Walking is an easy way to get moving in your day, and it has mental health benefits as well. I am one of the many people who added daily walks to my routine during the pandemic and they have made my life so much better that I don’t plan to stop. But is walking enough for your body to think of it as cardio exercise?
The answer is complicated. Walking counts as cardio in some ways: it can burn calories, it increases your heart rate, and it counts for the exercise we should all be doing each week. On the other hand, it won’t improve your cardio fitness in the same way that running or an intense aerobics class would improve it. If you want to improve your endurance, you need to do more than just run.
How the calories burned while walking compared to running
Running burns more calories than walking per unit of time, but both are similar when distance is taken into account.
As a rule of thumb, you will burn around 100 calories per mile whether you run or run. In truth, however, the amount of calories burned depends on the size of your body (you burn more calories when you are taller) and how fast you run or walk. The calories per mile are slightly lower when walking. This calculator from Runtastic (in metric numbers, sorry) estimates that a 150-pound person burns 82 calories running a mile, or 115 calories running a mile.
The biggest difference is in the calories per hour: for the same 150-pound person, walking burns 261 calories an hour and running burns 714. For both calculations, I have the examples of a 20-minute mile (3 miles per hour) for the Hikers used and a 10-minute mile (6 miles per hour) for the runner. The faster you go, the higher the calories burned.
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So if you run or run to burn calories, running will burn more calories in half the time. But if you’d rather run and have the time, both of them will do the job.
Walking cannot replace “vigorous” cardio
Each training intensity has its own advantages. Walking is what I think is very basic cardio, jogging is more of a medium exercise, and high-intensity cardio would be something like sprinting or running. All of these are good for you, although you may not have to do all of them depending on your goals.
For example, if you want to be a fast runner, you will need a lot of medium cardio (slow running) and some higher intensity things (speedwork). if you want to improve your endurance as measured by metrics like VO2maxYou definitely need to work a little at these intensities.
On the flip side, if you are just trying to get some exercise in your life and you don’t care about getting better at it, a lesser intensity exercise like walking may be enough.
According to major health organizations (including the CDC, WHO, and AHA), we should all get at least 150 minutes of “moderate” exercise or 75 minutes of “vigorous” exercise per week. You can mix and match with the idea that every minute of intense workouts counts twice.
Where does walking fall into this recommendation? Well, the American Heart Association Are defined moderate exercise as that where your heart rate is between 50-70% of your maximum and vigorous exercise as between 70-85% of your maximum. Walking is generally in the moderate range, so you need to do twice as much – counted in minutes – as if you had opted for more vigorous cardio.
Walking doesn’t just have to be a walk
The distinction between walking and running is mechanical: if you always have at least one foot on the ground, go. Instead, if your gait has a small crack as you move from foot to foot, run. (Jogging is just a slow run.)
It’s often easier to maintain a higher intensity (and heart rate) while running than when walking, but that’s not always true. When hiking up a mountain, your heart rate can easily get into the “strong” zone. And if you’re a runner efficient enough, maybe you can go for one slow jogging while keeping your heart rate low in the “moderate” range.
When planning your workout, keep intensity in mind: measure your heart rate if you’re not sure where you are falling. You can use a tracker like a Fitbit or Apple Watch to do this, but you can also just place two fingers on the side of your neck and count the beats of your heart rate. If Your max is 200 and you are counting 150 beats per minute, you are at 75% of your maximum heart rate.
You may have a higher heart rate than you thought while walking – not impossible if you are a beginner or if your walks take you over hilly terrain. If you want a harder cardio workout, you can run faster or choose a different type of exercise, e.g. B. Cycling or dancing to get your heart rate up. But it’s okay to take a simple walk if that’s all you are aiming for.
