Hilarie: All I want for Christmas is a pedometer

Nov 14 2009 by Hilarie Stelfox, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

MY PEDOMETER has broken, after only 48,100 steps.

At least, I think it’s broken. Either that or I’m deluding myself.

All went well on my first day as the owner of a Rosemary Conley Calorie Pedometer. I clocked up 13,900 steps (rounded down to the nearest 100) and felt quite smug. The current health guidelines suggest a nice round figure of 10,000 steps a day, so I had some steps in the bank.

Which was just as well because the following day, despite a walk into town and back from the office and 45 minutes of table tennis on the back patio with Secondborn, I only managed 7,800.

I shook it a bit at bedtime to make sure I wasn’t being diddled.

Day three of life with a pedometer took me on a shopping trip to Manchester with four teenagers in tow. We wandered around for best part of three hours, had a meal and came home. The afternoon netted 9,000 steps and sore feet. The next day I was determined to step up my activity levels, if you’ll pardon the pun. By nightfall, after a walk into town from home and back, as well a round of table tennis, I’d got another 13,900.

That took me to Sunday, a day of rest and slobbing out. At bedtime the little crystal display said 3,500 steps, which, considering I hadn’t left the house, I didn’t think was too bad.

But then it all went wrong.

On Monday I played tennis for 90 minutes and afterwards did half an hour on a cross trainer.

By lunchtime my pedometer read 2,500 steps and despite an afternoon of strenuous tidying-up, recycling and going up and down the stairs (we have three flights) I’d only managed 3,400 before bed. I gave the pedometer a good shake.

But my suspicions were confirmed when the next day after walking to the town and back and adding another 30 minutes on the cross trainer for good measure, the pedometer said just 3,200 steps.

I put it in a drawer.

However, my experience proved that it is, in fact, quite difficult to walk 10,000 steps a day without taking some form of deliberate exercise. It’s easy to do around 2,500 or 3,000 steps by simply pottering about at home, but that isn’t good enough.

Which, I guess, is why the seemingly random figure of 10,000 appears in health guidelines. This equates to around 5 miles walked by someone with an average stride. It takes into account the fact that to achieve 10,000 steps the average person will have to commit to at least 30 minutes of moderate activity a day in order to achieve it.

Before my pedometer turned bad I was starting to enjoy the daily challenge of taking 10,000 steps and I could see how such an appliance could be extremely useful in encouraging the less than energetic to take some exercise. It certainly made me realise that without conscious effort it would be almost impossible to get enough.

My Christmas list now starts with pedometer. I’d like a proper one, please, that won’t lie to me. And no chocolate, no matter how much I plead for it.