Tag: running

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Running to prevent glaucoma, cataracts and macular degeneration

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My new Sweat Science columns are being published at www.outsideonline.com/sweatscience. Also check out my new book, THE EXPLORER'S GENE: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavors, and the Blank Spots on the Map, published in March 2025.

- Alex Hutchinson (@sweatscience)

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For the last 18 years, Paul Williams of Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory has been following 55,000 runners as part of the the National Runners’ Health Study, which has incredible statistical power thanks to its size and duration. These days, Williams churns out new studies like clockwork, showing the association of running with various health risks and body parts. Most recently, it’s the eyes: in three separate studies (one in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, two in  Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science), Williams shows that running reduces the risk of glaucoma, cataracts and macular degeneration. The mechanism isn’t entirely clear (epidemiological studies like this shows correlations, not causes), but Williams speculates that aerobic exercise may reduce “intraocular pressure,” the fluid pressure behind the eye.

What Williams really emphasizes in his recent studies is the “dose-response” relationship between running and health: the farther and faster you run, the greater the benefits. In this case, for instance, every additional kilometre in your average daily run lowers your glaucoma risk by five percent. Also, the faster your best 10K time, the lower your risk — in fact, there were no reported cases of glaucoma for runners who could run 10K faster than 33:20! This is quite different from the usual government health recommendations that advocate a fairly minimal amount of moderate exercise each week, and make it sound like there’s no particular benefit in doing more.

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Size matters in running and swimming: some data

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My new Sweat Science columns are being published at www.outsideonline.com/sweatscience. Also check out my new book, THE EXPLORER'S GENE: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavors, and the Blank Spots on the Map, published in March 2025.

- Alex Hutchinson (@sweatscience)

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It’s not just Usain Bolt — elite athletes have been getting bigger for the past century at a faster rate than the general population, according to researchers from Duke University in North Carolina. Yeah, I think we already knew that. But…

Futhermore, the researchers said, this pattern of growth can be predicted by the constructal theory, a Duke-inspired theory of design in nature that explains such diverse phenomena as river basin formation and the capillary structure of tree branches and roots. (www.constructal.org).

Apparently, the size of athletes illustrates some deep underlying truths about patterns in nature, as described in this Journal of Experimental Biology paper. Maybe, maybe not — it didn’t make a lot of sense to me. What I did find interesting was the data set they dug up for 100-metre world-record setters in swimming and running:

Specifically, while the average human has gained about 1.9 inches in height since 1900, Charles’ research showed that the fastest swimmers have grown 4.5 inches and the swiftest runners have grown 6.4 inches.

There’s been a lot of talk about how Usain Bolt’s otherworldly sprint times might be explained by the fact that he’s one of the first very tall men (6’5″, according to the JEP paper) to master sprinting. The second-tallest world-record holder is, not coincidentally, the second-fastest man, Asafa Powell, at 6’3″. This paper makes some interesting arguments about why this should be so, based on the scaling of horizontal and vertical forces in locomotion. It’s obvious to everyone why basketball players are almost all enormously tall — but the same forces appear to be in play, though less obviously, for runners and swimmers.

The authors also suggest that we may need to introduce size classifications, as in boxing and wrestling, to other sports. It’s an interesting idea — but I’m not sure that the genetic advantage of height is really any different from the genetic advantage of having a huge oxygen capacity or lots of fast-twitch muscle fibres.

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A four-day, 894-kilometre science experiment

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My new Sweat Science columns are being published at www.outsideonline.com/sweatscience. Also check out my new book, THE EXPLORER'S GENE: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavors, and the Blank Spots on the Map, published in March 2025.

- Alex Hutchinson (@sweatscience)

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Check out this Canadian Geographic article on a neat effort to learn more about the science of multi-day endurance running. It’s about a race called Blaze: Niagara Escarpment Race, a four-day, 894-kilometre relay from Tobermory to Queenston Heights. What’s unique is that the participants were extensively tested before and after the race — and even stopped to give frequent urine samples DURING the race!

For the past two months, the 20 elite endurance runners (10 members per co-ed team) participating have kept meticulous records of their training routines and diets. Elaborate pre- and post-race assessments of such data as heart rate, aerobic capacity, carbon dioxide production and muscle damage promise to reveal a host of escarpment-centric revelations, from the carbon footprint left by the runners and the number of heart beats and litres of blood pumped during the run to the caloric cost and the determinants of success, including age, nutrition and training.

The results of the study will eventually be posted at AdventureScience.ca and submitted to peer-reviewed journals. Should make for some interesting reading!

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Commuting calories: walk, run or bike?

THANK YOU FOR VISITING SWEATSCIENCE.COM!

My new Sweat Science columns are being published at www.outsideonline.com/sweatscience. Also check out my new book, THE EXPLORER'S GENE: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavors, and the Blank Spots on the Map, published in March 2025.

- Alex Hutchinson (@sweatscience)

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New Jockology column now posted here:

THE QUESTION

Will I get a better workout by walking, running or biking my 5K commute to work?

THE ANSWER

Most commuters strive to be as efficient as possible. To get the best workout (specifically, to burn the most calories), you’re better off being inefficient. [continue reading]

A couple of interesting points have already been raised in the comments section, including one about what “net” calories refers to. In brief:

“Net” is referring to the total calories burned while moving a kilometer MINUS the number of calories you would have burned during that time just by being alive (your “basal metabolic rate”). Otherwise walking gets credited with burning a bunch of extra calories just because it takes longer.

As a rough approximation, running burns about 50% more GROSS calories per kilometre than walking, but twice as many NET calories.

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Walking breaks for marathoners

THANK YOU FOR VISITING SWEATSCIENCE.COM!

My new Sweat Science columns are being published at www.outsideonline.com/sweatscience. Also check out my new book, THE EXPLORER'S GENE: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavors, and the Blank Spots on the Map, published in March 2025.

- Alex Hutchinson (@sweatscience)

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I notice that a recent article about walking breaks during marathon running by New York Times reporter Tara Parker-Pope has been lingering at the top of the “Most Popular” list for several days now. She is preparing for the New York Marathon in November, her first marathon, following the teachings of 1972 Olympic marathoner Jeff Galloway. The principle is simple — stop and walk for a minute after running anywhere from one to 10 minutes — and it has been very effective in helping people to begin and stick with running programs.

That being said, I do feel the need to bring up one longstanding criticism of Galloway’s approach: he oversells it. Continue reading “Walking breaks for marathoners”