Thursday fitness fun fact

Benefits of Treadmill Incline Workouts

Mimics walking real hills outdoors, assuming you do not hold onto the handrails.)

• Challenges the cardiovascular system without requiring speed.
• Because an incline challenges the heart at a slower walking pace, this means less impact on knees and hips.
• The slow nature is good for people either just getting back into exercise after injury, or for people new to exercise who don’t want to pull a muscle at faster speeds.
• Recruits lower back muscles to keep your body erect
• Provides a stretch to the calves and Achilles tendons

Incline Workout Basics

Slow is OK: Some exercisers might think that slow incline walks don’t have any value because they’re slow for most people, and that in order for walking to be effective, it must be done briskly. But think about hiking outdoors for long periods. Who goes as fast as a jack-rabbit? Brisk walking is vital for flat-level courses, but not always for inclines, depending on steepness, plus conditioning of the walker.

Three mph is very slow on a zero incline. But it’s very grueling for some people as a sustained pace at 15 percent incline (hands off the machine!). Incline walking causes increased motion at the hip, knee and ankle joints. This means your lower body must work harder. So don’t underestimate the benefits of slow walking on an incline.

Let Go of the Handrails: Most people overestimate what they can handle, and end up clinging to the machine for support. This cheating will get you nowhere. Instead, humble yourself and slow down. Imagine you’re walking an outdoor trail. You certainly wouldn’t be walking quickly if it were steep enough. Find the speed and percent-grade that challenges you, that gets you out of breath, that makes you sweat—yet at the same time, that you can handle without cheating.

Overexerting? Slow Down! If you get wiped out quickly, there’s one of two things you can do. Either adjust the settings so that you can manage the walking without holding on, and then stick with the new adjustment for an extended period. This is called steady-state training.

Or—slow down/lower incline for 1-2 minutes only, just to recover enough to resume pumping at the settings that quickly wipe you out. When you feel like toast again, then once more, lower the settings to recover. Alternate this way for 30 minutes or more. This is called interval training.

Go the Pace and Incline That's Right for You: Since walkers come in all abilities, I can’t just say, "Okay, set the incline at 10 percent and the speed at 3.5 mph and walk for 12 minutes." Instead, pay attention to how your body feels, and use that as your gauge.  About.com

Hey Terry... If you get a chance on an upcoming post....would you post abou****ts....? I now have access to equptment that has Watt's reading...but I have no idea what i'm looking at.... Thanks

Ok so I guess this is not a cumulative thing...like calories burned... so the thing is to get the watts as high as you can for as long as you can... Trust me brother...the 200 watts...are a long way off for me....I was at 80 watts for a little while, and I got a charlie horse in my calf that is yelping...one of those you can't even rub...but it is better today... My heart rate was at about 130, for 20 mins...I was sweating buckets...then I lifted weight....worked on my back....(it's all gotta get done....so lets see where it takes me)

390 watts sustained. Holy **** That's over .5 horsepower. And considering he ways a whole hell of a lot less than a horse that's an incredible power to weight ratio. Guess that's why he was the champ.

Hey Russ, WATTS = Power to the pedals which is based on cadence (RPM of pedals) X resistance. The best riders produce more power to the pedals over longer periods of time. Think of WATTS as being equivalent to horsepower in a car so if you want to be a "muscle car" in cycling, you've got to produce a high number of WATTS. This is a quote from G. Lemond - three-time US winner of the Tour de France: "It's amazing how little real knowledge there is in cycling about power output. Everybody talks about heart rate, and heart rate is important. But when you look at performance, it's real simple. It's how many watts you produce. I know riders who say, 'I can ride for 30 minutes at 190 beats per minute.' So what? You can ride at 190 bpm and still be putting out only 200 watts. A heart-rate monitor alone is never the best measure in cycling. There's wind, hills, drafting. You never can really tell how you're riding. In February, I got sick. I could tell I was getting sick right away. I could tell something was going on before I got sick. With a heart-rate monitor, you could train, and your heart rate would be high, and you would think things were fine. My heart rate was fine, but I could see my power output drop dramatically. Your performance doesn't exactly match your heart rate like everybody thinks. I've ridden at 180 bpm for 30 minutes in a climb during race, and I was at 330 watts of power output the whole way up to the climb. For me, that was poor. The next day, we came up the other side of the same mountain, and I produced 60 watts more at a lower heart rate."