Elephant Treadmill

Does Dr. James Levine up at the Mayo Clinic know about this?

What may be the world's biggest treadmill (above) — it weighs 8 tons — was delivered to the Alaska Zoo in Anchorage this week in an effort to help the zoo's obese elephant Maggie drop a thousand pounds or so.

Maggie, 23–years–old, is the only African elephant in Alaska.

Over the years she's put on a little weight around the gut, as happens to most living creatures, but in Maggie's case that means a very high risk of her getting arthritis and other joint problems due to the tremendous load on her hips, knees and feet.

In August of 2004, when Maggie tipped the scales at her all–time high of 9,120 pounds, zoo officials decided that enough was more than enough.

They put Maggie on a new diet and health regime and in the past year she's dropped 900 pounds.

Only another half–ton to go.

The zoo hopes to have its new treadmill, 20–feet–long by 8–feet–wide and built by Conveyer Engineering, an Idaho–based company that designs heavy–duty conveyer systems for mining, up and running by the end of this month and Maggie working out on it by Thanksgiving.

More on this fast–breaking story here.

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Update on the treadmill situation here at bookofjoe:

After my January 31 post on the subject, I did my due diligence — or rather, I took my crack research team off bookofjoe–related activities for a few hours and told them to get busy and find me the world's best treadmill for walking — and my Smooth 5.15 has been up and running and in daily use since it arrived in May.

Although Dr. Levine (below, at work in his office)

recommended a speed of 0.7 mph for all activities on it, I've taken to starting my morning papers at that speed and then, at around 30 minutes or so, after I've had my first cup of coffee, bumping it up to 1.0 mph for the next 90 minutes of reading.

So far so good: haven't gone flying off it yet.

I integrate a period of two or three minutes or so of backward walking and reading every half hour or so to keep my hamstrings happy.

As soon as this post goes up I will send it to Dr. Levine, my treadmill guru, for his contemplation and possible comment.