Any walkers out there? I need encouragement!

I have been walking a mile every night and walk several miles with friends on the weekends.  It takes me nearly 25 minutes to walk 1 mile.  :( 

How long did it take for you to get faster?  I feel so slow! 

Everyone starts somewhere and it varies from person to person. As you walk, look at a point up ahead and make a consentrated effort to walk faster than you currently are. After you hit that point you can slow a bit and then pick another point ahead to get to as you increase your speed again. Keep doing that and increase the distance that you are walking faster. You will be finishing that mile more quickly before you know it. Keep at it!!

Just keep at it! I know it's hard not to compare your progress to others', I do the same thing with my lap swimming. Everyone here is much faster than me, and at the pool the people in the next lanes are always faster. It's not like I'm not working at it; maybe it's my form or something, I don't know. However, I do 30 minutes without stopping and it really makes me tired, so I must be doing some good! Same way with your walking. You are moving and progressing, that's the important thing!

Jenny

Getting faster took effort.  LIke Scott said a concentrated effort.  Initially I found this comfortable pace that I could go at and my body got used to it.  I was wondering why I wasn't getting faster.

It's because I wasn't challenging myself to go faster.  I thought that as I lost weight it would get easier.  Well it did get easier on me, but I still wasn't moving faster.  I had to set a time goal for myself.  This is where the treadmill comes in very handy, because you have absolute control over the speed of the device.  You can increase it .1 mph and do that for a week or two, then increase it again.  Take baby steps with your increases so that you see improvement.  You don't want to go from walking at 2.5 mph which is approx what you are doing now and try to run at 6 mph.  You just set yourself up for potential failure.  Be easy on yourself, make gradual improvements and keep challenging yourself.

It's great that you are out and walking.  Keep it up, you will see the rewards.

Scott

When you are walking by yourself, put on some good music with a faster beat & try to stay on beat.  I use Google all the time to try to see how many beats per minute (BPM) a song has.  When I was in Target last night, I also noticed that they had a bunch of Biggest Loser CD's that tell you the BPM for each of the songs on there.    They were in one of those wooden units (I guess it's called a kiosk?) where you can push the button to hear a sample of the music. 

Yeah for you and walking!! I conciousily speed up the start of my walk where I'm walking nearly double my normal steps for several minutes and then I slow back down to my normal gate til the last five minutes or so of my walk and I speed up to double my normal steps. That has really helped increase my speed. I have been working on this all week and I started with just one minute of double my normal gate and have increased it each consecutive day by one minute.

Good luck hun and keep walking!! hehe

Thank you for the advice!  I really appreciate it! :)