Pedal your way to better health.

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by Jen Foley, MVHNews fitness blogger, Healthy Lifestyles Director at Two Rivers YMCA

Pedaling can be a fast way to reach your fitness goals. Four great reasons to get out on a bicycle or to pedal a stationary bike come right to mind:

1. Bicycling is easy on your joints, especially compared to the beating they take when you’re running or playing court sports like basketball and tennis.

2. Along with running and swimming, bicycling is buy cheap viagra one of cardio’s Big Three. It is simply a fantastic way to exercise efficiently.

3. Like other stamina sports, bicycling can be a great cross-training complement for your other sports.

4. If you haven’t ridden a bicycle in a while, you’ve probably forgotten this reason. And that’s rough, because it may be the best reason of all to ride: It’s really fun to get out on two wheels and feel the wind in your face.

And it you want to talk about weight control, talk about bicycling. Calorie-burning calculations are seldom correct. Each individual differs in overall fitness, fitness specific to an activity, size, weight, wind profile, and countless

other ways. Even so, it’s safe to say that a hard ride will help you burn off that extra lunchtime treat. One source says that a 180 lb. person cycling at a vigorous 14-16 m.p.h. for an hour will burn over 800 calories. Even if that figure is off by 25%, that’s still a lot of calories used to fuel an hour’s worth of fun.

Here are some tips for stationary, hill, and workday bicycling:

Jen Foley is the Healthy Lifestyles Director at the Two Rivers YMCA, Moline. Jen majored in Therapeutic Recreation at the University of Tennessee and Gerontology at Sonoma State University. She lives in Davenport with her husband, Tim and their two pugs Jack and Lucy. She enjoys having an active lifestyle and helping others achieve their goals.For a listing of all of Jen’s blog posts, click here.