Walking or running on a flat treadmill primarily works your lower body muscles. But when you add an incline on your treadmill you will generate several benefits.
Increased Calorie Burn
For every 1% incline, you burn 10 more calories per mile. This is because you’re working against gravity, which activates more muscles. The more muscles you’re working, the more energy you exert, and the more of your body you’re incorporating into a workout, all lead to a higher calorie expenditure.
Will Tone muscles
A higher incline can tone your quads, hamstrings, glutes, and ankle strength. Running uphill engages different muscles than running on a flat surface,
Can Reduce injury risk
Increasing the treadmill’s incline increases the intensity level without increasing stress on your joints. By increasing your treadmill incline by 3” you can reduce the impact that your legs absorb by about 24%.
Can Decrease workout time
When you’re running on an incline, you are getting twice the benefits that flat surface running has and, therefore, it’s possible to decrease your workout time.
We have written about this subject before, here and here. Here at Brigadoon Fitness we believe that exercising smart is the best and fastest way to health.
Just walking on a 15% incline is considered the optimum to build muscle and get the most benefits. Both the True Fitness TC900 and the TC400 have up to 15% inclines. Then there is the Alpine Runner that has a whopping 30% incline. All of these machines will help you with calorie burn, and muscle tone.
