000 steps in a day and 560,000 steps in a week but how on earth did you do it? And how bad did you feel afterwards? To me, numbers like that are off the charts.

I have worked out a schedule where I devote an entire day to walking ( I don't jog anymore) but my numbers would be a fraction of the totals you mentioned day after day for a week.

So, what's the story? What was that 132k day like?

[checking]

@prc1977  How to do it 

1) not 16 hours of jogging running. My 'groove' walking cadence is ~6600 steps/hour and I can push that to 7200/hr as a steady-state thing  by mixing in a bit (< 30% timewise) of light jogging. So more like 11-12 hours of moving.

2) Good tight planning and sticking to it. I target 1100 steps every 10 minutes (the 6600/hr), if I need a short break I will mix in some jogging for a couple of cycles to earn a couple minute break when I need it, and still maintain hitting targets. Longer breaks  are infrequent (10 - 20 minute only every couple of hours, only 1 or 2 longer recovery breaks. I no longer have detailed data for the 132k day, but here is what the most recent 100k day looked like:

Yes, I start at midnight. Pretty good about sticking to targets, except a brief nap and cleanup around 6 AM. until I hit 80k @ ~2:30 PM. Then I knew I would make 100 pretty easy, lost discipline, took a longer break and stopped targeting. If I were only trying for 80, I would shift the first 14.5 (disciplined) hours (that's how long 80k took, including breaks) out to something like 5 AM to 7:30 PM, particularly if trying to establish a regular pattern for multiple days.

What was the 132k day like - don't remember too many details, in a zombie-endorphin saturated-exhaustion fog most of the time. I know I didn't use targeting two years ago, but I do remember going down to the flat lands for a couple of 4 hour+ non-stop sessions, 2.5 mile laps around a lake (Crown Hill) and an 18 mile out and back along the remains of a defunct canal (the Highline, which took water from the South Platte where it comes out of the Rocky Mts. and carried into central Denver. I usually walk hills (trails and roads) at 7500-8000 ft elevation in the Front Range of the Rockies - it makes walking dead flat with 15% more oxygen (5500-ft elevation) seem pretty easy. Steps beyond the 32 miles of outdoor flatIand walking (about 1/2 the total) were done indoors on a treadmill or pacing in front of TV. I do remember that I stopped after 22.5 hours, I think I could have physically walked another 1.5 hours were it necessary to avoid some catastrophe, but I didn't have anything left mentally to do it "just because". The next day was not good, slept 'til 1 PM, quite stiff and sore and only took a couple K steps to try (with only mild success) to stretch that out.

 I should point out that this is not something that I do regularly. My long term (4 year) daily step average is 'only' about 33K - enough to get the fitness and endurance to try some of these things. I have no intent or desire to better the 132k day or the 565k - 7 day. Those were more 1-time things to address your basic question by an experimental approach (if you really want to know if what it is like, do it yourself). It was done in a special month when the wife was gone visiting relatives, and I am retired with few time-consuming commitments. The other benchmark for that month was 2.05 million total steps (~66k/day) - wouldn't want to do that again either.

Other than that, I can't think of much more to say about 'How?' except remember to eat small amounts of high energy food more or less continuously and stay hydrated with you favorite sport/electrolyte drink (I use 1:1.5 diluted Gatorade and Trioral which uses the World Health Organization recipe for oral rehydration fluid). 

[mr.o.u.s]

a 132K day starts at midnight during the second day of the Susitna 100 mile
"Race Across Frozen Alaska". I don't race it, just try to survive it. You
have to have about 20+lbs of survival gear with you at all times including
food, water and shelter so most ppl pull a sled. I think that makes your
strides shorter. I walk/jog/stumble for about 50-60 miles on the second day
and that is how I got 132k. The race starts Saturday morning at 9am and you
have 48 hours to finish. You get 100k+ for the 2 days it takes to finish so
you could definitely crush a weekend challenge 🙂
I have done the H.U.R.T.100 in Hawaii when I was younger and training more
and I can't decide which one is harder, they both have their challenges.
Fitbit wasn't invented then so I have no idea how many steps that was.
V/R,
W. M. Rouse
(907) 654-5051

[prc1977]

I think it is impressive to test limits like that. I went to an ultra once to see if it was something for me to train for. It was a running event held in the Mohican Hills in Ohio. I volunteered at a station and remember seeing people go by who were muttering to themselves or in a few cases just crying in the misery of their experience. 

Day two of the "Race Across Frozen Alaska" sounds like a real test of mental and physical capacity. The finish line must be an emotional place.

