Getting Healthy Can Be…Fun?

May 3, 2016

SILVER SPRING, MD-May, 2016 — American Hiking Society makes the case that some of the best gym equipment in the world is already inside your shoes in its new report, Hiking Trails in America:  Pathways to Health. The report, to be released at an event on May 26, 2016, in Washington, D.C., will highlight the urgency of making fitness fun and demonstrate that hiking – including urban and suburban hiking – can help put America on the path to better health.

With as few as 1 in 5 American adults meeting the Centers for Disease Control’s physical activity guidelines, clearly something must change. American Hiking Society will explain how making fitness fun is critical to improving the nation’s health.

“The business-as-usual approach has failed to motivate most Americans to achieve even a modicum of fitness,” said Gregory Miller, President, American Hiking Society. “By encouraging more people to get out on a nearby trail and just have fun, we can begin a new effort to get America moving and get healthy.”

Dr. Miller wants Americans to realize that trails aren’t just in the mountains and National Parks, but right in America’s neighborhoods. Paved and unpaved, travelling along the bank of a river in the city or winding through neighborhoods and connecting communities, trails are everywhere – and he wants everyone to lace up and enjoy them.

Join American Hiking Society as it outlines the path forward and issues a call to action on Thursday, May 26, at the Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC, from 9:00 am to 10:00 a.m. Invited speakers include Thomas Tidwell, Chief of U.S. Forest Service, Representative Earl Blumenauer (OR-03), Co-chair House Trails Caucus, and Denise Ryan, Deputy Director, National Park Service.

RSVP: POlsen@AmericanHiking.org

Founded in 1976, American Hiking Society is the only national, recreation-based nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting and protecting America’s hiking trails, their surrounding natural areas and the hiking experience. To learn more about American Hiking Society and its mission and programs, please visit www.AmericanHiking.org or call (301) 565-6704.