There's good news for those who adhere to the "slow and steady wins the race" adage: A light jog a few times a week may help you live longer, a new study from Denmark suggests. In contrast, running too hard may have drawbacks, the study found.
Researchers analyzed information from about 1,000 healthy joggers ages
20 to 86, and about 400 people who were healthy, but did not jog, and
were mostly sedentary.
The analysis showed that light joggers were about 78 percent less
likely to die over the 12-year study than those who were sedentary.
"Light joggers" were defined as those who ran at a speed of about 5 mph
(8 km/h) a few times a week, for less than 2.5 hours per week total. [7 Common Exercise Errors and How to Fix Them]
In contrast, those who jogged strenuously were just as likely to die
during the study period as those who were sedentary, according to the
research published today (Feb. 2) in the Journal of the American College
of Cardiology. Strenuous joggers were defined as those who ran at a
speed of more than 7 mph (11 km/h), for more than four hours per week.
The finding "suggests there may be an upper limit for exercise dosing
that is optimal for health benefits," study co-author Dr. Peter Schnohr,
of the Copenhagen City Heart Study and Frederiksberg Hospital in
Denmark, said in a statement. "If your goal is to decrease risk of death
and improve life expectancy, jogging a few times a week at a moderate
pace is a good strategy. Anything more is not just unnecessary, it may
be harmful."
Dr. Karol Watson, co-director of preventive cardiology at the
University of California, Los Angeles, agreed, and said that many
previous studies have produced similar findings: A moderate amount of
jogging is linked with the best outcomes in terms of a longer life span,
but when people run too far for too long, the health benefits start to
drop off.
"[Humans] weren't meant to do mountain biking or marathon running every
day ... and you don't have to" to live longer, said Watson, who was not
involved in the study.
Being a marathon runner is still likely going to be good for heart
health overall, but those runners should be aware that there is a slight
increase in mortality over a given period for extreme runners compared
to moderate runners, Watson said.
Other experts stress that more research is needed to determine whether
there really is an upper limit on how much exercise is good for you.
"The goal is not to unnecessarily frighten people who wish to
participate in more-strenuous exercise," Duck-chul Lee, of Iowa State
University's Department of Kinesiology, and colleagues, wrote in an
editorial accompanying the study in the journal. Although most research
suggests that, beyond a certain point, more physical activity is not
necessarily better, "we still need more data to truly determine 'is more
actually worse?'" they said.
The authors of the editorial also noted that in the new study, the
"strenuous" jogging group included only 40 people, while the other
groups included hundreds. If the study had included more people who
jogged strenuously, the researchers may have found a link between
strenuous jogging and a decreased risk of dying during the study, the
editorial authors said. Also, the study relied on participants' own
reports of how much they run, which may not have been entirely accurate.
The study's authors offered a possible explanation for the negative
effects linked to strenuous exercise in the results. It could be that
long-term, strenuous endurance exercise has harmful effects on the heart,
the researchers said. Some studies of marathon runners have found that
these athletes have a higher rate of heart scarring than people who
don't run marathons.
The study also adds to a growing body of evidence that has shown that even small amounts of exercise can have health benefits. In the study, people who jogged less than one hour a week were less likely to die than those who didn't jog at all.
The best outcomes in the study were associated with running between 1
and 2.4 hours per week, with no more than three days of running per
week, at an average or slow pace. "Many adults will perceive this to be a
goal that is practical, achievable and sustainable," the researchers
said.
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