Step counts and cadence

I had the absolute pleasure to meet Dr. Catrine Tudor-Locke last week. For those of you who may not be too familiar with her work, she does a lot of research regarding walking and pedometers.

I wanted to share a couple items of her latest research which I thought was quite exciting and practical.

Step count recommendations:

All too often in my work I am asked about the 10,000 steps count “target” for adults. Interestingly enough there is not much research supporting it as a target itself. The 10,000 steps was basically a number that was develop out of best practice and fit well with public health and physical activity promotion needs. Dr. Tudor-Locke recently published three reviews, which are open to the general public that have recommendations with step counts for children/youth, adults and older adults. In these reviews she has looked at the research to help develop step count recommendations.

Basically, she debunked the 10,000 step “target”, indicating that for adults there may be health benefits with daily step counts at around 7000. Of course there is nothing wrong with aiming for 10,000 steps, however it should not been seen as the only target. In fact, researchers have also shown that increasing your step counts above what you normally do may be more important than achieving a set target.

Cadence:

The other item Dr. Tudor-Locke is researching is the importance of cadence, i.e. how fast we walk.

It makes sense to think about our walking speed. When we look at the Canadian Physical Activity Guidelines we are encouraged to be active at a moderate-vigorous intensity. Therefore by looking at our cadence (i.e. our steps/min), we can get an idea of intensity.

In her work she has shown that about 100 steps/min is equivalent to 3 METS. For those of you who don’t have a background in exercise physiology, this could be interpreted as moderate intensity.

So what does this all mean for us practitioners? Well, pedometers are still a great tool to get people moving more and hopefully moving more regularly.

• Encourage the people you work with to increase their step counts above their typical levels. Don’t worry as much about them achieving 10,000 steps, but perhaps encourage them to set step counts for themselves. For example, if a person you work with gets on average 6000 steps/ day, perhaps a meaningful and realistic goal for this person is to increase their step count up to 7000-8000 steps/day.

• Use cadence as a learning tool for your clients. For example, have them try walking at least 100 steps/minute for a few minutes. This allows them to get an idea of what their pace should be at when walking at a moderate intensity. Have them try different cadences to see which one they feel comfortable with. The idea of doing this is help create a sense of how fast they should be walking to get more benefit out of their steps.

So how have you used pedometers and walking in the programs you run? I would like to hear your stories and ideas.

Tudor-Locke, C., Craig, C.L.,, Beets, M.W., Belton, S., Cardon, G.M., Duncan, S., Lubans, D., Olds, T.S., Raustorp, A., Rowe, D.A., Spence, J.C., Tanaka, S., & Blair, S.N. How many steps are enough? For children and youth. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 2011, 9:78.

Tudor-Locke, C., Craig, C.L.,, Brown, W., Clemes, S.A., De Cocker, K., Giles-Corti, B., Hatano, Y., Inoue, S., Matsudo, S.M., Mutrie, N., Oppert, J.-M., Rowe, D.A., Schmidt, M., Schofield, G.M., Spence, J.D., Teixeira, P.J., Tully, M.A., & Blair, S.N. How many steps are enough? For adults. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 2011, 9:79.

Tudor-Locke, C., Craig, C.L., Aoyagi, S., Bell, R.C., Croteau, K.A., De Bourdeaudhuij, I., Ewald, B., Gardner, A.W., Hatano, Y., Lutes, L.D., Matsudo, S.M., Rogers, L.Q., Rowe, D.A., Schmidt, M.D., Tully, M.A., & Blair, S.N. How many steps are enough? For older adults and special populations. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 2011, 9:80.