Back to the original question, though, because even after a two-day 100 mile trek across Alaska, a person would have to knock out an average step count of approximately 60-70k per day (almost 40 miles) for the next five days in a row.  I'm guessing that getting 70,000 steps might be a bit tough the day after the race ends since you haven't slept etc. so your numbers have to go up to make up for a recovery day and well, those two days crunching along the tundra might not be the toughest days of a 560k week. You have a long way to go even after that kind of insane race.

I appreciate reading what 100k+ days are like and I imagine it must feel great to accomplish that but a 560k week seems crazier somehow.  There is no time for anything other than walking, fueling up, recovering and sleep. For a week.

Maybe that's why this thread keeps going for years because so many people casually registering 80k/day weeks is so implausible considering what it really takes to do it.

Cheers to you for doing it.

[checking]

I too am very impressed by the 132k day in the frozen Alaska race. Mine was done under ideal conditions: dead flat courses outdoors, perfect weather, not much to carry but a few hours of food and hydration. Even less to carry when doing laps around the lake, passing by home base every 40 minutes or so. And the indoor walking component is even easier than flat outdoor, as long as you can avoid distractions. Still all real steps but nothing compared to what @mr.o.u.s  describes.

[Corney]

mr.o.u.s. Yes, but do you average 80,000 step everyday 5-7 days per week
52 weeks per year like some individuals? I agree someone could log 80-100K
steps several times a year but not everyday.

[checking]

@Corney Don't change the parameters. The original question was average 80k/day (not 80k every day) over 7 days. Your - couple times a year comment indicate that, indeed, you too think it is possible.

BTW - truth is not dead, only continuously under assault.

[Corney]

checking: What does average 80K steps a day mean to you? Average 80K
steps in one day? In some cases truth is dead! When I was a runner I
averaged 6-7 miles a day, everyday, 52 weeks a year for over 27 years.
What does average mean?
According to my dictionary: average refers to the result obtained by
dividing a SUM by the number of QUANTITIES added together, not just one
quantity.

[checking]

@Corney, not worth the trouble, you don't understand math.

[BruceM]

You have to realize that some people cheat. A local health insurance company gave employees Fitbits and rewarded people who met goals. I saw more than one employee carrying it in their hand and shaking it as they walked. There was one man who joined the "70's and Steady" forum and immediately began getting more than a million steps each day. He would get the same number of steps each day. We simply ignored him and he went away after a while.

They might be cheaters, gaining nothing from the Fitbit.

[checking]

@BruceM, Gee I thought this discussion was about how people actually accomplished an 80k steps a day average for a week - that's hard; cheating to record 80k accelerometer triggers is easy - may take time, but not effort,, and most everybody knows it. As for you million a day guy - that must have been years ago, before Fitbit blocked all manual exercise entries from being included in leaderboards. Not all people cheat, even at high numbers, but Fitbit does not provide sufficient information to prove this, nor does it provide enough information to prove that they do cheat. So by me, innocent until proven guilty, although I may not believe or pay much attention. The cheating is more obvious at high numbers, but how do you know people at low numbers don't cheat just as much - like the 4k stepper who does an additional 6k of couch "walking" to keep their spouse or doctor happy, or the 10k stepper who adds another 10k couch steps to keep up with a group leaderboard. Frankly the whole ethos of "steps" being the most important fitness parameter, on which Fitbit is based, is really quite silly and stupid. Glad to be going inactive here.

[blazingsword]

I walked 19 minutes today & did 2,043 steps.
If I wanted to do 80,000 steps in a day I would have to walk 13.33333 hours per day to make it to 80,000 steps in one day.

If I walk 1.5 hours a day at that same pace, I would end up doing 9,000 steps.

But in no way would I be able to do 80,000.

Yesterday I did 8,417 steps which was 3.57 miles. Those steps were throughout my day. Helping out at church, two short walks with a friend, (20 minutes in a.m. & p.m.), plus grocery shopping, and running errands.
Unfortunately the Fitbit Inspire doesn’t say how many minutes it took me to do those steps.

But what I do know is that I average about 2,000 steps per mile. If I get in 10,000 per day for five miles, approximately, that’s a good day for me.

I hear where you are coming from.
I for one live in a condo. Been through some rough patches over the last decade. Loss of spouse, downsizing, (my desire), then my own issues. Now I am up in years. Not been as physical active as I would have like to be but struggled with some serious sinus issues. But my younger sisters, & I have 3 of them, say I am in better shape and health than most women my age: my late 60s. (However, I’ve been a Fitbit Zip user for years. Before that a Spark tracker on Spark people. My Fitbit Inspire is synchronized with Spark People.)

