How Walking Can Improve Your Health
Hamish Hayward | July 13, 2010When it comes to exercise, walking is a great low impact workout that the vast majority of people can do. It needs no special equipment, there are no expensive monthly gym fees to pay and you can work it into your daily schedule whenever it’s good for you. If you look at the potential health benefits of walking you might be forgiven for thinking that you were looking at an advert for some new wonder drug – but they are very real and easily obtainable with no more than a few minor changes to your daily routine.
Many health and medical advisers suggest that 10,000 steps a day are all that is required in order to obtain the significant health benefits on offer. That’s approximately four and a half to five miles for the average person. It sounds like a fair old distance – but it’s very much easier to achieve than you would think. Bearing in mind all the potential health benefits, it’s worthwhile making the effort to walk just a little further each day.
Modern living can be somewhat sedentary – so many people will, in the absence of remedial action, fall short of the recommended 10,000 steps a day target. In order to find out what your daily average step count is, you might want to consider getting yourself a pedometer. These can be picked up for just a few dollars nowadays, and a pedometer will not only tell you how many steps you take but how many calories you burn and the distance you cover.
Once you know the average number of steps you take on a daily basis, you should seek out ways to make up any shortfall between your daily average and the 10,000 step target value. There are any number of ways to do this – just be sensible and start off slowly, there’s no need to do it all at once.
If you can set aside time each day for a dedicated walk then that’s great. However, if that’s not a practical proposition for you then there are plenty of ways to fit walking into your day. Go for a ten or fifteen minute walk during your lunch break. Leave the car at home and walk to work, or get off the bus a couple of stops early and complete your journey on foot.
Take advantage of modern technology and walk around whilst talking on your mobile phone. A fifteen minute telephone conversation can let you fit in an extra 1,000 or 1,500 steps. There are plenty of other opportunities to fit walking into your day – and it all adds up.
Be sure to seek the advice of your doctor before you commence any new exercise routine – especially if you have any medical conditions, haven’t exercised for some time or are over forty years old. However, because walking is a low impact workout which carries a very low injury risk (as long as you’re sensible), you should begin to receive a number of health benefits if you walk on a regular basis. You’ll be pleasantly surprised at just how quickly you see and feel the results.
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