The fact that walking requires no specialized, expensive equipment, is one of the many advantages which it has as an exercise method. However, while it certainly isn’t essential, many people will enjoy listening to music when they workout – whether or not they decide to select walking as their exercise method.
There have been quite a number of different studies which have investigated the effect which music has on athletic workout efficiency. Just last year, a group of scientists at Liverpool’s John Moores University in the UK conducted a study on the effect of listening to music on workout efficiency.
They varied the tempo of a “workout mix” of songs in order to see how it affected the workout efficiency of a test group comprising of 12 male students. They found that when the tempo was raised, not only was workout effectiveness higher – but that the test subjects found their workout more enjoyable. No doubt UK taxpayers will be pleased to learn that their money is being well spent.
If you have a notion to increase the effectiveness of your walking workout, there are plenty of sources of information available. There is even a dedicated Nike blog on the subject of music to workout to. You can buy workout music CDs and download workout mp3 tracks from Amazon – you can also find special iTunes workout play lists.
Many of these delve heavily into the science. You can select a playlist that begins with a fairly low bpm (beats per minute), then gets faster as you warm up and then finally reverts to a reduced bpm at the end of your workout in order to let you cool down.
At the end of the day, there’s no need to get too scientific or to over analyse the situation (assuming that you’re not a professional athlete or trainee Olympian that is). It’s pretty immaterial whether or not you get the number of beats per minute correct. As you walk along with your favorite tunes playing in your ears, the time and the miles will pass much more quickly.
If you want to push yourself to walk a little faster then something up tempo would be appropriate. On the other hand, if you just want to take it easy and listen to something more relaxing, that’s fine as well. The main thing is to pick tracks which you like and which will help to make your workout session enjoyable for you.
One small piece of advice – don’t set the volume so high that you are unable to hear traffic noise and aural warnings if you tend to walk in areas of heavy traffic. Do enjoy your walking workout program- it’s one of the best exercises to lose weight that you can choose.
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