Are Running and Walking Equivalent Exercises?

I just saw a fitness article where they said that running and walking are equivalent activities because you burn as many calories by walking a mile as you do by running a mile.

That's one of my fitness pet peeves.  Running and walking are not equivalent fitness activities.  Not by a long stretch.

This reminds me of when I was in Middle School.  If you played a sport and had a game that day, you got out of gym class for the day.  However, we got a new gym teacher who revoked this policy.  The teacher's rationale?  That your heart rate had plenty of time to recover and return to normal by the time your game would start after school.

That was an incomplete view of the nature of physical activity.  Heart rate is a factor, but it's probably the least important in that calculation.  You're depleting glycogen stores and fatiguing muscles, which require recovery, when you do exercise.  That doesn't recover fully in just a few hours.  In fact, glycogen depletion might not fully recover fully until after you've had a good night's sleep  In the case of muscle fatigue you may not be fully recovered for days.

With walking, the amount of calories burned is really a virtually inconsequential factor.  If you run 3 miles, you will burn maybe 300 or 400 calories.  Same with walking 3 miles.

If you watch TV for 4 or 5 hours?  You'll burn 300 or 400 calories.

The act of simple existence means you will burn calories all day long.  That's why you need to eat a reasonable, balanced diet, even if you're not into a huge workout routine.

You can walk for miles and miles and miles, and the calorie deficit you create will be more than obliterated by the very next meal you eat.

Bad news for runners:  same there, too. 

So, is burning calories really that big of a deal? 

Yes and no, but mostly "no".  I once had a workout routine that was so strenuous that I was burning enough calories that I could eat anything I wanted to.  A typical workout day consisted of a 6.5 mile run, 25 mile bike and 3,000 yard swim. 

I dropped the swimming and biking to taper for a marathon once.  I was running over 40 miles a week... and I gained weight.

That's why every serious fitness trainer will tell you flat-out that you cannot lose weight by working out, alone.  I've heard various riffs on this theme.

For years, the popular myth was, "I'm going to lose weight by lifting weights.  I'll add so much muscle mass, and it'll amp up my metabolism.  I'll burn so many calories, 24x7, that I'll just lose weight because of my increased muscle mass."

Every person I ever met who had this philosopy... EVERY ONE ended up being a very fat, very powerful person.  Better than being fat but weak, but if their goal was to lose weight, this strategy failed miserably.

So, why is running better?  It's not the calories burned.  I concede that point.  It's that by running, you are actually altering your physiology.  You do increase your metabolism, not so much by increasing muscle mass (you'll notice most distance runner's legs have the bulkiness of chicken's feet), but by actual total-system physiological changes.

Those simply don't occur while walking.

The second problem with walking as a fitness activity is that it's highly unlikely to raise a person's heartbeat into an optimal training range for cardiovascular improvement. 

For those of us, myself included, who would prefer not to die of a heart attack, this is sort of important.

Now, I don't want to discourage anybody from walking.  If that's part of your fitness routine, stick with it.  In some cases, it's probably better to walk, versus run, not from a weight loss or CV standpoint, but from the standpoint of joint health, etc. 

So, if you walk, keep walking.  Really.  It is far better and far more than most people ever do for their health.

If you are running, though, keep running.  Don't abandon running and take up walking thinking it's an equivalent fitness activity.  It isn't.  Not by a long stretch.

And if you're somewhere in-between:  a person who walks regularly and has considered running, I'd say to ease a transition into running over time.  Run even a few yards with your daily walk (after making sure your weight is managed to where it won't unduly stress your joints and getting a pair of nice cushioned training shoes).  If you can eventually get to where you are running, say, 1 mile during your 3 mile walk, you'll be considerably further along than if you walk all 3 miles.

The other things I'll say as general notes are:

Training your whole body, not just your lower body, has not only worked for me personally, but is also the method most trainers recommend.  As we age, our strength and muscle mass tend to decrease.  So, for overall quality of life, as well as optimal health, some weight training is adviseable, even for people like me who may have been able to maintain a high degree of fitness without the benefit of weights when we were younger.

Diet?  I'd say find an acceptable one that you like and can stick to.  Don't look for the perfect diet.  It doesn't exist.  Find one that's mostly healthy, that you can incorporate into your lifestyle and do for the rest of your life. 

As we age, it all gets harder.  There are no shortcuts and to manage our health, it takes a combination of strength training, cardiovascular training and sensible diet.