Walking can provide a great many benefits to your health, particularly if you’re not a fan of more strenuous activity, like running or strength training. While walking may seem like it’s not a big deal, remember this: when you’re walking at a brisk pace rather than a slow one, you burn about 8 calories every 60 seconds. This doesn’t sound like a whole lot, but those calories really add up – in fact, you can end up burning more calories by walking than you can by running if you really do your walking workout right!
It’s all in the speed of your walking, because the faster you walk the more muscles you use, and the more muscles you use the more energy you burn. For example, a 150 pound person running at a speed of 4-5 mph (which is about average) burns around a 100 calories a mile. But that person walking at a speed of 4-5 mph will burn nearly double that, about 180 calories in a single mile! How does this happen? It all comes down to how many muscles you’re using when you’re either running or walking, and how you’re using them.
On average, when you’re walking, your pace and your muscle involvement stays pretty much consistent, not requiring much effort on your part other than just moving forward. You’ll burn energy, about 8 calories a minute or so, but you won’t burn near as much as if you were jogging, which puts more strain on your muscles and requires a lot more energy to keep up. But walk as fast as if you were running and you’ll have your abs, hips, waist, arms, and legs into the movement simply trying to keep from actually running and you’ll be burning nearly twice as many calories as running alone since your movement now takes up more energy than running does.
When it comes to managing weight and weight loss, speed really does matter, because typically, the faster you are moving the more energy you are putting into it. A slow jog will not burn as many calories as a brisk walk will, not by a long shot. How do you know you’re walking fast enough? If your hips are moving back and forth as you walk and your arms are starting to pump from side to side (your body’s natural reaction to trying not to run) then you’re well on your way. If you’re just moseying along then you’re not burning as many calories as you really could be. Imagine trying to run away from something, but you have to walk instead. You’ll be walking super fast without really knowing it.
Even if you’re just walking normally, you can boost your walking workout by swinging your arms as you walk, or every 50 feet or so, turn around and travel backwards to use different leg muscles (great for the butt and thighs anyhow to walk backwards). Pump your fists into the air with every footstep, or every so often switch your walking style to lunges instead. The key is in putting the most movement into your body so you can burn the most energy, and therefore, the most calories. Or, just kick up your movement a tiny notch to get that much more energy burned.
So, if you’re walking so fast that your body is just squirming all over the place to kick into a run, try to hold that pace for as long as you can, because you’re burning double time on your calories. In walking 4-5 mph, you can burn 15 calories a minute, which turns into 225 calories in 15 minutes’ time. That’s not so bad, considering you’re not running your fool head off. Even if you can only hold that walking pace for a few minutes at a time, every second counts, and every minute burns off a ton of calories.
Source:
http://www.thatsfit.com/2009/07/08/does-walking-or-running-burn-more-calories/