14 ms·

"runners were expending about two and a half times their resting metabolic rate each day, a notable decline from the early days of the event, when they were bur

"runners were expending about two and a half times their resting metabolic rate each day, a notable decline from the early days of the event, when they were burning at least three and a half times their resting rate" Not sure why they call the findings surprising. Body builders have known that since before Schwarzenegger. Body adapts and then you have to change the routine. For long distance runners HIIT or just short, intense workout would be the obvious answer to up the metabolism again.

mikekchar 7y ago
Yep. Runners usually do sprints to break through plateaus.
gameswithgo 7y ago
you can add training load in lots of ways. most evidence suggests a mix of mostly low intensity with some very high intensity is optimum no matter how much total running you do. but the first order thing is just to get as much load as you can handle.
- blensor 7y ago
  I am just the occasional runner, but have been thinking about adding weights to make them more intense, however, I am very hesitant for fear of doing long term damage to my joints?
  - rapsey 7y ago
    Why not just add sprinting?
  - zcid 7y ago
    I wouldn't recommend using weights for any kind of distance. If you want to up the intensity, it's generally considered safer to do 400m/800m sprints, hill sprints, sled/prowler, etc.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    Why do you want to get better? At some point, exercise has diminishing short and long term benefits and becomes actively harmful. This isn’t true for everyone, but I stopped running years ago because I could see it would have long term detrimental effects on me. I still exercise, but I think I have a good understanding of where I want to be and just to maintain at that level.
    - OldFatCactus 7y ago
      Source for this? Middle-aged runners look like they're in great shape. Evidence suggests long-distance running, if done correctly, has no adverse effects on the body. We've literally evolved for it
      - scarface74 7y ago
        Definitely not an anti-exercise site: https://www.active.com/health/articles/why-too-much-running-is-bad-for-your-health https://www.active.com/health/articles/why-too-much-running-... Not to mention shin splints, torn Achilles, etc. Of course there are diminishing returns if you are running for the purpose of living a longer, healthier life. As far what we “evolved for”. There is no evolutionary benefit of living past the age where you can pass on your genes and endure the next generation can do the same. There is no evolutionary pressure for a people to live pass that age. Evolution would never favor a trait that would allow a population to live be 100 instead of 60.
        nothrabannosir 7y ago
        > Evolution would never favor a trait that would allow a population to live be 100 instead of 60. It would. Grandparents care for grand children. In fact, they seem to have an uncanny ability to inculcate them with the desire for having more children, of their own. Hmmmm ;)
        scarface74 7y ago
        I am not saying “old people are useless”. I’m saying that there wouldn’t be evolutionary pressure to allow people to survive pass 60. It’s believed that we evolved to have stamina for long distance running to tire out our prey. The elders wouldn’t be the hunters.
  - loeg 7y ago
    It's unclear from your comment whether you mean weights while running or separate weight training. Adding weights while running tends to lead to injury and isn't a good idea. Adding more running, adding more intense running (sprinting, intervals, or fartleks), or adding non-running weight training (squats, deadlifts) can all improve your running and are good ideas.
  - nmdeadhead 7y ago
    As someone who runs a lot with a pack that typically weighs forty pounds, I highly recommend that you not do this. FWIW, I don't believe I'm damaging my joints by what I do, but I spent many years hiking with a pack and then many years running without a pack before I started running with a pack. It can, however, be done: https://github.com/ctm/Bataan-Memorial-Death-March https://github.com/ctm/Bataan-Memorial-Death-March
  - sn9 7y ago
    Your suspicions are correct; that would be a bad idea. What are your goals?
luckydata 7y ago
There's a trend of funding & publishing research that yields completely obvious results and when you point it out you always get downvoted to hell on HN, don't know why.
- wutbrodo 7y ago
  It's because occasionally "obvious" claims are wrong, and having research that confirms them gives us a firmer foundation of knowledge. The article mentions that this is one of the first studies to quantify energy expenditure in this way, which would mean it's bringing the "obvious" claims into the edifice of scientific knowledge. Non-novel research results are an important (and underrated/underincentivized) part of science. The article may be leaning too heavily on claims that the results are surprising, but that has little to do with the research.
  - Pulcinella 7y ago
    I do wish we could just buckle down and figure out diet and exercise related health knowledge. So many diet and exercise related studies just have too small sample sizes and are too narrow. This makes sense because it’s expensive and time consuming to track a lot of people’s diet and exercise routines to get rigorous results. I think, however, we should just bite the bullet and pay $10 billion (or however much) to precisely track several thousand people’s diet, exercise, sleep, etc and figure this out. Basically pay people as a full time job to eat and do what you tell them (ethically of course. They aren’t slaves. We just need better data than sample sizes of twenty people trying to track their own health with self reported diaries).
    - jvagner 7y ago
      Most of what we need to know, for most of the population, we already know. Even if the effort you suggested were to be done, the noise would continue to distract in exactly the same way. I've worked as a tech exec, and I've worked as a personal trainer, and I've competed... we have the knowledge. We know how people can be healthy, we know how people can live long lives, and we know how people can have bodies that are a benefit to their lifetimes, not a burden. I remember a study, it graphed a demographic of people across a scale from "healthy" to "unhealthy". What they found was that people were heavily represented on either end of the scale, but to a significant degree, not at all in between. So, the choice is... people's (barring economics, to some degree, I'll concede -- though, being poor in other countries isn't the health catastrophe that it can be in some first world countries).
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
Someone 7y ago
If this is something that bodybuilders have known for ages, I have to readjust my ideas about body building. This paper (https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/6/eaaw0341 https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/6/eaaw0341) is about a 140 day event were runners, on average, run a marathon a day. It also states ”The mechanisms underlying this metabolic compensation are unclear but likely include reduction in nonexercise activity and reduction of physiological activity in other organ systems. Changes in running cost could also contribute, but evidence for training-induced improvement in running efficiency is mixed and the effect, when present, is generally modest, ~3% savings in energy per kilometer” So, it doesn’t seem more efficient running explains the lower energy expenditure. Instead, it’s just that, as the days went on, they dropped dead in their bed earlier every day, and their bodies postponed doing long-term maintenance (my interpretation)
- sn9 7y ago
  Yeah reduction in NEAT is fairly common in prolonged caloric deficits. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermogenesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermogenesis https://www.strongerbyscience.com/metabolic-adaptation/ https://www.strongerbyscience.com/metabolic-adaptation/

