Walk This Way

So, the company I work for participates in the Virgin Health Miles program. As a result, a bunch of us have been wearing pedometers provided by the program. As a participant, you get paid by racking up pedometer steps by walking, running, or other forms of exercise. In addition, you can set up challenges to spice things up a bit.

A co-worker and I started up a one-on-one challenge with the goal of putting up as many steps as we could in two weeks. To make a long story shorter, on the final day before we left work we both checked in. I had slacked a bit in the last couple days and I was down over 11,000 steps. I could either give up or just go for a win.

The contest would end at midnight, so at around 9pm, I did 7 miles (some jogging and mostly walking) and checked in my steps. I found that I was up about 2000 steps. I figured it may have been enough, but I wasn't too sure. You're allowed to check-in the previous days miles the next day for challenge purposes. And, I had no idea whether or not my opponent might have put up some real numbers in the final hours as well.

Anyway, with about ten to fifteen minutes until midnight, I decide what the heck, let me run up and down my stairs for five more minutes. I racked up another 500 or so steps, and checked them in. And, that was that.

Today, I find myself a victor by a final margin of... 79 steps! I don't know how much closer you can get when the totals are in the 135K range. Pretty funny. My co-worker was not amused. She can't even look at my face right now. I have to watch out now though as I'm sure she and others in the office will no longer be slacking in the final hours of any future challenge.