Posts tagged: walking studies

Cold Inside and Out Burns Calories

 © Copyright Walter Baxter and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons LicenceIt’s been a strange winter, and cold temperatures have been hard to come by in some places. But when the chill returns you may be able to burn more calories just by keeping warm. Because your body has to work to stay warm it’s putting in more effort and burning more calories. As long as you refrain from those hearty carb laden comfort foods you can use it to your advantage. You can take it one step further it seems with cold drinks as well. I found a statistical analysis of the calories it takes to melt an ounce of ice. It seems that it’s the same amount as forty push-ups. For a cup of ice that’s 347 push-ups! Of course you could do the push-ups and then cool off with the ice.

TODAY: DO SOME PUSH-UPS. WELL… AT LEAST TRY TO!

Take A hike

It’s Sunday. Relax and clear your head while burning calories and strengthening your body by taking a good long walk. A study I just read today also says that we should be doing different new things regularly to stimulate our brains. So take the weekend and go someplace completely new or where you haven’t visited in a long while and walk there. The exploration will benefit you in many ways.

TODAY: WALK SOMEPLACE NEW.

Walking Slow Is Good Too

Researchers have found out that walking slow can actually burn slightly more calories than mid-speed walking. Evidently when they looked at the motion of your body they found that you are basically stopping and starting with each step and momentum isn’t helping you along. At the other end of the spectrum, at very high walking speeds you use more muscle groups with arm motion and with a long stride. That burns extra calories. Running has lots of up and down motion that may burn more calories lifting your weight up off the ground and moving forward. Of course the aerobic exercise of a quicker pace has many benefits as well.

The big thing is that all walking will benefit your diet. Just do it! (Hey that’s catchy.)

TODAY: TAKE A WALK

Walk As Though Your Life Depended On It

I’ve got  one big reason for you to walk. If you don’t do it you will die sooner. Does that shock you? It has a different lasting effect if you are male or female, but both are positive. A study of over 72,000 nurses showed that women who walk three hours or more per week reduce their risk of a heart attack by 35%. For men the difference can be bigger. In one study of retired men, mortality rates of men who walk less than one mile a day was actually twice that (100% higher) of  those who walk more than two miles a day.

Just be careful crossing the street.

TODAY DO THREE THINGS:  1) WALK A ROUTE THAT YOU THINK IS TWO MILES   2) DRIVE IT TO SEE HOW FAR IT REALLY WAS.   3) MEASURE OUT A COUPLE OF DIFFERENT TWO MILE ROUTES TO WALK.

30 Second Burst Exercise Accelerator

I saw a report today from a university study in Ontario that a half hour of bicycling had the same effect as an hour and a half of moderate pedaling by simply doing 30 second “power bursts” followed by 4 minutes of slow pace cycling. It seems the same might work for other aerobic exercise like walking. Sounds like a great way to get more for less.

TODAY: TRY A POWER BURST WHEN YOU EXERCISE.

Walk Your Beat

Walking is good for your heart beat. It helps keep it beating! Studies ahow that mortality rates among retired men who walk less than one mile per day were nearly twice that among those who walked more than two miles per day. The health benefits and weight loss that comes from walking outweigh… you.

TODAY: WALK

Surgeon General Warning… Walk Five Days

Just so you don’t think that I nag you to walk because I think it’s a good idea. The nags all have factual basis. I may not be a doctor, but I’ve read what they recommend. And the big guy, the Surgeon General, recommends “30 minutes or more of moderate intensity physical activity on five or more days per week to improve your health and fitness.” It can be accumulated walking of 30 minutes, meaning it can be done in shorter lengths throughout the day. 10 or 15 minutes at a time during different parts of the day is fine. The ‘moderate intensity’ means you feel the exercise and get warm and slightly out of breath when you do it.

So get up and walk or we’ll have to stick a big red surgeon general warning on the side of your couch, because it’s hazardous to your health!

TODAY: GET OUT THERE AND WALK!