Why Walking Is Such An Excellent Way To Take Exercise

Increasing numbers of people are starting to realise what a great way to take exercise walking is. It’s an enjoyable, low impact, low injury risk exercise with the possibility for the introduction of a social element as well. For someone who is new to exercise, or maybe hasn’t exercised for some time, walking is the perfect introduction.

You don’t need any special equipment or training and you can fit it into your daily routine whenever it suits you best. It’s also very cost effective. There are no monthly gym fees to pay, so it won’t cost you a fortune to get in shape.

As with any form of exercise or physical activity, you will burn extra calories when you are actually walking. However, the really good news is that you will also increase you metabolic rate. What this means is that you will use up calories more rapidly during the course of the day – whatever you’re doing. It doesn’t matter if you’re reading a book, sitting watching TV, listening to the radio or even when your asleep – you will burn calories faster.

Apart from weight loss, walking on a regular basis will provide you with many health benefits. Your heart will be strengthened and your blood circulation will improve as walking increases oxygen intake in the blood. It can help to reduce your blood pressure level, increase your lung capacity and it even helps to fight depression and anxiety. The risk of contracting certain types of cancer is also considerably lower for regular walkers. Walking will provide you with more energy and will help you to sleep better. The full list of health benefits is too long to include in full. The list of benefits available from walking reads like an advert for some new miracle drug.

One good way to make sure your walking sessions are fun is to make it a social event. Instead of sitting in front of your computer, why not go for a walk with some colleagues during your lunch hour – or you walk around the local park, or even just your neighbourhood, with family and friends in the evening after work. If you like, you can just take your dog.

Listening to music while you walk can also make the miles and the time fly by that much faster. An mp3 player is a good investment if you don’t already own one. Just be sure not to have the volume too high and pay particular attention to traffic if you’re in a busy area.

Fitness footwear technology has seen some interesting new developments of late. You can now choose from a wide selection of “toning” shoes such as Fit flops sandals, Skechers Shape Ups shoes, Masai Barefoot Technology shoes and Reebok Easy Tones exercise shoes. These all claim to increase the amount of work done by the muscles in your legs and butt and increase the efficiency of your walking workout. They achieve this by using special soles, which either mimic the effect of walking on soft sand or which generate an element of microscopic imbalance which makes your leg and butt muscles work a bit harder.

If you find it difficult to keep motivated to walk, then you might consider trying a pedometer. An Omron pedometer is accurate to within 5% and will display your results in terms of steps taken, distance covered or calories burned. The generally agreed target, in order to achieve very significant health benefits from walking, is 10,000 steps a day. Wearing a pedometer during the day will not only help you to keep track of your progress, but will prompt you to seek out new ways of boosting your daily step count.

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!

Leave a comment