抄録
The purpose of this study was to research the influence and characteristics of weekly hill walking by comparison with habitual walking in elderly people. The hill walkers in this study were the members of a mountaineering group who do about 3.5 hours hill walking more than twice a month, and the walkers were the members of walking groups who go
walking more than once a week. Both hill walkers and walkers who have continued the exercise more than two years and people over 50 were extracted and analy analyzed. Time for one walking was 1.5±0.8 hours. The frequency and exercise volume per week were 1 time (19 Mets· h/wk) in hill walkers and 4 times (26 Mets· h/wk) in walkers. The contents of the questionnaire survey were age, sex, the reason for starting each exercise , period of duration, chronic diseases and changes in the subjective sense of well well-being. As a result, the prevalence rates of chronic diseases were lower than the general average values of the same generation, and more than half of people realize positive changes in the subjective sense of well well-being after starting these exercises in both groups. On the other hand, more people in the walking group than those in the hill walking group realize ‘’My walking speed increased’’. In contrast, the prevalence r rate of diabetes i n hill walkers was lower than that in walkers, and a high percentage of hill walkers feel improvement of knee pain and amelioration of physical strength. Significant differences were detected in these points. In addition, the proportion of peo ple who realize psychological changes was higher in weekly hill walkers. More specifically some items such as ‘’I have a wider circle of friends’’, ‘’My life became fulfilled’’, and ‘’I can feel refreshed’’ were recorded high scores, and they showed signif icant differences. In conclusion, this study leads to the suggestion that 3.5 hours weekly hill walking has potentially positive effects on some items regarding health, physical fitness, and the mental state compared with about 1.5 hours walking 4 times a week in elderly people.
