Tag Archive for 'Camminare'

Walking is good but at least more than 2200 steps

We have been told for years that walking 10,000 steps a day reduces the risk of heart disease and premature death, even in those who spend the rest of the day sedentary.

Recent research has highlighted that the minimum number of steps is 2,200 per day and that health risks decrease as we increase our steps throughout the day. The risk is significantly reduced among people who take between 9,000 and 10,500 steps per day, with a 39% reduction in the risk of premature death and over a fifth reduction in the risk of a heart attack or stroke.

Although the results have shown that any number of daily steps above 2,200 was associated with lower rates of death and heart disease, regardless of sedentary time, the benefits increase with more steps taken by individuals.

These new studies indicate that every single step toward reaching 10,000 steps a day counts in reducing the risk of death and heart disease.

So let’s stay active for our health as advised, through 150 minutes of moderate exercise per week. And in any way possible, we should strive to reach 10,000 steps a day.

It’s truly alarming if global health organizations have to remind us to walk, to engage in the simplest and most natural action a human can take.

Nevertheless, we must follow this advice because, as the saying goes, “it’s a matter of health.”

Sedentary lifestyle and urban traffic

Speaking of being sedentary lifestyle, I do not know how aware we are that it is the structure of our cities that leads us, like the current of a river, toward this very negative lifestyle. As long as cities remain spaces that almost exclusively facilitate the use of cars, walking and bicycling will remain on the margins of our lives and lack of movement will continue to be an endemic problem.

People on bicycles have “appeared in Paris,” and the most important thing about this incredible transformation of Paris is how quickly it happened once the streets were transformed. One cannot say that “Paris has always been like this,” because it has not. It took leadership.

A woman driving a convertible stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Steam and smoke waft around her vehicle. She stares longingly at people enjoying the fresh air and park to her left. Illustration.

The following are the thoughts of @BrentToderian (City planner + urban planner at @TODUrbanWORKS. Global advisor on cities. Past Vancouver chief planner).

To ensure cars didn’t take back control of Paris streets as the pandemic was “ending,” (like they have in so many cities), Mayor @Anne_Hidalgo made sure that 60k parking spaces and many streets were permanently transformed to seating for restaurants, people places and bike-lanes.

There’s no simplistic “silver bullet” for making lively streets & great #peopleplaces — but if there was, it would probably be street seating & moveable chairs. Don’t let anyone say there isn’t room — just rethink space for cars. As #Paris effortlessly illustrates. #placemaking

Walking around European cities — from bustling urban centers like Milan and Amsterdam to smaller cities such as Ghent and Bruges in Belgium, and Ravenna and Padua in Northern Italy — it’s clear that there are numerous improvements that can be borrowed for the United States and implemented relatively quickly and inexpensively:

  • Make streets multimodal
  • Implement congestion pricing and/or limited traffic zones
  • Eliminate street parking
  • Boost transit options
  • Reclaim plazas and other public space for people

 

 

Walking spaces since 1850

Colin Pooley, Walking spaces: Changing pedestrian practices in Britain since c. 1850. Published July 13, 2020 Research Article.

Walking is one of the most sustainable and healthy forms of everyday travel over short distances, but pedestrianism has declined substantially in almost all countries over the past century. This paper uses a combination of personal testimonies and government reports to examine how the spaces through which people travel have changed over time, to chart the impacts that such changes have had on pedestrian mobility and to consider the shifts that are necessary to revitalise walking as a common form of everyday travel. In the nineteenth century, most urban spaces were not especially conducive to walking, but many people did walk as they had little alternative and the sheer number of pedestrians meant that they could dominate urban space. In the twentieth century, successive planning decisions have reshaped cities making walking appear both harder and riskier. Motorised transport has been normalised and pedestrianism marginalised. Only radical change will reverse this.

We do not need advice for every walk we take

We are constantly bombarded with advice and rules about how to do sports. We receive advice on how to exercise at dawn, how much we should drink when it’s hot, the best clothing for winter rather than summer, how to give continuity to our workouts, what to pay attention to when we run, the most appropriate music according to the intensity of the activity, and so on ad infinitum.

I wonder if this need induced and, in part, even demanded by people is not a way of giving up deciding for oneself how to do an activity and relying completely on the rules proposed by others.

If I have to consult an expert about what time it is best to walk for 30 minutes in the summer and how much I should drink during the day I actually give up my autonomy as an individual, I also give up experiencing what is best for me, and I become a person who adapts and gives up developing competence even through mistakes.

Now giacche is not talking about Olympic champion training but rather elementary activities, this surrender of one’s autonomy into the hands of others I find unjustifiable and disrespectful of one’s abilities.

Experts if one wants to train continuously and with obvious improvements appropriate to the time one intends to spend on that activity. But let’s rebel against this avalanche of advice that when it’s hot, tells us to dress light and not go out in the hottest prees. Let us not abdicate our critical thinking skills, otherwise we will become adults who have babysitters to carry out their daily lives.

 

Do not forget to walk

Despite the exceptionally hot weather these days, one should still not eliminate all forms of motor activity, especially the simplest and most common: walking. Certainly one should choose the early morning or evening hours. One can also start with a slower pace than usual, using as a criterion for evaluating effort, the possibility of being able to speak without perceiving a particular effort.

During this walk it is important to live with pleasure in the present moment, one step after another.

It may be helpful to exercise control over breathing by maintaining one’s habitual inhalation and trying to lengthen the expiratory phase by 3 to 4 seconds. In this way, the stride will continue to be coordinated and the walk will flow in a relaxed manner.

