Team Orange woke up in Hayes, Kansas this morning with grumbling stomachs after last night’s 9pm-3am shift. When we stumbled out of our rooms and asked the woman managing the Day’s Inn about a great breakfast place, she said that the IHOP across the street is the “best breakfast place in town.” Well, IHOP didn’t exactly sound like the small organic café my stomach was yearning for, but considering I hadn’t been inside an IHOP since college, I thought it was worth checking out. Plus, I love pancakes.

What felt like genuine excitement when I walked in the door turned to utter disgust when I left the IHOP an hour later. My spinach and tomato omelet was the size of a nerf football, and boasted three layers of cheese surrounding the few wisps of spinach and pieces of tomato that kept the breakfast creation true to its name. Sean’s over-easy eggs came with a mountain of buttery hash browns and a pile of french toast dripping in blueberry syrup and whipped cream. And the kicker was that Sean’s 1,500 calorie extravaganza was a mere $4.99, compared with Lansing’s tab of $5.99 for three scrambled eggs and a piece of wheat toast. IHOP not only serves portions ample enough for a family of four, but they create financial incentives for people to order more food. And this is the “best breakfast place” Hayes has to offer.

Since we’ve been traveling across the United States for the last two-and-a-half weeks, we’ve spent a lot of time in small-town restaurants and the series of chains dotting the West’s web of interstates. Everything, and I mean everything – from hamburger joints to small-town steak places – is supersized. It’s no wonder that recently released obesity statistics predict that 75% of adults will be overweight eight years from now.

An article published in the August edition of the journal Epidemiologic Reviews made media waves when it was released in mid-July, because it painted a bleak picture of the future of the American waistline. Three out of four U.S. adults will be either overweight or obese in 2015, and 41% will be obese, up from 66% who are currently overweight or obese and 34% who are currently obese. Moreover, people are gaining weight at the waistline, which increases the likelihood of diabetes and heart disease, two of our nation’s most serious killers.

There are all sorts of arguments for whether obesity is linked to genetics, and the jury is still out on how close the genetic tie is, however one final finding of the review indicates that there is a strong environmental/behavioral cause. The recent study reported that Asian-Americans born in the U.S. are four times as likely to be obese as those born overseas; and Asian immigrants who've lived in the U.S. for many years are more likely to be obese than new immigrants. Economic and community factors aside, it’s hard to argue that portions, food choices, and activity levels don’t contribute to this stark shift.

Struck by the abundance of unhealthy choices and the cheap tab at my recent visit to IHOP, I did a bit of research about the food and restaurant industries. In an experiment about the relationship between wealth and obesity conducted by Adam Drewnowski, an obesity researcher at the University of Washington, he found that one dollar could buy 1,200 calories of cookies or potato chips but only 250 calories of carrots. Looking for something to wash down those chips, he discovered that his dollar bought 875 calories of soda but only 170 calories of orange juice.

Restaurant meals are even worse than the grocery store, averaging 1,000 to 1,500 calories, or two-thirds of the daily average calories recommended by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In places like Hayes, Kansas and Rifle, Colorado (where we were a few nights ago), and many of the towns we’re passing as we run across the U.S., there are no healthy choices, and instead, locals looking for a special night out frequent chain sit-down restaurants, which are often more serious offenders than traditional fast food joints (for example, the classic burger at Ruby Tuesday has a whopping 1,013 calories and the McDonald’s Big Mac, with its 540 calories and 29 grams of fat, seems downright “healthy” by comparison). With high calorie counts, limited options and ever-increasing suburban sprawl, Wal-mart better start doubling its stock of XXL’s.

I hate to paint such a bleak picture of America, but as I travel through the Heartland, it’s tough to ignore the state of the American body. People see us running and ask us who is chasing us. Servers look at us like we’re nuts if we ask for a half-portion of food at a restaurant. Hotel managers are speechless if we ask whether there is a restaurant within walking distance. This is America. The statistics don’t lie, and neither do the empty parks and full burger joints. Something’s gotta give.

It has been an incredible experience to be able to dedicate the last 77 (and remaining 18) days to one pressing global issue: safe drinking water. Spending 24 hours a day educating and learning, being in the spotlight and observing, and talking and listening has been a true gift; and it has reinforced how much power each of us holds in creating positive change. I’ve got my hands full with the safe drinking water issue right now, but if anyone one there is looking for a cause to work on, tackle obesity (and maybe try to take IHOP out of business too).