Will weed hurt my running performance?

Despite what you may have heard, it is a dangerous substance when used for recreation. (There is substantial evidence it helps with pain where the medicinal use outweighs side affects). But if it wins votes then it must be good, right?

DON'T DO IT, ESPECIALLY IF YOU INTEND TO SMOKE IT. Rise above peer pressure. As a runner your body is sacred if you intend to be a competitor not a slacker loser.

d2 runner, should i?!? wrote:

I'm on a d2 track and cross country team and my roomates and some of my friends are always smoking weed. They want me to try it and quite honestly i'm curious but what are the effects on distance runners? I'm not afraid that my drive to run will slow down but it will be detrimental to my body and performance in the long run?

You will be putting poison in your lungs, but we don't really use them much while racing do we.

If there is history of addiction in your family, my recommendation is to decline.

The truth is infrequent, moderate use has no impact. These days you don't have to smoke it, you can bake up some brownies.

But, if you've never been on a weed high, be aware you might not like it. Some people don't. I am one of those people. If you decide to try it, do very little.

Be aware that some personalities are captivated by the effects and then over time it becomes a part of their daily lives in an intrusive way. Nobody wants that to happen to you, including me.

It's okay to decline. Really. It's okay to give it a try. It's NOT okay for it to intrude on your goals/life.

That's the truth.

I was a d1 scrub in college, but a few of my teammates were NCAA qualifiers, all-Americans, etc. Several guys on the team used weed regularly; most didn't. The fast guys were among those who didn't. Just one data point, and correlation doesn't imply causation, but it's easy to surmise that if you're spending time smoking weed, you're probably also doing other things that slow you down and/or NOT doing things that will make you faster. It strongly suggests a lack of focus on running. Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but don't kid yourself into thinking it will have zero effect on your body.

Tell me how it will help your running. End of thread.

Lol so many party poopers in this thread.

Obviously, don't go smoking everyday but smoking once a week or so will not do ANYTHING. It's not a poison. It's not a cigarette. It's freaking pot.

My well-respected d3 coach caught me once and said this:

"I strongly believe that there is a level of destruction to everything we put into our body. In terms of recreational things, I'd list them like this (worst to best for you):

1) hard alcohol

2) beer

3) soda

4) pot"

Everything in moderation my friend.

Ca$hclay wrote:

Tell me how it will help your running. End of thread.

Where do you want me to start?

Google: pot and exercise.

Then READ

I've seen it take a kid from a 9:11 personal best to not break 10 the next year. He lost all motivation for life, gained weight and just kind of faded away.

Of course I've seen this when a kid starts having sex with his girlfriend too.

These might be the worst responses in the history of LetsRun, and that's saying something.

I'm 19. Male. College freshman running on my own, currently training for a half marathon. Been a regular smoker off and on for about a year and a half. Weed is not harmful to you. Much better pastime than alcohol, cigarettes, and the like. And no, it's not addictive. A small percentage of users gain "dependency"- this is merely psychological, but not many at all. Has some carcinogens (what doesn't?), but it is a fun and non-destructive habit.

Weed does not change you in ways you don't let it. People who get lazy or unmotivated from weed were those who previously were not very motivated anyways and probably never had anything going for them. No, it does not lessen your IQ. Yes, some idiots smoke all the time and allow it to make them sedentary on a regular basis, and they are therefore not very smart. But those who do that probably weren't very intelligent in the first place.

Here's what I do when I'm smoking regularly: I'll smoke in the evenings, after my running is done for the day. It's enjoyable, I like watching tv, hanging with friends etc., when I smoke. Alone or with others, it's still fun. You may feel a few effects left over the next morning- a bit scatterbrained, perhaps. That's all, if anything. It should not by any means keep you from living a productive life, although when you are high, you will probably not be able to be productive with schoolwork, exercise (this depends), or anything else.

As for the high itself, weed actually makes me more creative and exploratory in my own thoughts. I think and daydream about my future and various possibilities in different aspects of my life when I'm high. I'm a thinking person, so I enjoy the open mindedness that being high gives you. I can often think about my relationships and life differently if I sit back and contemplate things while high. A few times, I've made interesting observations about things in my life while high. Very rarely do you ever have any euphoric experiences or anything of the sort, but this is definitely possible when you are listening to music outside, are new to smoking, and are enjoying the nature around you. Listening to music is so much fun when you're high, too.

Like I said before, it's a fun, non-destructive habit. Definitely shouldn't be illegal, but that's a whole other talk.

If you start doing it and make other poor choices regularly, then you will lose your focus on running and obviously do worse. If you just do it once in a while but keep your focus on running otherwise, it will have no effect. This is from first hand experience of myself and my running buds who did it. I've won races days after doing it and I witnessed my buddy become a national champ 2 years after he was a hardcore pothead but kept at it recreationally afterwards. Sometimes a decision such as smoking weed goes hand in hand with an array of other downhill spiralling choices and that's when you have to wake up. But if you do it and you're generally smart with regards to important life aspects, then you'll be alright.

My friend tried it the night before a meet last season. He said he felt a little hang over in the morning but his muscles felt relaxed. He did his normal warm up but did it shorter than usual because his legs felt loose and his lungs were relaxed. His hang over wasn't as strong after his warm up. When his race started he went out in 73, then 2:26, then 3:25! He felt great until the last 200 but died out but still finished in 4:46! His first time under 5!!! He was happy but said it felt like there was still some smoke in his lungs and was coughing a lot when he finished. He thinks he could have gone under 4:40 without the smoking.

Macdaddy wrote:

Ca$hclay wrote:

Tell me how it will help your running. End of thread.

Where do you want me to start?

