Mall Walkers Shop for New Lease on Life : Thousand Oaks: Senior citizens started doing their laps at The Oaks Mall about 1 1/2 years ago.

Five hundred miles. To the 60- and 70-something generation who stroll with Elinor Welch through The Oaks Mall, the fact that the 67-year-old had walked the equivalent of 1,000 laps around the shopping center was simply incredible.

“The first time I walked here, I thought I was never going to make it,” Welch said one recent day, a patina of sweat on her forehead. More than 1 1/2 years ago, a few laps would make her legs and feet sore, and she was completely out of breath.

“You just really knew you were out of shape,” she said.

Today, the gray-haired matron thinks nothing about the three miles or more she does around the mall every other day. She walks at a fast clip.

There are no skinny dance instructors here, no loud music blaring from speakers. And most of the participants will admit that they haven’t seen the latest aerobic fashions.

But the climate-controlled mall has become a gymnasium for Mall Walkers, a sturdy group of seniors who organized more than 1 1/2 years ago.

Instead of strolling leisurely, they stride, outfitted with shoes designed specifically for walking, pulse-counters and Walkmans, eyes pointed purposefully forward.

Experts say walking is good for the heart and easier on the body than jogging. There is also a social element to fast-paced walking.

Most of the gray-haired gliders exercise early in the morning before shoppers crowd the aisles.

The 25 or so senior citizens who choose to make the mall their regular morning walk say they prefer the slick floors of the shopping center to the tree-lined paths of their own neighborhoods.

“My neighborhood is not safe for me to walk in,” Welch said.

In the summer, air-conditioning cools the building; in the winter, there is insulation from freezing weather.

Some of them, such as Carleen Binkley, 66, do it to keep from getting bored.

“I found out since retiring that you must keep active,” said Binkley, a former school cafeteria worker. “It’s an incentive to get up and get out. Even if you are by yourself, people will wave and say hello.”

Binkley and Laura Myszka, 66, can be seen every other morning doing laps at a fast 5 m.p.h. around the mall. Every lap is half a mile, and each completes at least two miles every other day.

“We’re the fastest,” Myszka said. “They call us the speed demons.”

After logging nine miles a week, Myszka said, she was recently commended by her doctor. “He said it was the best thing I could be doing.”

A younger generation of walkers has also been drawn to the mall. One 42-year-old said she comes each morning to exercise before working at her part-time job as an accountant.

“I used to bike and run, but this is easier on my feet,” Susan Atcherly said. “But these people make me feel positively lazy. Look at them go.”

Indeed, most of the people who frequent the mall have become friends. They talk animatedly while working up a sweat. Others can be seen wearing the necklaces that proclaim them as 500- or 100-mile walkers.

Afterward, some gather at a fast-food restaurant to drink coffee and plan excursions together.

“There’s old, and then there’s old, “ Binkley said. “Here I think we’re all young.”