mikekchar 7y ago

Yep. Runners usually do sprints to break through plateaus.

gameswithgo 7y ago

you can add training load in lots of ways. most evidence suggests a mix of mostly low intensity with some very high intensity is optimum no matter how much total running you do. but the first order thing is just to get as much load as you can handle.

blensor 7y ago
I am just the occasional runner, but have been thinking about adding weights to make them more intense, however, I am very hesitant for fear of doing long term damage to my joints?
- rapsey 7y ago
  Why not just add sprinting?
- zcid 7y ago
  I wouldn't recommend using weights for any kind of distance. If you want to up the intensity, it's generally considered safer to do 400m/800m sprints, hill sprints, sled/prowler, etc.
- scarface74 7y ago
  Why do you want to get better? At some point, exercise has diminishing short and long term benefits and becomes actively harmful. This isn’t true for everyone, but I stopped running years ago because I could see it would have long term detrimental effects on me. I still exercise, but I think I have a good understanding of where I want to be and just to maintain at that level.
  - OldFatCactus 7y ago
    Source for this? Middle-aged runners look like they're in great shape. Evidence suggests long-distance running, if done correctly, has no adverse effects on the body. We've literally evolved for it
    - scarface74 7y ago
      Definitely not an anti-exercise site: https://www.active.com/health/articles/why-too-much-running-is-bad-for-your-health https://www.active.com/health/articles/why-too-much-running-... Not to mention shin splints, torn Achilles, etc. Of course there are diminishing returns if you are running for the purpose of living a longer, healthier life. As far what we “evolved for”. There is no evolutionary benefit of living past the age where you can pass on your genes and endure the next generation can do the same. There is no evolutionary pressure for a people to live pass that age. Evolution would never favor a trait that would allow a population to live be 100 instead of 60.
      - nothrabannosir 7y ago
        > Evolution would never favor a trait that would allow a population to live be 100 instead of 60. It would. Grandparents care for grand children. In fact, they seem to have an uncanny ability to inculcate them with the desire for having more children, of their own. Hmmmm ;)
        scarface74 7y ago
        I am not saying “old people are useless”. I’m saying that there wouldn’t be evolutionary pressure to allow people to survive pass 60. It’s believed that we evolved to have stamina for long distance running to tire out our prey. The elders wouldn’t be the hunters.
- loeg 7y ago
  It's unclear from your comment whether you mean weights while running or separate weight training. Adding weights while running tends to lead to injury and isn't a good idea. Adding more running, adding more intense running (sprinting, intervals, or fartleks), or adding non-running weight training (squats, deadlifts) can all improve your running and are good ideas.
- nmdeadhead 7y ago
  As someone who runs a lot with a pack that typically weighs forty pounds, I highly recommend that you not do this. FWIW, I don't believe I'm damaging my joints by what I do, but I spent many years hiking with a pack and then many years running without a pack before I started running with a pack. It can, however, be done: https://github.com/ctm/Bataan-Memorial-Death-March https://github.com/ctm/Bataan-Memorial-Death-March
- sn9 7y ago
  Your suspicions are correct; that would be a bad idea. What are your goals?