A 30-minute walk is more than enough to achieve benefits on the cardiovascular system and muscle tone and also on improving one’s moods.

Walking together with other people with whom to share this experience is certainly more enjoyable than walking alone. It also stimulates motivation especially in the initial stages of this motor activity and allows it to become a daily appointment not to be forgotten.

The Italian sedentariness is serious

These days in the newspapers we continue to talk about how widespread sedentariness is. Here are some slides to understand the problem of this lack of movement.

Psychosocial aspects of walking

Walking is one of the primary human activities. Today it is instead possible to live sitting down passing from one means to another. Therefore, a project that aims to promote walking becomes innovative and very necessary to promote the well-being of citizens.

There are several psychosocial aspects involved in the success of this idea; they concern the perception that citizens have of:

  • how appreciable and rewarding it is to walk in their city,
  • what motivations walking satisfies
  • how much their overall well-being is enhanced.
  • These three aspects should come to constitute a single integrated personal model, allowing one to move easily from the intention to walk (I want to do it) to the action (I am doing it).

Being aware of these three aspects and their interaction becomes, therefore, necessary for the success of this project on walking. Survey data showed that people appreciate walking in the city if:

  1. sees others walking to work or as an expression of physical activity,
  2. there are green, safe and aesthetically pleasing spaces,
  3. the streets are safe,
  4. pedestrian accidents are rare,
  5. there are schools where people walk,
  6. traffic is reduced.

In relation to individual motivations, it has been found that people are oriented to perform an activity that

  • reduces daily stress and improves mood,
  • improves the relationship with one’s own body,
  • takes place in the open air
  • can be done in company,
  • respects individual rhythms and is moderately intense,
  • is simple and accessible.

The third aspect of this approach concerns the promotion of one’s own well-being. This result derives from the interaction between the two aspects described, which refer to the criteria of walkability and motivation. When these meet, the individual shows a higher level of personal satisfaction, which provides him or her with a better perception of well-being.

Walking keeps death away

Association of Daily Step Count and Step Intensity With Mortality Among US Adults

JAMA. 2020; 323(12):1151-1160.

Question  What are the associations between daily step counts and step intensity with mortality among US adults?

Findings  In this observational study that included 4840 participants, a greater number of steps per day was significantly associated with lower all-cause mortality (adjusted hazard ratio for 8000 steps/d vs 4000 steps/d, 0.49). There was no significant association between step intensity and all-cause mortality after adjusting for the total number of steps per day.

Meaning  Greater numbers of steps per day were associated with lower risk of all-cause mortality.

At this time of year, plans are always being made to improve our lives in the coming year. This research provides us with an opportunity to make an important and meaningful choice for our well-being. It’s free and affordable for everyone. It involves walking, an activity that many of us do on an extremely limited basis. It does not matter the speed, to obtain benefits it is enough to move with our pace, however, it is necessary to do 8,000 a day to obtain this positive result that will make us live better and longer.

10 reasons to walk everyday

Knowledge takes place through movement: start walking again at least half an hour every day.

  1. Walking awakens every muscle in the body, not just the legs.
  2. Walking is a time to spend with other people but also in solitude
  3. Walking improves our mood
  4. Walking is just for all ages
  5. Walking is the only activity in common with every human being from thousands of years
  6. Walking has been and is the primary activity to know and expand our territory
  7. Walking on one’s own legs is what parents teach their children
  8. Walking is the basis of running, jumping, throwing and any other form of movement.
  9. Walking into the nature stimulates watching, smelling and the sound of one’s own footsteps
  10. Walking is a free activity

How  do  you  want  to  be?

 

Risultati immagini per wall-e film tramaImmagine correlata

Walk as a tool to be health

Health strongly favored by:

  • 10,000 is the minimum number of steps to do per day
  • 150 are the minutes per week of moderate intensity physical activity
  • 130 steps per minute is the ideal pace for a walk
  • 100 are the walking steps per minute. 25 steps in 15 seconds
  • 5 are the minutes to walk every hour
  • The world don’t walk so much and the world average is 5.000 steps
  • Warning: introduce changes to one’s habits through the adoption of habits tailored to one’s psychological and physical conditions and compatible with everyday life

Risultati immagini per Large-scale physical activity data reveal worldwide activity inequality

Smartphone data from over 68 million days of activity by 717,527 individuals reveal variability in physical activity across the world.

a, World map showing variation in activity (mean daily steps) between countries measured through smartphone data from 111 countries with at least 100 users. Cool colours correspond to high activity (for example, Japan in blue) and warm colours indicate low levels of activity (for example, Saudi Arabia in orange).

b, Typical activity levels (distribution mode) differ between countries. Curves show distribution of steps across the population in four representative countries as a normalized probability density (high to low activity: Japan, UK, USA, Saudi Arabia). Vertical dashed lines indicate the mode of activity for Japan (blue) and Saudi Arabia (orange).

c, The variance of activity around the population mode differs between countries. Curves show distribution of steps across the population relative to the population mode. In Japan, the activity of 76% of the population falls within 50% of the mode (that is, between the light grey dashed lines), whereas in Saudi Arabia this fraction is only 62%. The UK and USA lie between these two extremes for average activity level and variance. This map is based on CIA World Data Bank II data, publicly available through the R package mapdata (https://www.r-project.org/).© 2017 Macmillan Publishers Limited, part of Springer Nature.