i think running is actually bad for one's heart

Most of that 'solid research' claiming 'excessive' running can be harmful has been debunked. The latest study I saw found that exercising even vigerously for four times the often 'recommended amount' increased life expectancy.

edition.cnn.com

Exercise more than the recommended amounts for the longest life, study says | CNN

Madeline Holcombe

The World Health Organization has said how often adults should exercise, but now researchers are building onto those recommendations by analyzing how the time span and intensity impacts life span. For your longest life, you m...

Link:edition.cnn.com/2022/07/26/health/exer...

If the OP is into anecdotal evidence, consider that nearly every post war Olympic 5000m finalist is either still alive or lived beyond the average life expectancy (save for a couple of Soviet athletes).

you are confusing the anecdotal random bs that takes the odd person out with where the mass clump is. do you really think doing sports messes with your heart more than Joe Couchpotato?

i do think that more so than, say, standing around trying to hit a baseball, if your sport is go send your heart rate up to 150 and you have something genetic, it might get exposed. ditto if you, like fixx, combined a predisposition for family cardiac issues with years of smoking and eating wrong, before you "found running jesus" age 35. the man's arteries were clogged. not like he died of some arrhythmia that can be linked to large hearts from exercise or something.

the ones who IMO really have a problem are football players. you regularly hear about professional level players dying of stuff in their 40s and 50s, and not just the CTE people.

This includes a fair amount of studies about different sports. Social sports seem to promote longevity best but then also some sports can be done at high ages easier. Tennis and badminton are up high, so is golf.

cyclingapps.net

Which Sport Helps You Live Longest? (A League Table of Sports) - CyclingApps.net (Fastfitness Group)

facebook.com/fastfitnesstipsonline

There is no doubt exercise is good for you. A meta-analysis (📎citation) of over one million people found a 24% reduction in all-cause mortality between the least and most intensive ...

Link:www.cyclingapps.net/blog/which-sport-h...

But I decided to check out the 1968 Olympic results for track and see what that shows.

In the 100m men, the medalists died at roughly 77 (US), 58 (Jamaican), and 76 (US). 4th place, from Cuba, Pablo Montes Casanova died at 62.

In the 5000m, Gammoudi is 85. Kip Keino is 83. Temu died at 57. Martinez died at 74. Ron Clarke at 78. Wohib Masresha is 78. Sviridov was 84. (Most of the 5000m field is the same as the 10k field).

In the 10000m, Naftali Temu, gold medalist from Kenya, died at 57. Mamo Wolde of Ethiopia died at 69. Gamoudi of Tunisia is 85. It's notable that life expectancy in Kenya and Ethiopia at birth was probably in the 40s when they were born and from age 5 was probably in the 50s. Mexico's Martinez was 74 when he died. Nikolai Sviridov of the USSR was 84 when he died this year. Ron Clarke of Australia died at 78. Ron Hill of the UK died at 83. Tracy Smith of the United States is 78 now.

I know it’s purely anecdotal…but I’ve yet to see ANY interview with a centenarian, or person from a blue zone where they cite PB’s, race placings, interval session records and progress, or pounds lifted in the gym as the main reason for their longevity.

Usually the reasons given are low stress levels ( exercise is a stressor…the higher the intensity, the more stressful to the body it is), reasonable ACTIVITY levels…not exercise per se, a sensible diet, with usually a few “treats” added, and good social and family connections.

Why would we think that high intensity exercise was “healthy”. Our ancestors were all about energy conservation, despite moving a lot, they would not have ran, unless they had to, and they, not ruled by a stop watch would have gone as slow as they needed to. Being chased, or chasing at high speed would have been a stressful activity rarely done and to be avoided if possible.

Look at the videos of elderly Chinese people exercising outdoors in the park. It’s social. They all have a smile on their faces. They rarely look as though they are pushing the envelope, but they are capable of feats that many in the West would be nowhere near.

Something tells me that our attitude and approach to exercise and activity in the Western world is a bit skewed.

From 30000 feet I have always wondered if, based on everything nowadays being about "inflammation", whether lifting and running could have some bad effects. In theory, you are trying to stress the body and then super compensate day in day out. Isnt that like having chronic inflammation year 'round? Its interesting. But maybe the positive effects just outweigh that?