luckydata 7y ago

There's a trend of funding & publishing research that yields completely obvious results and when you point it out you always get downvoted to hell on HN, don't know why.

wutbrodo 7y ago
It's because occasionally "obvious" claims are wrong, and having research that confirms them gives us a firmer foundation of knowledge. The article mentions that this is one of the first studies to quantify energy expenditure in this way, which would mean it's bringing the "obvious" claims into the edifice of scientific knowledge. Non-novel research results are an important (and underrated/underincentivized) part of science. The article may be leaning too heavily on claims that the results are surprising, but that has little to do with the research.
- Pulcinella 7y ago
  I do wish we could just buckle down and figure out diet and exercise related health knowledge. So many diet and exercise related studies just have too small sample sizes and are too narrow. This makes sense because it’s expensive and time consuming to track a lot of people’s diet and exercise routines to get rigorous results. I think, however, we should just bite the bullet and pay $10 billion (or however much) to precisely track several thousand people’s diet, exercise, sleep, etc and figure this out. Basically pay people as a full time job to eat and do what you tell them (ethically of course. They aren’t slaves. We just need better data than sample sizes of twenty people trying to track their own health with self reported diaries).
  - jvagner 7y ago
    Most of what we need to know, for most of the population, we already know. Even if the effort you suggested were to be done, the noise would continue to distract in exactly the same way. I've worked as a tech exec, and I've worked as a personal trainer, and I've competed... we have the knowledge. We know how people can be healthy, we know how people can live long lives, and we know how people can have bodies that are a benefit to their lifetimes, not a burden. I remember a study, it graphed a demographic of people across a scale from "healthy" to "unhealthy". What they found was that people were heavily represented on either end of the scale, but to a significant degree, not at all in between. So, the choice is... people's (barring economics, to some degree, I'll concede -- though, being poor in other countries isn't the health catastrophe that it can be in some first world countries).

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

Someone 7y ago

If this is something that bodybuilders have known for ages, I have to readjust my ideas about body building. This paper (https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/6/eaaw0341 https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/6/eaaw0341) is about a 140 day event were runners, on average, run a marathon a day. It also states ”The mechanisms underlying this metabolic compensation are unclear but likely include reduction in nonexercise activity and reduction of physiological activity in other organ systems. Changes in running cost could also contribute, but evidence for training-induced improvement in running efficiency is mixed and the effect, when present, is generally modest, ~3% savings in energy per kilometer” So, it doesn’t seem more efficient running explains the lower energy expenditure. Instead, it’s just that, as the days went on, they dropped dead in their bed earlier every day, and their bodies postponed doing long-term maintenance (my interpretation)

sn9 7y ago
Yeah reduction in NEAT is fairly common in prolonged caloric deficits. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermogenesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermogenesis https://www.strongerbyscience.com/metabolic-adaptation/ https://www.strongerbyscience.com/metabolic-adaptation/