Walking up/down hill

Can someone please provide me with a site that proves or disproves the following assertion:

“Walking downhill burns more calories than walking uphill.”

I have found sites that indicate that walking downhill is harder on your body (joints) than walking uphill, but haven’t found one that specifically says it burns more calories.

E3

I can think of two reasons why walking uphill burns more calories than walking downhill.

First, walking uphill is increasing your potential energy. That energy has to come from somewhere, and it comes from you burning calories.

Second, try walking up a few flights of stairs or a steep hill compared to walking down. Walking uphill is much more tiring, thus likely burning more calories.

I googled around and found one site that said that walking uphill burns 354 calories per hour, but I haven’t found anywhere that says how many calories are burned by walking downhill.

It’s more complex than PE otherwise there would be a net gain in energy from walking downstairs compared to walking on level ground. Biomechanics play a large role so we can’t compare outselves to a wheeled vehicle.

Really it’s because walking upstairs increases one’s relativistic mass :stuck_out_tongue:

Actually, once you’ve worked out for a while, going down stairs is far more difficult than going upstairs. Might be those muscles don’t get worked out as much, or just because your legs are tired and you’re trying to find that middle place between “Going up” and “Falling down” that lets you descend a flight of stairs.

I also seriously doubt it. Going downhill (don’t know how “stairs” got into this), always seems harder for beginners because the quads work harder, while uphill it’s the hamstrings. Unfit people usually have much weaker quads. Any habitual mountain climber finds it easier going downhill because the opposing muscles are equally strong.

Any climber in hot weather can tell you for sure that you burn more calories (and are much hotter) going up than down.

As the OP noted, it is indeed harder on the knees going down steep mountains, but once the muscles are strong, it pretty much protects them from injury. When carrying a heavy pack down, most use poles to ease the burden on the ol’ knees.

I realize it isn’t the proof you seek, but comparing pulse and respiration rates strongly indicates this statement is false.

My hike last weekend (and the weekend before, and the weekend before that) supports this line of reasoning.

Going downhill is much, much easier once your muscles are in shape.

Someone should ask the Grand Old Duke of York. He’d know.

I hiked to the top of Half Dome last weekend; 18 mile round trip, 4,800 foot elevation gain. I think that counts as having “worked out for a while,” and I’ll tell you, going downhill was much less tiring that going uphill.

However, on stairs going downhill can be difficult, because you have to aim your foot at just the right spot to get it on the step, so I don’t disagree with you entirely.

It sounds to me like you don’t disagree with me at all. In my OP I was trying to remain nutreal. My opinion has always been that walking up hill burns more calories that walking down hill.

That always annoyed me. I would have said:

And when they were only halfway up
They were also halfway down