Permission to take things down a step.
Getting your steps in every day is great for health and has been shown to improve posture, joint health, mood and body mass index (BMI), a measurement used to categorize healthy and unhealthy weight.
But while 10,000 steps is sold as the magic number to achieve weight loss, science says we should aim for different digits.
The double-digit step goal wasn’t initially designed with health goals in mind, instead part of a wildly successful 1960s marketing campaign in Japan to sell pedometers.
Now, new research being presented at this year’s European Congress on Obesity, May 12–15, has found that merely 8,500 steps a day can help keep weight off after dieting.
Published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, the review looked at multiple studies involving those going through weight loss programs, followed by a weight maintenance phase.
One group of participants followed a program that involved lifestyle changes such as diet and adding more steps to their daily routines, while the other control group received no treatment plan.
The number of steps all participants took each day was measured at the end of both the weight loss phase (around 8 months long) and the weight maintenance phase, with an average duration of 10 months.
While both groups walked around 7,200 steps at the start of the trials, the control group didn’t increase their step count or lose weight.
Meanwhile, the lifestyle changes group not only increased their steps to 8,454, but also lost an average of 4.4% of their body weight by the end of the weight loss period.
They also maintained the higher daily steps throughout maintaining their weight loss, hitting 8,241 steps daily, and kept most of the pounds off.
A deeper look into the research showed a strong connection between higher step count and keeping the weight off, especially if the number of steps per day is increased during weight loss.
However, the researchers noted that more steps didn’t necessarily equate to more pounds lost.
Instead, other factors play more important roles, such as a calorie deficit, one of the most common pieces of weight loss advice.
And while more movement is also recommended, this often means combining cardio exercise like walking with strength training to build up muscles and burn more calories.
Overall, though, the research team says that increased step count as part of lifestyle changes certainly helps achieve a healthier weight that can be sustained over time.
Walking remains one of the most accessible activities, with popular styles like “Nordic walking” claiming to burn thousands of calories in mere minutes.
“Increasing the number of steps walked to 8,500 each day is a simple and affordable strategy to prevent weight regain,” said Professor Marwan El Ghoch in a press release.
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