Walking is an easy way to exercise! Studies have found that exercising within two hours of waking up in the morning has the best effect, which can wake up the body and mind and help you sleep better at night. Brisk walking can strengthen heart and lung function, achieve better health effects, and promote longevity.
Taipei, Taiwan (ADH News) – Walking is one of the easiest ways to keep moving in your daily life. It doesn’t require tools or companions. It can be done at any time, and it is easier to achieve the frequency of exercise 3 times a week. Studies have found that walking in the morning is the most beneficial to health, especially in the first two hours of waking up, walking exercise can wake up the body and mind and also make you sleep better at night. A 10-minute brisk walk 3 times a day can strengthen the heart and lung function, help maintain longevity, and achieve better exercise effects than walking 10,000 steps a day.
When is the best time to walk?
Doctors recommend walking during the day for the best results and a variety of benefits. Natural light in the morning can help us reset and adjust our biological clock, helping to boost the spirit of the day. Exposure to sunlight also regulates melatonin in our bodies and boosts the feel-good chemical serotonin in the brain, which helps balance mood and positive thinking, making it easier for us to get rid of negative emotions. So when the sun comes up, it’s a good time to go out for a walk, even if it’s only a dim light, our sensitive eye receptors can sense it and start moving and reacting.
Having sunlight while walking can stimulate the brain and strengthen our ability to regulate emotions. In particular, walking within 2 hours of just waking up can best wake up the body and mind after a night of sleep, reduce the production of melatonin that helps sleep, and make us more energetic during the day, so we won’t be tired easily. When the night is coming, the body will naturally send out sleep signals, and the quality of sleep will be improved accordingly.
As for whether it is better to walk before a meal or after a meal each has its advantages in terms of the body’s working mechanism. Exercise before meals can help with weight loss and blood sugar control, and exercise after meals can help with the catabolism of sugar and fat in the body. You can choose freely. However, if you go out to exercise in the morning, it is recommended to eat some food first, add calories and raise blood sugar, and then go out for a walk.
The recommended walking time for a day is 30 minutes, which can be done together in the morning. If you have difficulty in time execution, you can divide 30 minutes into 2 to 3 times to complete. This is the flexibility of walking exercise, and it can also increase the number of times you go out for a walk, and promote circulation and metabolism.
How to walk for the best results?
What way to walk will achieve a better exercise effect? Some people aim to walk 10,000 steps a day which originated in Japan in the 1960s. Before the Tokyo Olympics in 1964, step-count fitness equipment was developed, mainly to encourage everyone to get rid of the habit of not exercising and lazy mentality and go out to walk more. At that time, there was a wave of walking and it was believed that the more steps you took, the more fat you could burn. This trend also spread to countries around the world.
However, more and more recent studies have found that walking fast is healthier, so another trend of brisk walking has been raised. A team of researchers led by Marie Murphy, professor in the Department of Life and Health Sciences at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland, found that walking more was associated with a lower risk of cancer mortality, but faster brisk walking was associated with a 10 to 20 percent lower risk of cardiovascular disease. Therefore, it is believed that brisk walking is more beneficial to health and can maintain longevity.
Compared with walking 10,000 steps a day, it is easier to achieve your goal by taking a 30-minute brisk walk once a day or 3 times a 10-minute brisk walk. As long as you speed up your steps a little and increase the exercise intensity to above medium, you’ll get healthier. It will strengthen your heart and lungs, and prevent diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer by taking a brisk walk.
The UK annual Health Survey by HSE found that people who regularly walked for more than 30 minutes a day had lower BMI values and smaller waist circumferences than those who engaged in general exercise. If you want to stay in good shape, start walking today! If time permits, remember to choose a brisk walk within 2 hours of getting up in the morning, start the day full of energy, maintain a good mood, sleep better at night, and achieve the highest health benefits.
