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A new Washington rat race: Fitbit-wearing power walkers vie for step supremacy

By Michael S. Rosenwald, Washington Post, September 16, 2014

One day this summer, Rep. Fred Upton was walking down Pennsylvania Avenue when he happened upon White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough.

They are political foes. Upton, a Republican from Michigan, chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee. McDonough is the right hand of Democratic presidential power.

Upton went for the jugular: He asked McDonough how many steps he had taken that day. They held up their wrists, their step totals displayed on their Nike FuelBands and Fitbits.

“I was winning,” said Upton, whose one-day record is nearly 18,000 steps. “So that’s a good thing.”

This is the new Washington rat race. In a town that hits DefCon 1 on just about any issue, lawmakers, administration officials, congressional staffers, diplomats and bureaucrats have found something healthy and bipartisan to compete over: the number of steps they walk each day. In the era of political gridlock, at least they’re trying to move physically.

House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) is obsessed with his Jawbone Up band and regularly checks in with 10 other band wearers in his office: “Hey, you getting in your steps?” Hill staffers have formed Facebook groups to share--and gloat about--their step totals. The State Department recently held a five-week walking competition. Team names included Agony of De Feet and Holy Walkamolies.

“The type of people you find on Capitol Hill are very competitive by nature,” said Alexa Marrero, a senior aide to Upton who competes with him. (He accuses her of cheating by moving to the Hill so she could walk to work.) “You have a bunch of Type A personalities in jobs prone to keeping you behind a desk all day, so there are a lot of people who have found this as a fun way to get up.”

The competitions are changing official Washington behavior in some corners. Elected officials insist on parking far away for meetings to get in their 10,000 steps a day, the total often recommended by fitness experts and dietitians. Legislative correspondents--they are underdogs in competitions because they answer e-mails all day--are finding ways to be at their desks less. Boehner’s staff even holds meetings in the Capitol Rotunda while walking in circles, which is not meant to be a metaphor for Washington politics.

Political Washington has entered the realm of the Quantified Self. Smartphone apps and sensors such as the Fitbit can track steps, miles, calories burned, heart rate and even sleep patterns. Users link up on Web sites or apps to see how many steps their friends or colleagues have taken. Trash talking ensues.

“You can send happy faces or sad faces,” said Sen. John Boozman (R-Ark.), a devoted step tracker. “That sort of stuff.”

How many step trackers there are in Washington is impossible to know, but there are some hints about the city’s collective walking capacity. Jawbone has stats showing its D.C. users average about 8,262 steps a day, which is less than U.S. leaders New York at 8,704 steps and Boston at 8,471. D.C. beats slender and tony Miami, which somehow manages only 6,734 steps per day.

Tracking steps is still in its early days. Of the 60 percent of U.S. adults who say they track their weight, diet or fitness, just 9 percent use an app or online tool to keep up with stats, according to the Pew Research Center. Analysts project that number will grow considerably next year with the introduction of Apple’s new watch. Unveiled last week, the watch will track fitness and, as with many Apple products, could turn a new idea mainstream.

Studies show that using pedometers and other devices to track activity can improve health by motivating positive behaviors. When competition or teamwork is involved, walkers are less likely to relegate their tracking devices to a drawer, in the same way that many people turn their treadmills into expensive clothes hangers, experts say.

Not everyone in Congress has embraced the walkathon. Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) recently complained about the privacy aspects of devices such as the Fitbit. His staff did not respond to a question about whether he or his staff use the devices, but it’s not as if Schumer is opposed to walking briskly. As former senator Robert J. Dole (R-Kan.) once observed, “the most dangerous place in Washington is between Charles Schumer and a television camera.”

Some lower-level staffers have taken to just competing with themselves.

Sarah Czufin, a 23-year-old legislative correspondent for Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), uses a Jawbone Up that vibrates once an hour to remind her to collect her steps. Making sure she walks enough is important, she said, because “my job takes place at my desk” and after work is filled with receptions featuring free, often fried, appetizers.

She will do just about anything to hit her numbers, including walking back and forth down a hallway during a phone interview. (That netted her 673 steps.)

“Can you hear my heels clicking?” Czufin asked.

Yes.

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