Announcing a New Walking Club

I don’t know about you, but much as I like our walking/biking trail, I walk alone and do not feel comfortable walking on that trail by myself. I’m sure there are others like me out there who would be interested in walking with someone and walking somewhere safe.

To combine these two things, I want to start a Walking Club at the Oak Leaf Park, located at 401 Centennial Dr. To see more information on Oak Creek’s parks, click here. For a map, click here. Oak Leaf Park is number 15.

I like Oak Leaf Park because it has a playground, so if you’re bringing children, they have a place to play. It has a shelter so you can get out of the sun if you need to. It’s not too far from Target, which has restrooms and water if you forgot to bring some. (The restrooms are the part that many people like since most parks don’t have these facilities.) The trail is a half mile so it’s very doable.

I would like to have our first meeting at 7 p.m. Aug. 22 at the park. We can meet at the shelter. We can take this opportunity to meet other residents who’d like to exercise more but don’t have a workout or walking "buddy." If you really like walking, you can move indoors at the high school when the building opens for citizen walking in fall. Walking indoors allows you to do it in a safe environment and out of the weather.

To join "the club" all you need to do is show up and walk. When a variety of walkers meet and have different levels of walking speed, just remember to have slower members walk on the right and allow faster folks to pass. Walking can be as challenging or easy as you like. Make sure you wear walking shoes and dress appropriately for the weather. Bring water too!

Here are some ideas to take walking to another level. If you want to add a bit more of a cardio-respiratory challenge to your walk, carry 1-2 lb. hand weights. I wouldn’t use more than two pounds because it’s too easy to break your stride and then your body is going in different directions and you can pull muscles and hurt yourself. Adding arms to a workout increases the effectiveness and adding weights makes it even more challenging.

When you add arm weights, be sure to bend your elbows and tuck your arms in so you can move them in rhythm with your feet. If you let your arms hang down they get off kilter with your feet and you can pull your back muscles. If you get tired of moving your arms, rest your hands on your waist.

With hand weights, you can also do side raises, forward raises, extended arm circles, overhead presses, shoulder presses and arm curls. You can get quite a workout with these light weights!

To work out your legs more, you can add lunges to your walking routine. You could also do short bursts of running and walk sideways (be sure to turn and do it on both sides). Walking sideways is good for the hips.

If you don’t want to carry weights around, think about investing in a stretch tube. I believe Target may sell them. Usually the thicker they are the harder they are. Tubes can be used much like weights to perform exercises but are lighter to carry. You can also loop tubes around a chain link fence and do many other exercises with them.

By combining tubes and weights to your walk you can get a complete and total body workout. Walk over to the playground and try crossing the bars. See if you still can, or climb the monkey bars. If no one is on the swings give yourself a push and go! There’s a reason we were healthy when we were young.

So mark your calendar for 7 p.m. on Aug. 22 at Oak Leaf Park, 401 Centennial Dr.  See ya there!