If you are thinking of exercising without too many complications, science recommends that you forget about the elevator in the first place. In fact, before stress tests existed, monitoring cardiorespiratory function after climbing stairs was a reliable test to find out if someone was fit . Six years ago, Canadian research conducted with people in their sixties showed that this activity is twice as strenuous as walking fast, and it consumes 50% more calories than lifting weights or walking up an incline ramp, as Elena Sanz reports. in the latest Extra Issue of Very Interesting Questions and Answers.
For their part, scientists from the University of Roehampton, in the United Kingdom, found that climbing five floors on foot five times a week means burning an average of 302 kilocalories if we do not skip steps, and 260 when we do it two by two . The researchers attribute the difference not only to the fact that we spend more time in the first case, but also that the short steps mean a faster contraction of the muscles and, consequently, a greater expenditure of energy.
The benefits don't stop there. In an article in the specialized journal Preventive Medicine, it could be read that dedicating 13.5 minutes a day for seven consecutive weeks to this exercise produces important physiological improvements, such as a slowdown in the heart rate and an increase in the levels of the so-called good cholesterol.
