The AP is reporting on an office product that combines a workstation and a treadmill.
Steelcase Inc., the nation's largest office furniture maker, will begin taking orders for its "Walkstation" starting November 19. The station will cost $4,000.
I've actually known about the development of these "Walk & Work" stations for a long time. The man in the above picture, Jim Levine, came out and gave us a really great lecture last year. He's had these setups for him and his employees in his office for at least a few years now.
In fact, Levine's lab has a track that goes around the perimeter. When they have small meetings, they walk around this track and talk as a group, rather than sit as most of us would in a meeting.
Levine recently did a research study on his walk & work desk. If you used this desk for half of your workday, you would expend an extra 500 calories per day. Over a year's time, that's a 52 pound weight loss, assuming everything else is constant.
The take-home message is that total daily activity (not just exercise) matters when it comes to weight loss. I also briefly talked about this in a past blog. I do a 1.5 hour lecture on this topic (and some others) a couple times a year. In the past, it's been called "The Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon of Weight Gain" or "The Hidden Secrets of Weight Management." In 2008, the title will be "The Metabolism Myth." It's a lecture for current and former 20/20 clients, as well as general members of the PRO Sports Club. The dates for the lecture have not been set yet, but I'll keep you posted once the dates are set. It's definitely a lecture you don't want to miss because you're going to find out some very eye-opening information that will help play a huge role in your efforts to lose weight and keep it off.