Maybe you've
tried that routine yourself in an attempt to burn more calories.
Long
story short:
Don't do it. In most cases, carrying weights burns only
a fraction more calories, while setting you up for potential
injury because your natural walking movement gets thrown askew,
ligaments and tendons are weakened and stretched, or blood pressure
increases from gripping the handweights.
Here's the
why's and where-fors and some better ways to pump up your calorie
use without hanging weights off your body.
Handweights
To increase calorie use when holding weights, you must swing
your arms. A lot. But that can also throw off your stride, and
strain muscles and ligaments, as well as raise your blood pressure,
or tire your arm and shoulder muscles before your legs. Tire
arms will mean an early end to your walk since you'll be dying
to put down the weights. The way to burn calories and to pump
up aerobic fitness and health is to have an extended workout,
not stressful 10-minute session with aching, tired muscles.
The increase
in calorie use varies, depending on the size of the weight and
the arm swing. Most people don't swing the weights wildly to
shoulder height for 20 or 30 minutes (that might earn you a
calorie increase of 10-20 percent ... if you aren't disabled
first).
Rather,
most people simply carry them with arms dangling nearly motionless
at their sides, or with elbows bent but with no arm swing. That
usually earns you up to 5 percent more calories. Maybe. Figure
you burn 270 calories on a 45-minute walk at a 4-mph pace, and
you've now earned yourself a whopping extra 13 calories. That'll
earn you about a half a chocolate drop. Big whoopee.
Ankle
weights
Same dangers as above, but your leg movement is inhibited, usually
prompting a slow shuffle, rather than the desirable power stride
and pushoff that uses more muscle and therefore more calories.
(Take a look at my stories in the Walking chapter on technique.)
Calorie-burning
Alternative
Yup, speed. Step up the pace of your walk. For example, going
from a 3-mph pace to a 4-mph pace will increase calories used
per minute by some 50 percent. Go from 4 mph to 6 mph and you've
nearly doubled your calories per minute.
This is
a heck of a lot more substantial than 5 percent. 2) Weight loss
& exercise - Why exercise helps you reach your goals Many Americans
start walking or exercising to lose weight. Exercise helps,
but you need to understand the ways it helps to put your goals
in perspective.
But if you
start ticking off the calories you chow down during your walk,
you might be disappointed, so we won't even go there. Plus,
the range of calories used is as expansive as the great Salt
Lake. The surface you walk on, how much muscle you already have,
weather, body type, and the metabolism your parents blessed
you with are all factors that affect it.
So if the
number of calories burned during exercise is relatively small,
you ask, why bother? Well, exercise does a lot more for you
then just burn, baby, baby while you're out there sweating.
For example, exercise:
1.
Keeps your body "hyped up" and burning a few more calories even
after you've stopped moving. See my story on Afterburn.
2. Builds muscle, which will burn more calories even
when you're just sitting around. Now isn't that a treat? Take
a look at my story about how much muscle strengthening to do
(Pump Up Your Muscles) after you've seen your doctor if this
is new for you.
3. Trains your body to use fat more efficiently all the
time. Ever see a fat marathoner? Ever wonder why those really
active folks seem to eat all the time? They have a really stoked-up
metabolism.
4. Is the No. 1 way to prevent weight gain, including
after you've lost it once already. So get into the exercise
habit while you're losing it so it doesn't come back and find
you.
Remember
this little factoid as you develop your exercise habit now:
The average American gains a pound each year between the ages
of 25 and 55 while also losing 1/2 pound of muscle each of those
years. That means the average 55-year-old will weigh 30 pounds
more than at 25, but will actually carry 45 pounds more of fat.
Not if you
exercise!
Maximum
Treadmill Workout -
A tape filled with music and instruction to coach you through
a walking or running workout that will help you get the results
you want.
Dynamix Music
