Walking on a treadmill
Important Side Note – If you are someone who runs on a treadmill, this is not meant for you, not all of us have the capability to enjoy running, or even the physical capability.
When one thinks of treadmills, typically, running is not far behind. While treadmills are great for running as they offer less impact on the knees and joints than say running on concrete, this post is going to be focusing on the other great exercise that treadmills are made for, Walking.
I know that many of you are thinking how painfully obvious this might seem, but unfortunately I believe that the idea of walking as a form of exercise instead of a means to get somewhere is largely underrated. A lot of people (including myself at one point) believe that cardio has to be an intense form of running, swimming, skipping or other higher intensity options that are done a few times a week. When in fact walking (when done correctly) can be as much cardio as any of the other options mentioned while being the option with LOWEST JOINT IMPACT (other than swimming). In fact, I’ll go as far as to say that walking on a treadmill is ONE OF THE BEST AND EASIEST fat burning tools available, but as previously mentioned, when done PROPERLY, as just like any other exercise when not done correctly it can be a potential waste of time and energy.
INCLINE
One of the best things about a treadmill is the function to adjust the incline. Most people don’t walk up hills that often (unless you live in San Francisco, Seattle, etc) as most cities are built on relatively flat areas. Walking on an incline increases the amount of calories burnt, it’s as simple as that. When on a treadmill there is a break even point between speed-walking and running for me it’s on the 6km/h mark, and once I pass it, there is no way for me to maintain a controlled walking pace, which makes it very hard to push myself without it turning into a full blown run. Instead what I do is find a pace (speed) that I feel I can walk (or speed-walk) at and then I begin to raise the incline till I can no longer keep up with the pace I’m going at.
If you don’t want to run, walking on an incline lets you burn more calories for the same distance/time.
IMPORTANT !!!!!!
As mentioned earlier, all the information is for when this is done correctly, and you might be asking yourself, how can one walk incorrectly on an incline? The answer isn’t in the walking part it’s the HOLDING ON part. DO NOT HOLD ON TO THE MACHINE, let’s all take a trip down memory lane and remember the game we used to play as kids where the floor is lava, I want you to have that same mentality with the machine, any moment you think to grab on to the machine, remember ITS LAVA. The amount of people I see walking on an incline treadmill or doing stair-master and they’re holding on to the machine, ankering themselves to it and thus NEGATING any of the positive effects that the incline has.
If you have to hold on to the machine in order to walk, you’re either walking at too fast a speed or at too high of an incline.
HOW TO IMPLEMENT IN TO YOUR WORKOUT ROUTINE
There are various ways to use incline walking in your workout the main three are;
by time
by distance
by calories burned
By time, which is my personal favourite, is when you have a set amount of time dedicated to walking, typically at the end of your session (as the main amount of cardio should almost always come AFTER weights or any kind of muscle oriented exercises). Here within the time you’ve set, let’s say 25 minutes, within these 25 minutes your goal is to walk for the whole 25 minutes without stopping or lowering the speed or incline. Keep a note of what speed and incline you did (a picture is easiest), so that next time you can go however much quicker/higher incline than last time. This allows you to progressively improve your cardiovascular level and allows you to continuously burn calories.
By distance, you choose a distance that you can realistically complete in the timeframe you have. Once you have chosen the distance you now choose the speed and incline at which you can comfortably maintain that pace, without stopping or holding on the to the machine. Similarly to by time, I would recommend to take a picture at the end once you’ve reached the goal distance so you know how long it took you, and now you have a time to beat next time. Remember, it is up to you to change the speed and incline to push yourself and make it harder on yourself, the goal isn’t to solely improve your time, but also increase the intensity.
The final option, by calories burned, the reason I left this till last is because while it may seem like the best, it is the hardest to accurately monitor and track. If you have an apple watch or any fitness wearable with a heart rate monitor, you may be able to accurately(kind of) track how many calories you’re burning. If you don’t, you can always use the treadmills ESTIMATE, but I wouldn’t trust those estimates at all, as they’re using formulas that don’t take your heart rate and fitness level into consideration.