Most people say that walking is not much of a workout if you’re looking to get ripped. This recent study begs to differ as they found that changing up your pace in a simple way leads to burning of calories whilst walking.
Researchers at Ohio State University discovered this when they looked at exactly how many calories a person could burn if they kept changing speed whilst walking. Their findings revealed that walking at various speeds can see you burn up to 20% more calories in comparison to maintaining a steady pace.
Researchers said “The metabolic rate for oscillating-speed walking was significantly higher than that for constant-speed walking”.
Walking is the most friendly when it comes to exercises, as you do not need any pricey equipment or special training; and everybody can do it. Even if you have a busy schedule, a walk around the block or through the neighbourhood park can be and should be done.
You can either alone or with a friend and most of all, injuries are rare. In the interim, walking offers many benefits.
According to The Surgeon General “increase in physical activity significantly reduces your risk of chronic disease and premature death. Regular exercise helps to protect against heart disease, stroke, some cancers, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and depression. Even people who already have a chronic disease may benefit from physical activity. Walking can lessen the severity of an illness or condition, while managing or reducing symptoms.”
But probably the best benefit is that walking helps you keep off the kilos, and this all backed by science.
Change It Up
According to Dr Manjo Srinivasan, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and co-author said “Humans do not generally walk at constant speed, except perhaps on a treadmill, normal walking involves starting, stopping, and changing speeds.”
In order to measure the metabolic rates of each participant, researchers requested that they should change their walking pace on a treadmill while its speed remained steady. Srinivasan said “when the treadmill speed changes, the machine itself does some of the work, instead of the person walking.”
Participants in this study had to walk quickly to move to the front of the treadmill belt, or slowed down so that they can move to back to the belt. Researchers observed that in comparison to a steady pace, they burned between six and twenty percent more calories by walking in this manner.
Is there an ideal walking speed?
The researchers “found people preferred lower walking speeds for shorter distances.” Although as the distance increased, participants generally started picking up the pace.
So get your walking shoes on, bro
Sources: Medical Daily, Biology Letters
Alice Paulse
