Spring is in full swing, and you can almost smell summer around the corner. At the beginning of April, we enjoyed a long run of bright sunny days, and here’s hoping there are many more to come.
With long sun-filled days (🤞) and National Walking Month coming up in May, now is an ideal time to stride out, enjoy the weather, and boost your fitness with a good walk.
Walking is one of the simplest forms of exercise. As long as you have a decent pair of well-fitting, comfortable shoes, there’s nothing to stop you from heading out right now.
If you’re too comfortable to act immediately, or you prefer to build up to exercise in your own time, stick around and read about the positive health benefits you could gain, plus five fun ways to increase your daily step count, with practically zero effort.
Health benefits you can enjoy from a 30-minute daily walk
If you walk for 30 minutes every day, you could benefit from:
- Increased cardiovascular fitness
- Stronger bones
- Reduced body fat
- More muscle power
- Greater endurance.
Building regular walks into your week could also help to reduce your risk of developing certain health conditions, including heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and osteoporosis.
Keen to get the health benefits, but still unconvinced about stepping out, or being able to sustain a regular walk?
Try switching things up.
5 fun ways to up your daily step count
1. Pop buds in your ears and some pep in your step
If you get bored when walking, jazz things up. Listen to music, get engrossed in an audiobook, or tune into your favourite podcast or radio show.
Alternatively, if you prefer getting your steps in on a treadmill, watch your favourite TV show or, for an extra-long stint, play a movie.
Love nature? Schedule a daily walk at different times of day and notice how the nature around you changes.
2. Get playful with your grandchildren
Playing outside with your grandchildren is a fantastic way to increase your step count.
If you have the time, hold a mini sports day or set up an intricate obstacle course and turn it into a fun competition. Or play simple games – tag, hide and seek, or a kick-around.
Whatever you all fancy, you’ll soon be out of puff keeping up with them.
Walking with children can be entertaining too – if they are small, they’re bound to notice things you may overlook, turning a regular walk into an exciting nature trail.
3. Head into the garden
Just two hours to gardening can equate to almost 9,600 steps – meaning you’ll cover your whole daily 10,000 step quota into a single, highly productive activity.
Whether you’re mowing the lawn (no, using your ride-on mower doesn’t count!), digging the beds, pulling weeds, or planting new seeds, you’ll be getting some low-impact cardio, building strength, and improving flexibility.
Gardening involves digging, lifting, and bending, which all contribute to your overall fitness, meaning you’re getting more steps under your belt and a full-body workout to boot! Not to mention a lovely looking garden. 🪴
4. Hit the shops
If you’re not too keen on walking but love shopping, you’re all set.
Instead of making a whole thing of “going for a walk”, go shopping instead!
The number of steps you’ll manage to amass will depend on where you’re shopping and how early you succeed in finding whatever you’re looking for.
If you browse extensively or return to buy the first thing you saw after visiting all the other shops (yes, we all do it!), your step count will soon rack up.
A walk along a mile-long high street could easily take between 2,000 and 3,000 steps, and that’s before you factor in browsing time in the shops and walking between stores.
If the weather’s not up to much, imagine the number of steps you could accrue with a visit to The Trafford Centre – the sheer size means you’ll easily hit 10,000 steps, even if you use the escalators.
5. Follow a walking workout without leaving the house
Clocking up your steps in the comfort of your own home is easier than you might think. With literally thousands of walking workouts freely available on YouTube, it’s also unlikely to become boring any time soon.
A weather-independent option, walking workouts videos are designed to mimic outdoor or treadmill walks. So, a 30-minute walking workout is equivalent of a 30-minute power walk.
If you’re not sure where to start ask our Operations Lead, Karen Fogg for her top recommendations.
Karen used walking workouts to keep her step count up during her 10,000-step challenge. Raising money for Cancer Research UK, she found the videos super useful when it was raining or she didn’t feel like dragging herself out of the house.