Walking is a fantastic method of dropping a few pounds, getting in shape and achieving a wide range of important health benefits. It’s a low impact way to exercise that doesn’t require any special equipment, training or expertise. You can do it wherever you like and there are no expensive monthly gym membership fees to pay. You can slot it into your daily schedule whenever it’s most convenient for you. Fit your walking into one long session or break it into shorter spells over the course of the day. It’s completely up to you.
One essential item of walking equipment is a good pair of shoes. If your shoes give you blisters or cause you discomfort, then it will be difficult to motivate yourself to keep up with your walking workout program. So be certain that you have a good pair that fits you well. If you want to, you could get some of the latest designs of fitness footwear which help to increase the amount of work that your lower body muscles perform during normal activity.
There are a variety of different makes on the market – Skechers Shape Ups, Reeboks Easy Tones, Fit flops exercise sandals and Masai Barefoot Technology are amongst the best known and most popular – but there are more brands appearing on the market all the time. There are some variations, but the common concept appears to be a specially engineered sole which increases the amount of work done performed your leg and butt muscles. This boosts the effectiveness of your workout and helps you in getting the maximum return from your walking exercise program.
The generally accepted target figure in order to achieve health and fitness benefits is 10,000 steps daily. A lot of people who walk for exercise find that a pedometer is a useful motivational aid which encourages them to increase their step count and get closer to the target figure. Pedometers are not expensive these days but, if you think that a pedometer would help you to stay motivated you should be certain to get a reasonably good quality model.
Recent research found that a large number of pedometers were inaccurate – some by as much as 50%. The general trend seemed to be for inaccurate pedometers to overestimate the number of steps taken – so someone who was taking 5,000 steps a day might mistakenly believe that they were hitting the 10,000 step target value. This is because the cheaper pedometers generally use hairspring technology which is factory calibrated during the manufacturing process. These tend to become less and less accurate as the pedometer ages – with an increasing tendency to overestimate the number of steps being the norm.
Better models use coiled spring technology and dual accelerometer sensors which means that they are more accurate and have a longer lifespan and can be carried in your pocket or a bag rather than worn on your belt. AnOmron pedometer typically has an accuracy of plus or minus 5%. Other quality brands include Taneka, Yamax and New Lifestyles.
Should you wish to find out just how accurate your pedometer is, there are two very simple tests which you can perform. The first is to simply count out 100 steps and compare it with what your pedometer has recorded. The second is to note the reading on your pedometer when you first sit down – at your desk at work for example – and then to check it again after being seated for half an hour. If your step count increases significantly as a result of your normal movements whilst seated then it will certainly artificially inflate your daily step count.
Most pedometers are digital these days of course. They usually have a memory and you can generally see your results for 7 days – useful if you want to monitor your progress. Some even allow you to load your results into your computer using a USB connection so that you can monitor your results over time. You can choose how your results are displayed as well. Choose from the number of steps, the distance covered or the number of calories burned – whichever helps you to keep motivated.

