Is there bone building benefit to walking with ankle and or hand weights?
Good afternoon…
I wanted to give you a quick response to your question while I had a minute. There is a both a negative and positive result when walking with weights. The first would be to NEVER walk with ankle weights. In doing so, you are causing un-necessary stress to your hips if you are not walking with a proper gait. Walking with weights in your hands is completely acceptable though! On the positive side, any “weight bearing” exercise will help benefit the bones and reduce the risk of Osteoporosis. I hope that helped?
There is no osteogenic benefit with walking with weights. The amount of weight is much too light to stimulate bone growth and the weights are placed in the worng area to be effective She would do much better to utilaize a weighted vest in an structed exercise program that includes weight training tageted at the hip and spine.
Dr. Carol Zehnacker, DPT
Relative to bone building. Any movement that requires impact will benefit the skeletal structure. Is the relationship linear with weight, meaning do we increase bone building linear with increased impact (through wearing ankle weights) I believe it would be safe to say YES. However, I would rather bypass the weights in avoiding unnecessary strain upon knees, hips and ankles.
In regard to walking with a weighted vest, this is often recommended for people without a diagnosis of osteoporosis in the spine, however, if you have a client with this condition, loading the spine is not recommended.
I agree that walking with ankle weights and hand weights is contra-indicated. I’ve seen people with wrist and elbow issues related to holding hand weights (or even, in the day, a Walkman).