Walking is good for you, but you need to do more!

Just In Time Personal Training Walking is good for you, there is no disputing that. It brings about some major health benefits such as: Losing weight and/or body fat. Helps with bone density and bone strength. Reduces many health factors such as heart disease, stroke, blood pressure and cholesterol. Improves fitness. Improves mental health and wellbeing. Reduces risk of developing osteoporosis, some cancers and type 2 diabetes. Walking is easy to do and it is low impact, requires minimal impact on the body, can be done at your own pace and can be done throughout the day in one hit or broken up into smaller bursts. I am sure you are aware of the notion of trying to accumulate 10,000 steps per day and if you haven’t then that is a good goal to work towards. In fact, your iPhone has an app (Health) that can track this for you and there are many wearable devices/pedometers that you can use to record this for you. But I am here to tell you that while walking is good for you, you need to do more! You see there are many components of fitness and as we age, we need to try to keep on top of many of them to ensure a pain-free, injury-free and healthy and longer life! Here is a list of eight fitness components that I have compiled: Balance Muscular strength Muscular endurance Flexibility Cardiovascular fitness Mobility Agility Coordination Now if we just walk every day, we will arguably help improve elements of coordination, agility, mobility, fitness, muscular endurance and balance; but it is not enough. You see there is something known as sarcopenia and this is a condition characterised by a loss of skeletal muscle mass and function. Although primarily a disease of the elderly, it can be seen earlier from disuse and malnutrition. Sarcopenia is a syndrome characterised by progressive and generalised loss of skeletal muscle mass and strength with a risk of adverse outcomes such as physical disability, poor quality of life and death. It is thought that your basal metabolic rate (MBR) decreases at 1 to 2 per cent per decade after you reach the age of 20 and up to 10 per cent per decade after the age of 45, while most men will lose about 30 per cent of their muscle mass in their lifetimes! A 2015 report from the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research found that people with sarcopenia had 2.3 times the risk of having a low-trauma fracture from a fall, such as a broken hip, collarbone, leg, arm or wrist. So, I now hope you can see the need to take the time to look into doing something about it and note that it is never too late to get started! You see, the majority of clients that we see are aged 45 to 75 and many come to us seeking our services for the sole purpose of building strength, balance, flexibility, mobility and to reduce the risk of falling! There are many exercises that you can do and in many cases without the need for much if any equipment! In fact, if you would like to email me, I have put together a video of an array of exercises that you can do at home or outdoors with no equipment and I will be more than happy to send it to you for you to try! We also offer two FREE “More than just a walking group” sessions for both the Southbank and Docklands communities and these were designed to help our community active and to do more than just walking. These are held every Wednesday at 9.30am and Tuesday at 9am, respectively, and you are welcome to join! For more information, exercise guidance or if you have any questions, feel free to contact me by heading to justintimept.com •