Taking breaks while walking is worthwhile
Each initial step requires more energy than the subsequent constant movement. So if you take a break from walking from time to time, you will burn more calories.
If you want to maximise your calorie consumption during a walk, you should take breaks in between. This tip was given by a research team led by physiologist Francesco Luciano from the University of Milan. In a study, the scientists found that people need 20 to 60 per cent more oxygen when walking or climbing stairs if they paused briefly every 30 seconds than if they performed the movement continuously over the same distance. The group published the results in the scientific journal "Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences".
"It's like a car that uses more fuel in the first few kilometres than it does afterwards," explained lead author Francesco Luciano to the British Guardian. This has to do with the fact that prolonged exercise becomes more efficient over time - the heart rate adapts and the metabolism reaches a state of equilibrium. However, many estimates of the energy required for walking are based on data from people who exercise in a metabolic steady state.
To find out more about the actual energy requirements of walking, the scientists recruited ten healthy volunteers and had them exercise on a stair climber and a treadmill. The exercises included three different speeds and lasted between ten seconds and four minutes. During the training sessions, the researchers recorded how much oxygen each person consumed and calculated the metabolic demand for the different distances. They found that the test subjects needed more energy at the beginning of each walk to get going and warm up the body than later in the exercise, when the body was already moving and working more efficiently.
"When we start out, there are some fixed costs at the beginning," Luciano said. "These costs are incurred regardless of whether we run for 10 or 30 seconds, so they are proportionally more important for shorter distances than for longer distances." The work thus underpins the knowledge of the health benefits of short exercise sessions, especially for people who spend a lot of time sitting. The findings can also help to improve rehabilitation programmes and exercise recommendations for people with limited mobility, such as those who are severely overweight and stroke patients.
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