Since being in a condo where they are still building around me, it has been hard getting out to walk. Of course that didn’t include all the changes with mountains of paper work to be done either. I hate paper work. But it has to be done.

I finally decided to get a Cellercise mini trampoline and bounce on it for a few minutes everyday; and sometimes maybe twice a day. My feet don’t leave the mat but I get my heart rate up and feel good afterwards and YES those bounces count as steps.

So I guess my point is, you never know where someone has been in their life.
As far as I am concerned, if people want to up their scores by whatever means legit or not, that’s up to them. I only know that I do what I need to do to stay healthy & mobile.

It takes discipline & commitment & honesty with one’s self to sustain & to reach goals.
As for me, I do what I need to do. And if I can help or encourage others, I will do that as well.

So for some people if they cheat, they only cheat themselves; that’s the bottom line.

But for those that are not very mobile and can only exercise sitting down, more grace to them.

As for me, sometimes it takes a real breakthrough in my mindset to get moving & so I continue to push forward.

Sent from my iPhone

Moderator edit: merged reply

[Corney]

Let me try to put this thread to bed.  When one claims they average 80,000 steps in a day, that claim is meaningless.  Claiming an average for a one time event would be like a hitter claiming their batting average is .750 after going 3 for 4 after one game or a pitcher claiming their earned run average(ERA) is 0.00 after pitching a nine inning game and not allowing an earned run.  Batting averages and ERA's are calculated over a season or part of a season like batting averages.  A 80,000 steps day is a best day not an average.  Lets all agree to follow Fitbit's lead when they calculate the numbers in our weekly progress report.  The numbers are based on the previous 7 days and include:

Best day.

Total steps.

Average steps per day.

Total miles.

Average calorie burn

Total active minutes.

I acknowledge a person can walk 80,000 steps in one day but calling it an average for a day just clouds the issue.  Call it what it is, a best day or an excellent day!  For a person to average 80,000 steps per day their weekly total would be 560,000.

[Ronlaub]

Just for the record, there are many that exceed that 560k for their 7-day total.

I'm in one closed group that has one person that is showing a 7-day step count of 1,005,969 and another at 680,767. The other group I am in has two more over 560k. Where it is entirely possible (but extremely difficult) to do that in a single week, these two pairs are showing outrageous step totals week after week after week. 

Professional athletes and the top ultramarathoners do not train this way. 

I'm still waiting for one of these people to explain in detail how they do it on a regular basis. Nobody has stepped forward with a viable training schedule yet.

[nasacpa]

Yeah, the math on that million step/week claim just doesn't add up.  That's close to 6,000 steps/hr for 24 hours.  So, I'm guessing they don't ever sleep, eat, shower, go to the bathroom..............

[checking]

Of course those reported on Fitbit don't add up. If someone was out on the road really doing these things they would be using G*rm*n and measuring miles, not Fitbit and steps. I've never once heard Pete K, mention his step counts.

[Baltoscott]

@blazingsword — thanks for sharing.  I love that you went out an got a mini-trampoline to deal with the fact that your obligations and construction in your community have made ‘real’ walking more difficult lately.  

Fitbit measures all movement as steps and some steps are easier than others, but your real competition is yourself so as long as you are seeing improvement you are on the right path.  Keep it up.

[blazingsword]

@Baltoscott, thank you so much. My late husband, was a part of the Steeplechasers group in Frederick. And he qualified for the Boston Marathon the first time he did his first marathon in Baltimore, MD. And then he qualified for the Boston Marathon a second time. Both times he did the Boston Marathon while fighting cancer. He had bile duct cancer, one hair away from pancreatic cancer. He underwent the Whipple at Johns Hopkins, then oral chemo, and radiation in 2007. But in 2011 the cancer had spread to his bones. He fractured his pelvis while running. So at this point it was chemo by infusion. He passed away in March 2013. And at that time his heart rate was for the last 45 minutes, that of what his marathon racing would have been. (My daughter graduated from Gainesville, FL with RCNP MD; and so she was with us at his passing.) It was then that my heart broke, but for him it was the greatest run of his life into the arms of Jesus. I stayed by his side the entire time. Just two weeks before he was diagnosed, I prayed about whether or not to stay with my job. I was a proofreader for a trade show company, and the company was becoming more user friendly Alas, I decided to resign and hopefully look for another job within a year. But Jesus had other plans for me. So by the grace of God, I still put one foot in front of the other, and look forward to the future, no matter what it holds.