Forget Pilates, yoga and spin – Japanese walking is the latest fitness craze you need to know about

Japanese walking is becoming the latest fitness craze – taking over trendy workouts like Pilates, yoga and spin classes. 

The exercise consists of bursts of slow and fast walking which increases your heart rate. Also known as the ‘3-3 walking workout’, you walk with intensity for three minutes, then slow down for the next three.

This is repeated five times, totalling 30 minutes. 

It was developed by Professor Hiroshi Nose and Associate Professor Shizue Masuki at Shinshu University in Matsumoto, Japan, to help elderly people get the health benefits experienced by athletes undertaking high-intensity interval training.

The three minute benchmark is when the researchers found most of the older citizens tended to get tired.

It is advised to take longer strides in the fast intervals while bending the elbows and swinging he arms to help maintain the correct form. 

Participants of the study found that those walking at varying speeds experienced a host of healthbeneits, including weight loss and lower blood pressure. Thigh strength and physical fitness also improved.

A later 2018 study by the same researchers found that over a ten-year period, those who did interval walking reported greater to age-related injuries and illnesses.

It was developed by Professor Hiroshi Nose and Associate Professor Shizue Masuki at Shinshu University in Matsumoto, Japan, to help elderly people get the health benefits experienced by athletes undertaking high-intensity interval training

Japanese walking is becoming the latest fitness craze – taking over trendy workouts like Pilates, yoga and spin classes

The Japanese walking method has also been hailed for helping to regulate blood pressure and boost your VO2 max – a numeric measure of your aerobic capacity which reflects how well your heart, lungs, and muscles work together to deliver and use oxygen for physical activity. 

The higher this is, the greater your cardiovascular fitness and even translates to a longer lifespan, according to a study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

However some experts are skeptical about the benefits of the walking exercise.

Sean Pymer, an Academic Clinical Exercise Physiologist at the University of Hull said: ‘So is this walking trend really the be-all and end-all? Or does it matter less about what exercise you do and more about how often and how hard you do it?

‘The answer is likely to be the latter…We should focus on ensuring we perform regular moderate to vigorous physical activity and make it habitual. If that activity happens to be Japanese walking, then it’s a worthwhile choice.’