How Does a Pedometer Help You Reach Your Fitness Goals? 

You’re probably missing this crucial aspect of your weight loss program.

You may be able to get to your weight loss goal faster if you add this simple thing to your life.

For most of you, this tool that helps aid your weight loss success comes free with the smartphone you’re reading this short blog post on. Using this tool can assist you in not losing precious time and hard-earned money on your way to your weight loss goal.

Below is a case for you to better understand pedometers. They are often an untapped tool that can help you achieve the weight loss you desire for longevity, looking better for the people you wish to impress, and keeping yourself at peak performance for all the trials and tribulations you’re bound to experience during your life.

Let’s get to work! 

What Are The Two Important Parts of Physical Fitness Program 

First things first, let’s hit the two important parts of your weight loss and fitness program.

*Side note: below is a simplistic representation. There are more aspects to understand and those can be found in other blog posts.

• Diet – what you’re eating. Helping you better understand how food affects your body in a common sense way that puts you in control of how you look is the mission of Cornerstone Weight Loss. 
• Exercise – activity requiring physical effort, varied out to sustain or improve health and fitness.

Why walking is the most underrated form of exercise 

What do you think of when you think of exercise?

Is it possible you’re imagining the clinking and clanking of heavy iron and slightly rusty weights in a dark, damp dungeon?

Perhaps you’re imagining the cool, crisp air burning your lungs during a sunrise run while the rest of your neighborhood is not yet awake.

Whatever your ideal image of exercise is, it seems like walking may missing from your list.

There’s no huffing and puffing. There’s not much sweat. The likelihood of needing a shower after is minimal.

Please don’t let superficiality discount how beneficial walking can be for your weight loss program.

Adding 10,000 steps to your day can burn 250-600 calories EXTRA per day according to this article.

*Side note: 10,000 steps is about five miles. You’d be surprised how easy it is to accidentally walk five miles throughout your day

To put that in perspective for you, a McDonald’s double cheeseburger is about 450 calories.

This is where pedometers can help people like you reach your fitness and weight loss goals.

What is a pedometer? 

According to Wikipedia a pedometer is  also called a step-counter. This device counts each step you take by detecting the motion of the your hands or hips.

(More on how pedometers work below)

What does a pedometer do?

A pedometer is a tool that helps you track how many steps you take on a daily basis. Many pedometers calculate average steps over time as well, ranging from weeks, to months, to years.

In a previous blog post that is written to help you better track your workouts, the main point is to help provide a visual representation of your exercise progress. An honest, real time depiction of what you do physically is helpful data that can propel your weight loss program forward.

A pedometer gives you this visual in terms of steps taken per day. Being able to know you have taken more steps today than yesterday will take more of the guesswork out of the exercise portion of your weight loss program.   

How do pedometers work? 

• Electronic pedometers – In electronic pedometers there is a pendulum that is wired to the device circuit that does the step counting. That circuit has no current flowing through it (open circuit) at rest. As you take a step, the pendulum swings and touches a metal contact. This completes the circuit and allows current to flow. Once your step is completed, the pendulum swings back to the original open circuit position. This adds one step to your count that is shown on the screen of your pedometer. 
• Pedometer Apps for Smartphones – Smartphones are equipped with location-tracking and use GPS satellite navigation to triangulate how far you walk or run. Additionally, “location services” pair with GPS to give you your step count.

Would a fitness professional recommend a pedometer 

Yes!

The more data you have during your weight loss program the better. If you can track how many steps you’ve taken per day you can use that as another method to understand your daily energy expenditure.

It’s nearly impossible to know exactly how many calories you burn through exercise. A pedometer can help you see how many steps you take per day. With all things being equal, if you have taken more steps today than yesterday you can internalize have a better understanding that you have exerted more energy. This helps you see that you’re making progress.  

At Cornerstone Weight Loss we help you better understand how food affects your body in a common sense way that will put you in control of how you look. In order to get in touch with a professional who can help tailor your weight loss plan to you, click below, fill out the information, and a member of the Cornerstone Weight Loss team will reach out to you to get the results in weight loss you deserve.