How to Burn More Fat With Walking
How can you get more from your walks? Get-Fit Guy reveals the 4 B’s for Better Walking, to help achieve fat burning, increased fitness, and long-term health benefits.
Earlier this month, I attended a three day conference on the hilly Berkeley campus in California. Because my lodging was about a half-mile from the conference location, I spent plenty of time walking down hills, up stairs, across grassy lawns, and through campus walkways. Although I didn’t get a chance to do much formal exercising, I certainly felt the muscular and cardiovascular benefits of walking, and had plenty of time to think about ways to make walking a more fitness- and fat loss-enhancing event.
And then, just this week, I found new research from a journal of diabetes that compares interval walking to continuous walking. In the study, participants walked for 60 minutes, five times a week, and either varied the intensity of their walking (interval walking), or kept intensity constant (continuous walking.) Even though both groups burnt the same number of calories during the walk, the group that did interval walking experienced much better blood sugar control–which has a direct impact on fat burning, overall energy, and long-term health.
This simply means that if you go on a walk, you’re going to get the best results if you choose some kind of undulating terrain that forces you to slow down and speed up (e.g. hill, stairs, etc.) Or, if the surface is flat, the best results will come if you walk as fast as possible for a while, then recover, then go fast again, and so on.
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So besides interval walking, what are some other ways you can get fitter faster, and burn more fat, with walking?
Here are 4 quick and dirty tips–your 4 B’s for Better Walking:
Bear a Load
As soon as you introduce weights, walking becomes a form of resistance training, burns more calories. and helps build bone density. When it comes to bearing a load, the sky’s the limit: you can wear a backpack full of books, sport a weighted vest, use arm weights and/or ankle weights, carry a baby, or have your kid piggyback on you. If you’re up for a more advanced trick, grab heavy rocks or logs from your walking path and carry them as far as possible.
Barefoot
BarefootIn previous episodes, you’ve learned all about the benefits of going barefoot, and walking is a perfect way to safely try ditching your shoes. This can strengthen your feet, give you a better feel for the ground, get you more in touch with your surroundings (e.g. earth, dirt, rocks, concrete, etc.), and strengthen more of the tiny ligaments and tendons in your feet and lower legs. I’ll begin a walk in my shoes, but then take my shoes off and carry them when appropriate, like when I’m in a grassy park area or on smooth concrete.
Balance
Take breaks during your walk to challenge your body. Balance on one foot on a rock or fence post. Walk on a curb–then once you’re good at that, walk on a curb backwards. Try shuffling sideways, then lunging sideways. Stop for front lunges and back lunges. Hop up on a park bench and do some body weight squats, then hop down and do some dips or pushups. Just like bearing weight, the sky’s the limit when it comes to balance breaks and other methods of turning a walk into a fitness adventure. Plus, this tip can easily be combined with the other B’s you’re learning about in this episode.
Breathe
In the episode, How To Breathe The Right Way, I talk about how deep nasal breathing can be a powerful method to deliver more oxygen to muscle tissues, strengthen inspiratory and expiratory muscles, and even tap into the power of meditation during exercise. The next time you go on a walk, try breathing through your nose as much as possible, preferably in a rhythmic, “4 count in, 4 count out” fashion. You may occasionally need to open your mouth on stairs, when going uphill, or when doing fast-walking intervals, but try to primarily breathe through your nose.
Finally, if you really want even faster results, then you should know that the faster you move, the more calories you burn–long after you’ve finished moving. This is why jogging (if your knees can handle it) is better than walking, running is better than jogging, and sprinting is better than running. For more on that, check out the episode, Does Running Or Walking Burn More Calories?
If you have more questions about how to burn more fat with walking, join the conversation over at Facebook.com/GetFitGuy!
Photos of woman walking at sunset and barefoot walking courtesy of Shutterstock.
About the Author
Ben Greenfield received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from University of Idaho in sports science and exercise physiology; personal training and strength and conditioning certifications from the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA); a sports nutrition certification from the International Society of Sports Nutrition (ISSN), an advanced bicycle fitting certification from Serotta. He has over 11 years’ experience in coaching professional, collegiate, and recreational athletes from all sports, and as helped hundreds of clients achieve weight loss and fitness success.
