Walking allows you to be in good physical condition. Depending on your age, here is the distance to cover each day for it to be effective.
Fitness and activity are often dictated by a preponderance of running, high-intensity, and performance-seeking advice. However, it is not always easy for everyone to start running, for physical reasons or even simply for motivation.
However, there is a way to get active and stay in shape without going to the gym or preparing for a marathon. Indeed, walking is strongly recommended, both physically and mentally. But it is important to walk correctly, that is to say, to know how often and what distance it is ideal to walk each day, or each week, to be physically fit and maintain a good state of mind. .
The secret actually seems to lie in not following a predefined program to the letter, but adapting your walking to your physical abilities and motivation. First of all, we must remember that the quantity of calories burned per kilometer traveled is proportional to the body mass of the person doing physical activity. It is therefore important not to start too violently, at the risk of injury.
It is also advisable to set short, medium and long term goals. Just as much in the distance to cover each day as the reasons why we start running. If the bar of 10,000 steps per day is often put forward as the ideal distance to cover each day to be in good shape, it does not necessarily correspond to everyone’s needs based on their objectives and abilities.
For example, the youngest (20-30 years old) must carry out sessions of 45 minutes of brisk walking for 12,000 steps on average for men and 10,000 for women. But the older your age, the more your activity and your steps should decrease according to the National Nutrition and Health Program (PNNS).
For 40-60 year olds, activity must drop by 10 minutes with almost 3000 steps less for men. For those over 80, physical activity is always recommended, but you must pay attention to your session time, it must not exceed 20 minutes so consider doing two sessions because the PNNS mentions 30 minutes of activities for 4000 steps.
An American study also attempted to identify the ideal number of steps based on age. If 8000 steps are thus generally put forward as an objective to be achieved, we thus notice that this bar varies, and that it is not necessary from a certain age to achieve the 8,000 steps daily to be in good health. health.
It is also recommended by the WHO to do physical activity every day rather than setting a numerical distance goal each day. However, it is advisable to measure the distance traveled each day using an application or a pedometer. This involves measuring the evolution of your daily performance, in order to monitor your progress.