Google: pot and exercise.

Then READ

You could start with educating us as to how the use of weed would actually enhance performance as opposed to hinder it. Inhaling smoke into the lungs is somehow performance enhancing? I believe you have the laboring oar on this one sir. Other posters have conveyed both direct and indirect negative effects of using. OP asked if it would hurt his running. I ask how would it help? Your conclusions and suggesting we "read" don't count. Facts, data and evidence to support your conclusions do.

And for the record, unlike Mr. Clinton, I did inhale, quite frequently as a matter of fact. Never in season though. Agree that moderation (in just about everything) is key.

Not really as long as you don't smoke it. Stick to edibles

bigatowle wrote:

I'm 19. Male. College freshman running on my own, ....

Being 19 leads to some awesome, sweeping assumptions.

Bottom line for me is OP has doubts/questions, so there is probably more going on than just experimenting with a little weed. That's sufficient to decline trying it. OP should never apologize to others for that. Their choices are not yours.

Infrequent recreational use in a highly functional life is perfectly okay and lots of people do it just like that.

Again, if there's addiction history in your family, it is probably best to not try.

Pot wont affect your IQ, that's great kiddo you keep puffin away and makings your observations looking through a cloud of smoke and check back in 10 year's and we'll see how sharp you are.

Look for Jeff Spiccoli on YouTube, Fast Times at Ridgemont High hard to come back from that.

You are right about the smoke, there's no benefit there... I won't argue about that. However, I will say that marijuana smoke is NOTHING compared to cigarette smoke --- one leaves me laboring on a run the next day or two and they other doesn't.

Nevertheless, here is some of that evidence for overall effects from marijuana:

ANTI-INFLAMATORY:

“Certain chemicals within marijuana have anti-inflammatory effects,” says Gregory Gerdeman, an assistant professor of biology at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Florida, and contributing author to The Pot Book: A Complete Guide to Cannabis. “The most obvious potential benefit to an athlete is controlling inflammation and some of the aches and pains that relate to injury. If you lower inflammation, you will raise the pain threshold.”

RUNNER'S HIGH = HIGH'S HIGH? :

“When you have runner’s high, you have feelings very similar to those you would feel if you were smoking marijuana: sedation, analgesia, mild happiness, the loss of the sensation of time and a loss of worries,” says Arne Dietrich, Ph.D., a cognitive neuroscientist and professor of psychology at the American University of Beirut, who has been studying altered states of consciousness for 15 years.

According to Dietrich, runner’s high occurs during sustained, steady physical activity when the prefrontal cortex of the brain down regulates.

“Studies show there’s a performance enhancement when this happens,” he says. “The system in the brain that runs you or plays tennis or does anything else in this flow state is simple, but efficient. The system in the prefrontal cortex is complex, but that complexity also means that it’s slow. When that system is down regulated, it enhances the other system, which is built for speed and efficiency.”

STOMACH ISSUES:

Former professional runner Chris Barnicle is familiar with this tactic. He regularly ate marijuana-infused foods during non-running hours while a 5K/10K athlete at the University of Arkansas and University of New Mexico, and later when he was sponsored by Asics and New Balance.

He didn’t use edibles just for fun. As a freshman in college, he was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease, which caused drastic gastrointestinal distress, created intense abdominal pain, affected his ability to sleep, and wreaked havoc on his appetite. Rather than go on prescription medication, he began eating crackers laden with marijuana-infused peanut butter.

“The digestive issues immediately disappeared, and I felt like I was recovering a lot better internally,” he says. “The stress I had with school, relationships and running seemed to wither away a little bit, too

SOURCE:

http://www.runnersworld.com/newswire/is-marijuana-the-source-of-a-new-runners-high

Was the first thing that popped up... I'm sure I could find more. My main, over-arching point isn't that marijuana is some miracle drug. However, the majority of the posts have been extremely negative about the drug and I don't feel it's warranted.

bigatowle wrote:

Much better pastime than alcohol, cigarettes, and the like. And no, it's not addictive. A small percentage of users gain "dependency"- this is merely psychological, but not many at all. .

Wow, there's a high standard. Do you also say that you are much better than the worst performers in a race?

And, hey, it's just a mere psychological problem for some according to you. Well, the streets here in NYC are full of people with mere psychological problems sleeping in the foggy freeze.

d2 runner, should i?!? wrote:

I'm on a d2 track and cross country team and my roomates and some of my friends are always smoking weed. They want me to try it and quite honestly i'm curious but what are the effects on distance runners? I'm not afraid that my drive to run will slow down but it will be detrimental to my body and performance in the long run?

It's pretty simple, OP: smoke if you want to, don't smoke if you don't want to.

Do not base your decision on how it will affect your running. It will not affect your running at all. No need to factor that in. I was a decent runner in HS - 4:39 on the track and usually high 16s in XC. I never tried pot.

Fast forward 4 years: I was smoking regularly (1-2 times per day) and had not run since HS. After graduating college, I decided to pick running back up. I also decided to continue my steady smoking because, well, I liked it.

I ran 15:57 within a year and a 1:12 half 2 years later. Both times were run within an hour of getting high. Back then, my regular morning routine was to wake up, take a couple of hits and head out the door for my run/race.

When I met my wife, I quit smoking. She was never a nag about it, but I could tell that she wasn't impressed by how "cool" I was. However, I continued to run and I still run to this day (7 years later). Despite quitting, I remained a 15:xx/1:12 type guy. No noticeable improvement.

Anyways, I am not promoting that you get high everyday. I am saying this: If you want to try it, try it. You running will not be affected. Take it by someone who has real experience with this, not from people who are simply talking out of their butts.