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Reasons to replace an hour of sitting with an hour at the gym
Mark Ryan
Guest columnist
Aug. 25, 2026, 5:04 a.m. ET
The middle-aged man was in the final phase of his workout at the Planet Fitness on Kerry Forest Parkway in Tallahassee. Done with the free weights, exercise machines, and sit-ups, he was wrapping up with 30 minutes of cardio on the treadmill machine
So moving along at a steady 3.0 miles-per-hour pace on the treadmill, earbuds plugged in to old Steely Dan, he was feeling good about himself, the way he usually felt when nearing the end of a gym visit
Rikki don’t lose that number. You don’t want to call nobody else …
To his right, a young man had his treadmill speed set at 3.8 mph. To his left, an older woman with an apparent bad leg was cruising at an impressive 4.0 mph clip
He was the slow poke in the group, but it wasn’t reason to put a damper on his good mood. He wasn’t there to set any records
He knew he wasn’t competing with anybody
Most importantly, he knew he wasn’t at home — sitting
The man was a proponent of the popular fitness saying of unknown origin, as follows: “No matter how slow you go, you are still lapping everybody on the couch.”
Yes, lately he was probably spending as much time at the gym as he once spent watching TV from the couch
Sitting disease is the informal term sometimes used to describe prolonged sedentary behavior
According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) data published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), one in four U.S. adults sits for more than eight hours a day, and 44 percent of U.S. adults do zero moderate-to-vigorous activity weekly
The World Health Organization reports physical inactivity as the fourth leading risk factor for global mortality. Sedentary lifestyles have been shown to be associated with many health risks, including depression, anxiety, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and cancer
Because the free weights and exercise machines were only on his personal schedule every other day, the man might play old Eagles or old Boz Scaggs on the home stereo when doing his daily sit-ups
Why can’t you just get it through your head … It’s over, it’s over now …
He wondered if Boz ever got on the treadmill
Mark Ryan is a registered nurse and lives in Tallahassee
