'Exercise' means all the physical activity that you do, including house and garden work, travelling on foot or by bicycle, manual jobs at work as well as sport and activities in your spare time.
| Write down in minutes the time it takes you to: - walk to collect your daily newspaper
- walk to work, or from your car, or whilst you are at work
- walk upstairs
- walk from and to the bus stop or tube station
- walk to where you buy or eat your lunch
- walk your dog
- walk to the shops and/or walk around the supermarkets or shopping centres
- walk from where you park your car
- actively care for an elderly parent or grandchildren
|
Now add up your answers. How many minutes did you achieve?
Remember that to gain the health benefits you should accumulate half an hour of moderate intensity physical activity on most days of the week.
How far are you from that target?
Are you surprised?
Do you think you could do more?
Can you fit more activity into your day?
Why not think about purchasing a pedometer to measure accurately the number of steps you do in a day?
The target is 10,000 a day but this is easily achievable. If you placed a time next to each or most of the questions above you would have already walked about 5000 steps. All you need to do is plan ahead to ensure that each day you take a few more steps.
You can use the pedometer to see how the amount of steps you take converts into distance travelled and calories used. How many miles a day do you walk? Do you do enough activity to burn off the calories you consume during the day?
Ways to increase your activity levels
- park your car in a different place
- hide the remote control so you have to get up to change TV channels
- use a toilet on another floor
- move the waste paper bin
- walk during commercial breaks on TV
- get an allotment combine physical activity and healthy eating!
02/06/2009
Lean Machine Muscle Toner
A home workout for busy people! Our compact electronic unit can be worn under your clothing whilst you go about your daily tasks, or you can lie back and relax, effortlessly exercising or just soothing tired muscles.
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