Compared with participants reporting no leisure-time PA, those who engaged in guideline-recommended minimum levels of PA (500 MET-min/wk; 2008 US federal guidelines) had modest reductions in HF risk (pooled hazard ratio, 0.90; 95% confidence interval, 0.87-0.92). In contrast, a substantial risk reduction was observed among individuals who engaged in PA at twice (hazard ratio for 1000 MET-min/wk, 0.81; 95% confidence interval, 0.77-0.86) and 4 times (hazard ratio for 2000 MET-min/wk, 0.65; 95% confidence interval, 0.58-0.73) the minimum guideline-recommended levels.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Dose-Response Relationship Between Physical Activity and Risk of Heart Failure: A Meta-Analysis - PubMed

There is an inverse dose-response relationship between PA and HF risk. Doses of PA in excess of the guideline-recommended minimum PA levels may be required for more substantial reductions in HF risk.

Link:pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26438781/

In other words, we should do 2-4 times more than the recommended level of cardio exercise.

Thanks, this is an interesting article.

FWIW, I happen to think over-exercising is pitifully foolish. Cardio in any form greater than ~3 hours/week has little health value, or at least scientists haven’t succeeded in showing that value. Over the long term, it can cause damage. The heart is a muscle after all, one extremely well engineered by nature, but it can fail because of overexertion, as can other bodily tissues. LR folks don’t like to hear that of course and give in to the tired old false-choice fallacy of claiming that running a heck of a lot is better than being a couch potato. Those are not the only two options!

I have never come across systematic research indicating that elite athletes live longer or age with better quality of life than normal people on average. It’s not clear that they fare worse either. But even if it’s not worse and about the same, it begs the question for hobbyjoggers as to why you would put your body through that for little to no gain. Elites have a good reason: livelihood; plus most only do it for a decade or two and then retire.

blue zone comparison is goofy. if we're asking whether running is healthy or not, isn't the comparison average and not "first place?" or are we so stuck on winning that it annoys some to have a health cardiopulmonary system and live longer than most but finish 30th behind folks who live on okinawa, take it easy all the time, eat perfect diets, etc. out of 8 billion. so to speak.

to be fair, i think contact sports beat you up and can make it hard to stay "normal fit" later on. i just deal with a certain amount of knee and ankle pain to work out pretty much daily. i often feel like people who didn't play those sports and get into activity late have less wear and tear.

i also wonder if there is some degree of metabolic/ epigenetic/ other stress resulting from competitive sports. but it also makes you significantly fitter than the average person. you just won't live forever and beat out some 112 year old okinawan. are we that obsessed? sometimes you have to pick a lane. i would assume runners last longer than most. compared to football players dying of heart attacks aged 42 or of CTE-induced suicide, far better choice.

2 or 3 runners died running. Thousands of non-runners die every year while not running. Yet, you think safety is with the non-runners?

Okay.

To put that into units we can easily understand, one MET-minute is walking for one minute at about 1 mph, so typical brisk walking at 3.5 mph for one minute is 3.5 MET-mins.

2000 MET-min/ week is jogging at 10’ pace (roughly 10 METs) for 200 mins or a bit over 3 hours. I’d say it’s much healthier to combine up to 3 hours/week of cardio with some weight training as they have complementary benefits. And of course the running part itself is better when done as a combination of mostly aerobic and some threshold and anaerobic components (as everyone here at LR already knows).

How popular was road racing when centenarians were youths, young adults, or even in early middle age? And were you expecting a large cohort from that generation to pick it up in their 50s or 60s?

Even more people died sitting in chairs.

Sitting on a chair all the time is not the only other alternative. Case in point: blue zones.

If you fear death by running then your other hobbies are to boring.

Try bull riding, race car driving or mountain climbing, after you will understand that running is safe

Why? People in blue zones live perfectly normal lives that most of us — except the very poor stuck in urban jungles— can live if we choose to. They are just doing “good old things”. It doesn’t require eating “perfect diets”, just whole foods and plenty of fruits and vegetables, socializing with friends, having a sense of community, doing modest exercise like walking, yard work etc.

I have my skepticism on how much of their lifestyle and which parts contribute to their longevity, but they are absolutely the benchmark to compare against. They are living long and satisfying lives while doing nothing special.

Scientifically speaking, the null hypothesis would be that intense exercise for the sake of exercise (as opposed to normal daily activities) is not necessary for great health.

Last year I was overtraining (at a hobbyjogger level) and was doing 2-3 workouts a week as well as 2 hour long runs. At the end of some races my chest was hurting a fair bit. I only ran 18:05 5k but was able to push myself for a 36:40 10k and 1:21 half. At the end of the half I was clutching my chest for a minute or two. I was overdoing it like an idiot and now I'm thankful that I eventually got injured.

take the jab and pay the price!

Didn't cost a thing

Maybe the owners censor disinformation that is actually harmful to others.

Some is trying to ambush your thread.