Taking Exercise in Stride
For: Well & Informed, July 2003
What’s so great about exercise? It makes your cardiovascular system stronger and more efficient. It also helps control blood pressure, blood sugar, and body weight. Those are just a few of the physiological benefits of exercise. You may not enjoy playing sports or may dread the very idea of exercise classes, but there is one form of exercise that almost anybody can enjoy and benefit from—walking.
Ideally, you should exercise at least half an hour every day. In fact, the new goal set by government experts for optimal health is an hour a day. Walking is the easiest way to meet this exercise goal. A brisk walk (brisk means 3.5 to 4 miles per hour, depending on the length of your stride) burns nearly as many calories as running the same distance at a moderate pace and offers similar health benefits. Even strolling or slow walking is beneficial to some degree.
What can you expect to gain by walking regularly? Here’s a small sampling of recent scientific findings on the benefits of walking:
• Reductions in body fat: Inactive overweight women (age 50 to 75) who walked briskly or cycled five days a week for at least 45 minutes had significant reductions in weight and body fat, according to new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Most important for heart health, they lost abdominal fat. A recent French study found that walking provides similar benefits for men.
• Heart benefits: Walking can reduce your blood cholesterol levels, as well as the risk of heart disease. A study in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that women who walked at least three hours a week cut their risk of heart disease by one-third.
• Blood pressure control: Many studies show that walking regularly can reduce blood pressure in healthy people or those who have high blood pressure.
• Lifting your spirits: Even short walks can improve mood, according to researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In one study, walking or jogging benefited people depressed enough to be on medication. (This does not mean that walking is a substitute for medication, of course.)
• Keeping you sharp: Walking appears to lower the risk of mental decline as you grow older.
• Stronger bones: Walking is weight-bearing exercise, which can help delay or prevent bone loss and osteoporosis.
• Avoiding diabetes: Many studies show that walking helps reduce the risk of diabetes. Most recently, in a study from the Diabetes Prevention Program, researchers compared diet and exercise to drug treatment alone in people at high risk for diabetes. People who dieted and walked briskly or did other moderately intense exercise for at least 150 minutes a week cut their risk of getting Type 2 diabetes by more than half. Drug treatment was helpful, but less so.
You need no special equipment for walking—just a pair of comfortable, cushioned, lightweight, low-heeled shoes. Avoid stiff-soled shoes that don’t bend. If you walk on rough terrain or out in the woods, you may need something sturdier. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that any flat shoe is okay for exercise walking. Dress shoes and most sandals can leave you with blistered or aching feet.
Walking is the best way to explore city streets, village lanes, or a country landscape. You can walk with a good companion or alone. If you walk on a treadmill, you can watch TV or even read while you walk.
To get more out of your walking workout: Seek out different terrains. Don’t always stay on the flat. Try the beach, gravel, grass, the woods, the track at the local school. And let your elbows do some walking. By swinging your arms when you walk, you’ll burn more calories (5 to 10% more) and get an upper-body workout as well.
UC Berkeley Wellness Letter, March 2003