Too many marathons can kill, warn doctors...

http://uk.lifestyle.yahoo.com/too-many-marathons-can-kill--warn-doctors-101925466.html

"Fitness fanatics should do “just one or a few” marathons or full-distance triathlons, say the cardiologists, because over-exerting the heart for years can lead to long-term damage.

There is now convincing evidence that repeatedly asking the heart to pump “massive” volumes of blood, for hours at a time, can lead to an array of problems, they say.

These include overstretching of the organ’s chambers, thickening of its walls and changes to electrical signalling. These could trigger potentially dangerous heart rhythm problems."

bugger, i've done 20 in total (11 this year) - guess i must be dead

Anything to excess is going to be bad for you. 

We all have to pop our clogs sometime. You may as well enjoy what you do whilst you can ? 

This is devastating news.  Someone should start a thread about it.

In my book doing lots of marathons is bloody stupid. But each to their own

This was the key bit for me:

"No amount light to moderate exercise is harmful, they note.
“A routine of moderate physical activity will add life to your years, as well as years to your life. “In contrast, running too fast, too far, and for too many years may speed one’s progress towards the ???nish line of life.”"

Wonder how they are defining intensity???

Just tried to get access to the full article but it costs £24!!!!! Off to the library I go!

You can find it here if anyone wants it...

Run for your life article

Another flawed use of data and statistics. The data was normalised to ignore factors such as obesity, smoking, drinking, and anything else you're commonly likely to die of.

http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again

i suppose anything can kill you if you are at the wrong place at the wrong time.

 Well I wouldn't trust any article that uses data as singular!!

TimR wrote (see)

Another flawed use of data and statistics. The data was normalised to ignore factors  

This subject came up a few months ago after a BBC story.  I think all runners know it does something to your heart, we all sit down in the evening with RHRs of 40 something while everyone else is pumping along at +60 or 70.  When you read all the research on this it will probably summarise as some running is extremely good for you, extreme running carries risk, it's not news.

Rafiki wrote (see)

 Well I wouldn't trust any article that uses data as singular!!

TimR wrote (see)

Another flawed use of data and statistics. The data was normalised to ignore factors  

 

That would depend on whether it was reffering to information or mass data and depending whether the operation was applied to the whole set of data or individual datums. I think using data as a singular noun is genearlly not seen as bad practice. Most people understand what you mean.

TimR wrote (see)

Another flawed use of data and statistics. The data was normalised to ignore factors such as obesity, smoking, drinking, and anything else you're commonly likely to die of.

http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again

 

Tim... that's an interesting blog link you've posted there, thanks.  I've no idea if the blogger is giving a balanced picture... but it seems to have merit.

I'd have summarised it slightly differently.

It seems that they have normalised the data to exclude smoking and drinking... but the critical thing is that they normalised it for blood pressure, cholsterol,and weight.

But can they do that? Because running influences those factors enormously.  To quote the blogger...  he says the reseachers have shown that... "If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don't have any health benefits."

The blogger offers further evidence that the authors of the report are ignoring data in other reports... and implies that they do have vested interests.

I don't know enough to know who's right. But I think I'm fairly convinced that this 'new' study quoted in the Telegraph today, is flawed.

Sleepy Bear wrote (see)

This was the key bit for me:

"No amount light to moderate exercise is harmful, they note.
“A routine of moderate physical activity will add life to your years, as well as years to your life. “In contrast, running too fast, too far, and for too many years may speed one’s progress towards the ???nish line of life.”"

Wonder how they are defining intensity???

 

Well it's a review so the different papers they reference use different definitions of intensity. But basically it's "light (eg, walking), moderate (eg, brisk walking), medium-vigorous (eg, jogging), or high-vigorous (eg, running)".

So what's the difference between a jogger and a runner?

Some papers do pin it down to a pace;

"those running typically over 8???miles an hour, appeared to get no mortality benefit compared with the non-runners, whereas those who fared best usually ran about 6–7???miles per hour—a comfortable jog for most people"

Distance;

"those who ran over 20 or 25???miles per week seemed to lose their survival advantage over the non-runners"

frequency;

"the individuals who ran 6 or 7???days per week appeared to lose the mortality benefits, whereas the survival advantages accrued best for those who ran 2–5???days per week"

Duration;

"those who did best were the people who jogged at a slow to average pace, for one to 2.5???h per week total, accumulated during two or three sessions"

So no breaking into a run, and no extreme training programs people, let's be safe

LOL - I was hoping for a 70-75% MHR cut off for light - 80-85% for moderate ???

Mo, Paula et al are pretty much doomed based on distance amd frequency! Aim high folks - school sports day anyone LOLOLOLOL

Not that I'll be changing anything I do - since as usual there'll be the opposite advice next week...

One study doesn't make a consensus. Let's wait a few years and see.

But please, no-one forward this article to my wife!

Look's like your standard get a jorno to make a story out of one part of the report to me and ignore the rest of the information. See how the Leverson report is being commented on for details.  

I'm not worried and I'm not going to stop doing marathons given the example they gave was of someone who ran a marathon every single day and then there heart collapsed.

RIP Claire Squires.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfYxx7vTQY0

--

From what I can gather Claire already knew she had problems and possibly ran against the advice of doctors.

We're all warned that we should get the advice of a doctor before starting exercise, especially if we're middle aged and starting up again. As the Nurse says and everyone on this forum should know; start slowly and build up.

A quick google for people who have died while actually running marathons brings up the, not suprisingly, point that it's mainly overweight men in the 40-60 age group running for charity that keel over. Golf is another activity that lots of people die doing, as well as Whist Drives and Bingo but that will be due to the age of the participants.

What the study is saying is that the heart is a muscle and builds the same way as any muscle, by forcing it to work above its normal rate and make it build itself stronger. For a small percentage of people this is taken to extremes and after many years it is fatal.

The thing to take away from this is get an anual ultra sound and EKG if you regularly run marathons at a hard effort. Maybe like boxing and drug testing, it will become the norm for elites to have it done.

i hate running anyway

especially marathons -