How many steps do you need to take to lose weight?
Despite of all the gadgets available that are geared towards helping people lose weight, old fashioned walking still turns out to be the best option when it comes to dropping those extra pounds. If you are one of those people looking to lose weight through walking, I would recommend you get a pedometer to boost your chances of success.
A pedometer is an inexpensive tool and will go a long way in helping you gauge your efforts by letting you know how many steps you have actually walked in a day,which will help you determine how many more you need to walk in order to lose weight.
How do you know exactlyhow many miles you need to cover in order drop extra pounds? You can find this by first calculating how many miles you are walking currently. Obviously you will have to start walking more steps or increase your distance each day in order to see a measurable difference on the scale. For example, if you are currently walking 8,000 steps with your existing routine and daily habits, which is helping you maintain your present weight, you will have to increase the number of steps to lose weight.
For the average person, there are roughly 1,500 steps in a mile. A person roughly burns around 100 calories each time he walks a mile. So if you commit to walking 4,500 steps in addition to the steps that you are already walking, you would end up burning an extra 300 calories a day. If you maintain this schedule for a week, you will create a weekly deficit of 2100 calories. To lose one pound, you need to burn 3500 calories. That translates to roughly 8400 calories burned or approximately 2.4 pounds lost each month. Maintain this for a year and you will easily lose almost 30 pounds.
It is important for people working on losing weight to make sure they also do some sort of strength training. Many people believe that strength training will make them bulky and so they wait until they lose the extra weight before they begin to work to tone their body. Unfortunately the fact is that the longer you avoid strength training, the longer you are putting off easier weight loss and maintenance. It is extremely essential to strength train to lose weight, to keep your metabolism active and your body healthy. It is also important that you spend time cooling down and stretching when you finish each walk. Walking is an excellent and healthy way to get fit and lose weight.
