Friday, April 29, 2011

Walking vs. Running: How many calories are you ACTUALLY burning?

Walking and running are 2 of the VERY best forms of aerobic exercise.  They are cheap and always accessible.  They both offer major benefits to your muscles, your heart, your lungs.  But, is one better than the other?  Run a mile.  Walk a mile.  Either way, you burn 100 calories, right?  Has anyone ever fed you that line?  Well, sorry to break it to you my friends, but it's a MYTH!  The truth is that running burns more *net calories than walking {over the same distance}.

A study done @ Syracuse University showed that running actually burns twice as many net calories per mile as walking.  Now think about this:  You can run 2 miles in about the same time as you walk just one mile.  So... in the same amount of TIME, running can burn 4x as many calories as walking!  Not to say that walking can't get you to the same caloric expenditure that running can, it just might take you a good bit longer :)
-Peace. Health. RoxyB!!

*net calories: the total number of calories burned minus the calories your body would have burned during that time just to function (aka- total calories burned minus your basal metabolism)

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