What we each find "normal" can vary a lot. From long distance hiking my sort of default approach now is, I guess, relatively fast unless I'm heavily loaded for some reason (which really only happens in very cold weather trips). I've been tooling along at what I feel is a comfortable pace and on occasion folks that either haven't heard of or don't accept the concept of HYOH have said things like "slow down, enjoy yourself" or words to that effect. At a time when I'm enjoying myself immensely. So each to their own.
OTOH, there are certainly a lot of people who like to hike faster than me (!). I do find it challenging to hike at someone else's (significantly different) pace, and when I hike with friends now I typically hike my own pace for a few hours and then flop down and read or snooze until we sync back up.

I do think that my approach to diet and exercise is lacking for the "most of the time" that I'm not backpacking. I've a lot of respect for folks who keep it all together in 'normal life'.