If you’re the kind of person that wants fast result and are willing to endure some pain in order to get it then walking is not for you. Walking is an effective weight loss technique and it is something that you can stick for life. Even when you are old enough to have grandchildren. How many grandfathers (and grandmothers) you see that are still lifting weight? Not many I bet.
There are many benefits to walking. One of it is that you will be able to burn fat without burning your muscle along with it. Plus, you will not be deprived of essential nutrient when you walk instead of running or other extremely hard and intense exercise.
Running is also low in impact and has one of the lowest drop out rate in all of the exercises that exist in the world. Think about it, if you don’t do the exercise you won’t reap the benefit. So why don’t you do something that you will do everyday consistently? (and perhaps add on some other exercise on top of it)
However, normal walking routine is both boring and inefficient at burning off your fat. With normal walking you will only burn about 100 calories per mile. (if you are about 180 pounds or 81 KG) The formula to calculate the rate of calories burn from walking is Distance x Weight. This means that its not how long you walk but how far you walk that counts. You can walk for a mile in 60 minutes and still lose the same amount of weight as your friend who walks a mile in just 20 minutes. However, you might want to take it slow at first and focus on walking safety and injury free.
Faster Fat Burning
If walking to burn fat is too slow for you however, you may want to try something a bit more intense but still as safe as walking. Instead of walking the normal way you should be doing an interval style of walking. This is actually adopted from the running style high intensity interval training (or HIIT in short) which burns fat a lot faster than your traditional running and jogging style. In walking, you simply walk faster for one minute before slowing down for another minute. Do this for 30 to 60 minutes per day and your heart (and waist) will thank you for it.
Before you start walking you have to be aware on how to prevent injuries. Contrary to popular belief, you do and can get injured by walking. This is of course depending on your age and your level of fitness but its better to prevent than to feel sorry right?
Before you can prevent or even treat an injury you must be aware of the types of injury you can face as a walker.
The first one is called Plantar fasciitis. It is an injury to your feet’s “shock absorber”. You know how people with high arch (on their feet) can walk faster and longer because their feet can absorb the shock of walking a long distance? Well, turns out they can overdo it and injure the soft tissue between the heel and the balls of your feet. On a side note, the opposite of the high arc feet is the flat feet. If you are still unsure whether its Plantar fasciitis then pay attention to your heel or arch when you wake up in the morning. If its painful in the morning then chances are it is Plantar fasciitis because the fascia stiffens during the cold night.
So what do you do if you have the Plantar Fasciitis? You should be able to solve this problem by stretching your arch. Just pull the balls of your feet upwards. You can try to do it in different position as long as you can pulling and stretching your arch/sole.
Also, you should be able to get some walking shoes that are not too soft in the middle. Get ones that are a little bit flexible but not too much. And finally, avoid walking on uneven surface in order not to strain your arch too much. You should also rest and not walk too much. (common sense, i know!)
The second problem most avid walkers face is ingrown toenail. This can be an annoyance (or real pain depending on how serious it is) The cause of this is simple. Your shoes are too tight and causes the toe nails to grow sideways (because they can’t grow forward) and hurt your soft tissues at the side. This can cause bleeding and discomfort.
The third injury is probably more serious and can cause some grief to your routine. It is the infamous Achilles tendinitis. It is the injury of your Achilles tendon basically. The one that connects your heel to your calf muscle. Prevention and cure is both simple. Just avoid walking on uneven surface too much and don’t strain yourself. Rotate your workout with swimming and upper body strength training. And as always, do some warm up and stretching.
Bunions
This may sound a bit icky for those with weak hearts. Bunions is simple your toe bone misaligned. (at the joint area) This causes a protrusion of some sort, causing inflammation and all sorts of pain when walking. You might need surgery to correct this if icing it and getting a bigger shoe (in the toe area) doesn’t help.
Lumbar strain.
Lumbar injury doesn’t really happen to people who walk instead of run because of the minimum amount of shock to the lower back. Basically its an injury to the lower back where some of your sensitive tendons and muscles reside. The prevention is easy. You just have to train your abs and some mid-body support muscles. Also, walk straight instead of slumping, it helps.
