Can walking be as effective a form of exercise as running? - Tony Paladin (Paladin Biokineticists)

Whenever we are going to relate things to one and other, it is always best to adopt the old adage of “comparing apples with apples”. Comparing apples with say bananas makes for good conversation; but it doesn’t actually address the cold, hard facts.

The debate about walking vs. running and the respective health benefits of each has swung like a pendulum for decades between Doctors, Surgeons, Biokineticists, Physiotherapists, Athletics coaches and Personal Trainers.

Before we can critically comment on whether walking can be as effective as running we would need to define what exactly: “form of exercise” means. If we loosely reference the World Health Organisation’s definition of “exercise”, we can break the components into functional / balance, flexibility, strength and cardiovascular.

If we use these components as indicators, we can critically assess whether walking is as “effective” as running.

From a functional / balance perspective, the slower the movement the greater the stimulus. Generally walking is a good choice for people who need to improve basic function, increase activities of daily living and enhance balance. The function / balance components can be respectively varied in difficulty by offering assistance or creating instability. Verdict = when it comes to training basic function and balance, walking wins.

Flexibility. Unfortunately on this front, neither walking nor running has much to offer in terms of increasing muscle and joint range of motion. If I had a loaded gun to my head and was asked to make a call, I would have to say that across the walking / running echelon, sprinting would probably elicit the greatest effect on flexibility due to the ballistic and elastic components of the activity. Verdict = Do Yoga or full range of motion exercises such as squats in conjunction to your walking and running program.

When we introduce strength into the walk / run debate, we end up with a chicken and egg situation. Does one need to be strong to walk and run or does walking and running make you strong? Lets make walking the chicken and running the egg. Walking is the most elementary form of movement; it is literally one step harder than sitting. From the perspective of rudimentary movement, it is logical that one should start with the basics prior to advancing the activity. The “basics” in this case, is walking and when advanced, is running. Strength however, nestles itself quite firmly in between the two activities: you need to be strong to run. Do we go with the chicken or the egg? Since neither walking nor running really develops strength, it is advisable to include other movements in your program, which do. Verdict = Walking should be progressed to incline walking which should be progressed to fast incline walking which should be progressed to running. Strength exercises should be included across the entire stratum.

Then we have the cardiovascular component. In short, the faster your heart beats, the more “cardiovascular” the modality of exercise is. One could argue that it is a no brainer that running elevates your heart rate more than walking does, but does it really? Running sloppily on a flat surface at a slow pace versus brisk walking with a backpack up a hill is like comparing apples with bananas. If we compare apples with apples; as a general rule running elicits more of a cardiovascular response on the body due to the speed of the activity. The body needs to work harder to run than to walk. If we are going to get walking to obtain the same level of work, we need to make it more difficult. This can be done with speed, resistance, hills and direction. Verdict = from a cardiovascular perspective, walking with purpose has the potential to topple lackadaisical running.

So… Shall I walk or shall I run? For the non-injured and mostly healthy community, running has the ability to elicit more of an exercise response than walking and should probably be the mode of choice. For individuals with joint problems or who are simply not fit enough to run, walking is a heck of a lot better than bum sitting in terms of exercise response. Even when walking is too easy and running is too hard, walk-running is also an alternative to get the heart rate up but still allow for bouts of rest. The bottom line is your ability: exercise is meant to be both challenging and enjoyable.

With regards to general health benefits, increased fitness, toning and weightloss; the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recommends that adults get at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity cardiovascular exercise per week; strength train each muscle group two to three days a week; do flexibility exercise two to three days per week; and finally, do functional exercise two or three days per week. Whether you choose to walk or run is your choice, just make sure your heart is beating while you are doing it!

Tony’s Primary areas of focus include: Orthopaedic rehabilitation through strengthening (mainly backs and knees). He works with regaining function in ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) reconstructions and total knee replacement patients.

Tony also has an interest in sport specific testing and training (primarily rowing, cycling, running and triathlon).

Tony can be contacted on 011 807 9877 or tonypaladin@kinetics.co.za. 

In case of an emergency, he can be contacted on 082 921 6776.

How much Exercise is enough? - Tony Paladin (Paladin Biokineticists)

According to the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) it is advised that adults should get at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity cardiovascular exercise per week, train each muscle group 2 to 3 days a week, do 2 to 3 days per week of flexibility exercise and finally another 2 or 3 days per week of functional or neuromotor exercise.

A literal interpretation of this would amount to 9 days a week alongside a further 2.5 hours of cardio! Obviously as most of us are employed and in the bid to win the employee of the month wellness contest, training for 6 hours per day would get most of us fired…

As a general tip (unless we are training for a specific sports event), we should train for enjoyment purposes which will naturally enrich our health as a by-product. In practice, I find that people who train solely to maintain weight or because their doctor told them to, end up becoming bored and non compliant.

Although the guidelines of the ACSM are more or less accurate, we can definitely draw up our own little “cheat sheets” when it comes to exercise. The most honest way of doing this is to consider that the 4 types of exercise suggested (cardio, strength, flexibility and functional) are not mutually exclusive and do not need to be done independently of each other. Another way of looking at this is like eating yoghurt and muesli; whether your pour your yoghurt on top of your muesli or blend it into a smoothie, it’s still the same moosh inside your guts…

If we were to exchange the word “exercise” for “movement”, and try and free up around an hour per day to do this, the consumption of the ACSM’s guidelines seem a little more surmountable. In these 6ish hours per week, if we were to sprinkle a nice spread of cardio, strength, flexibility and functional into the mix, then surely the target becomes pretty easy to hit?

Taking this a step further and doing functional movements (balance), with good form, using free weights through a good range of motion, we have pretty much killed 3 birds with one stone! All we need to do is mop up the balance with a bit or cardio.

The most easily digestible recipe for the implementation of an exercise program is to book your exercise time slots into your diary, the same way that you would book a meeting.  The time of day is up to you but I would suggest booking time out and getting away from your home or office and turning your phone off in order to limit distraction.

Once this step has been done, it is relatively easy to populate your program with movement! Make sure that that around 50% of the movement is cardiovascular and the other 50% is a nice mix of strength, flexibility and function.

As we are all human and the dreaded “L” word gets in the way (Life), there are inevitably going to be weeks where we are unable to fit in our quota of sessions. My advice here is to make sure that you do not go more than 2 to 3 days without doing something; even if it just recreational (health depending). Once you allowed yourself to slip for more than 3 days, the pattern of inactivity tends to set in and we are more likely to be forgiving on ourselves to take another day off which will eventually become a week, which will eventually become a habit…

Obviously on the flip side of this is the potential of getting TOO MUCH exercise. If the body is getting insufficient rest or is being broken down faster than it is being built, it will begin to degrade. The quickest tester here is your health; if you are getting sick more than 2 to 3 times per year you are either overcooking the training or not getting to bed on time.

Tony’s Primary areas of focus include: Orthopaedic rehabilitation (mainly backs and knees). He works with regaining function in ACL reconstructions and total knee replacement patients.

Tony also has an interest in sport specific testing and training (primarily rowing, cycling, running and triathlon).

Tony is the Chairman of the Biokinetics Association of Southern Africa (Gauteng division).

Tony can be contacted on 011 028 1128 or tonypaladin@kinetics.co.za. 

In case of an emergency, he can be contacted on 082 921 6776.