Health Care

Clipping a pedometer onto your waistband in the morning can make active – even if you don’t “exercise”.

When a group of sedentary people were given a daily goal of “10,000 steps of brisk activity”, their improvements in fitness level, blood pressure, and body aft over 2 years were comparable to those of a group that followed a traditional gym-based aerobic programme.
The pedometers made counting steps easy and fun, and acted as a motivational tool by providing immediate feedback.

“Most people are shocked to realize that they are sitting for 12-14 hours a day and taking an average of only 2,000 to 3,000 steps,” says Andrea Dunn, PhD, of The Cooper Institute for Aerobics Research in Dallas. Once the participants realized this, they started changing it by taking stretch breaks, walking in airports and railway stations, using rest rooms on other floors and pacing the sidelines of their children’s soccer fields. “The pedometers make it a game to get you moving,” says Dr. Dunn.

Even if you walk regularly, you are probably not hitting 10,000 steps, which is about 5-6 miles. That’s why it’s important to be active all day long. If you are trying to lose weight, you may need to up your tally to around 18,000 steps.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 16th, 2006 at 3:28 pm and is filed under Fitness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.