If in the evening the pedometer stops at 4,800, we can avoid looking at it as a bad report card. A study published in British Journal of Sports Medicine suggests that step count only tells part of the story: Among people who walk less, pace also seems to matter a lot.
The most interesting result concerns precisely those who remain below the famous 5 thousand steps. In the sample analyzed, taking less than 5,000 steps per day reaching around 80 steps per minute in the most active moments was associated with an estimate of the risk of mortality from all causes very similar to that observed among those who walked 5,000-7,500 steps, but with a cadence of around 60 steps per minute. Less road, in short, with a little more panache.
But this doesn’t turn a brisk ten-minute walk into a pass to the couch. Overall, the lowest risk was observed in the group that walked between 7,500 and 10,000 steps per day, especially around 100 steps per minute. The new study therefore scales back the obsession with a precise threshold, much less the idea that moving more is good.
What the researchers actually measured
The work was born from data from the UK Biobank. The participants wore an accelerometer on their wrist for seven consecutive days, so as to record both the number of steps and their intensity. For the analysis on all-cause mortality, 64,743 people entered, with an average age of approximately 61 years; for the cardiovascular one just over 70 thousand. Follow-up lasted on average about eight years.
The researchers divided the participants into four bands: less than 5,000 steps, between 5,000 and 7,500, between 7,500 and 10,000, and more than 10,000. Then they looked at the so-called peak-30 cadencethat is, the average number of steps per minute recorded in the most active 30 minutes of the day. Those minutes could also be spread out over the day: half an hour of military march without interruptions was not needed.
During the observation period, 1,697 deaths from all causes and 502 from cardiovascular diseases were recorded. In groups that walked fewer than 7,500 steps, mortality tended to decrease as intensity increased. A similar trend also appeared for the cardiovascular one.
The more concrete comparison gives a good idea. Below 5,000 steps, a cadence of 80 steps per minute was associated with a hazard ratio of 0.72 compared to the reference group; between 5,000 and 7,500 steps, with 60 steps per minute, the estimate was 0.70. Two different ways of walking, with very close risk estimates.
10 thousand steps had a great marketing department
Then there is that number that we now carry on our wrists: 10,000 steps a day. As the researchers themselves recall, his fortune did not arise from a biological threshold discovered in the laboratory, but from the campaign of a Japanese pedometer from the 1960s. The human body, not very cooperative with marketing, does not seem to have a switch that goes off at step number 10,000.
This study adds a useful piece especially for those who physically struggle to reach that figure. A person who walks 4,000 steps can try to make some of it more intense; those who have difficulty sustaining a fast pace can aim to gradually accumulate more at a comfortable pace. Quantity and intensity seem to be able to be combined, rather than competing for the title of the only valid measure of daily activity.
And you don’t necessarily need to go out with a metronome. Matthew Ahmadi, among the authors, proposes a rather more humane criterion: at a fast pace we should breathe noticeably louder, feel warmer and still be able to speak in short sentences, while singing should start to become uncomfortable. Absolute speed inevitably changes with age and physical condition.
It’s an association, not a recipe for living longer
The edge of the study must be kept close to the results. We are talking about observational research: the authors found associations between certain combinations of steps, intensity and mortality in subsequent years. This does not allow us to establish that it was walking faster, alone, that caused a longer life.
Furthermore, physical activity was measured for seven days and the participants were on average just over sixty years old. It would therefore be excessive to take 80 or 100 steps per minute and transform them into the new magic quota to be set on the smartwatch. We have just started to get rid of the 10 thousand, let’s at least avoid replacing them immediately with another small number.
The useful data is simpler. Taking more steps remains associated with important benefits, but when increasing them is difficult, even the way we walk seems to have an impact. The pedometer can continue to do its job. Maybe he can stop being a judge too.
