The Official 10,000 Steps Program (1st March 2010)
12pm today marks the start of Telecom’s participation in The Official 10,000 Steps Program, a 10-week walking challenge where teams in the organisation compete to be the first to virtually walk along around NZ. I missed out on the programme last year so wasn’t going to miss out again this time! Unfortunately, no one in my immediate team was interested to form a group so I ended up joining another team headed by Rachel Vinac based in Auckland (I was the only team member based in Wellington – felt so left out!) to get into the programme.
Every participant is given a Yamax pedometer (Telecom funds the first one and we’ll have to pay our own replacement pedometer – the Yamax pedometer costs around $60 and is said to be the most accurate in the market), an Official 10,000 Steps guide book and cap prior to the start of the programme. At the start of each day during the course of the programme, I have to reset the pedometer to zero and have it properly clipped onto the waistband or belt, directly in line with the foot, and record my final step count in the guide book at the end of the day (that’s before getting into bed). Each Monday morning, I’ll have to email my total step count for the previous week to my team captain so she can add it to the team step count on the website. For certain sports such as swimming, there is a conversion chart provided that converts the activity into steps (the pedometer is not waterproof). The aim is to walk at least 10,000 steps a day as studies show that if you complete 10,000 steps a day, you dramatically reduce the risk of developing illnesses and diseases such as obesity, diabetes and even some cancers. The key goal for each team is to walk a total of 7,097,256 steps to get right around NZ. Frankly, 10,000 steps a day sounds like a lot even to sporty and active me. Hmm, it would be interesting to see how many steps I actually clock in a day. Better get off my arse and start walking!
Every participant is given a Yamax pedometer (Telecom funds the first one and we’ll have to pay our own replacement pedometer – the Yamax pedometer costs around $60 and is said to be the most accurate in the market), an Official 10,000 Steps guide book and cap prior to the start of the programme. At the start of each day during the course of the programme, I have to reset the pedometer to zero and have it properly clipped onto the waistband or belt, directly in line with the foot, and record my final step count in the guide book at the end of the day (that’s before getting into bed). Each Monday morning, I’ll have to email my total step count for the previous week to my team captain so she can add it to the team step count on the website. For certain sports such as swimming, there is a conversion chart provided that converts the activity into steps (the pedometer is not waterproof). The aim is to walk at least 10,000 steps a day as studies show that if you complete 10,000 steps a day, you dramatically reduce the risk of developing illnesses and diseases such as obesity, diabetes and even some cancers. The key goal for each team is to walk a total of 7,097,256 steps to get right around NZ. Frankly, 10,000 steps a day sounds like a lot even to sporty and active me. Hmm, it would be interesting to see how many steps I actually clock in a day. Better get off my arse and start walking!
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