Roundups

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

A couple interesting posts on topics we’ve discussed before. One on a new study that found a surprising result and another to quantify what we’ve known.

Beet juice

We’ve already covered beet juice and its apparent ability to help untrained athletes. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to help trained athletes (or, in the case of the second link, only untrained athletes were studied).

It looked like beet juice truly didn’t help trained athletes and there was an explanation for why that might be the case.

But what if it does? Well, maybe it does:

The performance test was a standard intermittent running test called the Yo-Yo IR1—basically a beep test involving a series of 20-meter sprints at progressively faster paces. The average distance covered in the test was 3.4 percent greater with beet juice than with placebo. Despite covering more distance, the subjects’ average heart rate was also lower (172 vs. 175 beats per minute) when they’d had the beet shots.

These were not elite athletes but amateur competitive soccer players, suggesting similar fitness levels to amateur competitive runners (most of us). Considering this, I’d consider this result promising.

That said, I’d urge at least a little caution. This is just one study. It’s a hopeful sign but hardly definitive evidence that you and I should go out and buy gallons of beet juice. Try it if you’d like, this offers at least some reason to do so, but don’t count on it working yet.

How much does running extend your life?

We all know running is good for us, right? We all know it extends our lives, right? I hope so.

But one of the arguments I’ve heard from people who don’t run is that, if you spend time doing something you don’t like to extend your life, is that really a good thing? Say you spend a year’s worth of time running over the course of your life. If that only extends your life by 1 year (or less) and you didn’t like running, was that time really worth it?

Well, what if that one year spent running extended your life by 7 years? Would that change your decision?

Of course, if you’re reading this, you probably run for reasons that go far beyond longevity and you’re probably not counting the seconds you run, worrying that they are being wasted. That said, it’s nice to know you’re getting more out than you’re putting in, likely in many more ways than one.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

Sleep matters

How important is sleep? Really important.

In this study, cyclists were either allowed normal sleep (about 7.5 hours) or kept sleep deprived (about 4 hours) after a workout.

The result? Sleep deprived cyclists were sleepier (shocker!) and less motivated to train. In addition, their blood pressure had not recovered as much as those who were allowed normal sleep, suggesting less complete recovery from the workout.

These results shouldn’t be shocking but they are a good reminder.

Building muscle

I’ve been going back into the archives a bit recently and this one popped out at me. What does it take to build muscle?

In short, all those things we have usually thought of from weight to number of reps doesn’t matter as much as one thing: lifting to failure or near failure.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

There are no non-responders

We’ve all seen those people. Maybe some of us are those people. It seems like they work so hard and they just don’t respond to the training. They just don’t get more fit. It’s so frustrating to see that person who works hard and doesn’t get results. What do you tell that person?

Well, maybe it’s not the answer we want but it looks like the answer may be step up your training.

In the interesting study Alex Hutchinson writes about, there were non-responders in those who performed 1, 2, or 3 training sessions a week of 60 minutes each. In the 4 and 5 workouts a week group, not a single non-responder.

Even more interesting, when the non-responders returned to increase their training by 2 sessions a week, every one of them increased their fitness enough to fall out of the “non-responder” range.

In other words, they were all responders. They just needed more training time.

How to cool in hot weather races

It may seem strange to be thinking about hot weather racing in February but maybe less so with the weather we’ve had this past week.

Anyway, warm weather racing isn’t that far away. So what’s the best/most beneficial way to cool?

According to this study, performance improvements came from in event cooling via facial water spray and menthol mouth rinse. Pre-cooling via cold water immersion and ice slurry ingestion didn’t help.

Other studies have suggested the pre-race cooling might help but this seems to cast some doubt on that. The good news is mid-race cooling did seem to help. While we may not have menthol mouth rinse available at our races this summer, we can do other things to help cool us down and hold out some hope that those other interventions, performed while we’re running, will help.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

I’m feeling a little under the weather and low on energy this week so, instead of a regular weekly post, I’m going back into my archives to find some research that I never got to post in a monthly recap post. There are some good ones out there, here are a couple that jumped out at me.

Motivation and injury

You’re heading into a race. You have a goal that you set for yourself and you’re highly motivated to get that goal. Does this make you more or less likely to get injured on race day? Before reading this study, I could have guessed you might be more susceptible. If you’re motivated to get your goal, you might push through some things you wouldn’t with less motivation.

Well, it turns out I would have been wrong. Self motivated runners appear to be less likely to get injured.

In competition fueling strategies

There are so many options for in competition fueling these days. It used to be sports drinks and that was it. Now, you can get gels, energy bars, and other forms. What’s the best way to get your fuel?

This study tried to look at some options, including sports drinks, gels, bars, and a mix.

The result? Bars seemed to be the least effective in terms of performance and also seemed to be the most likely to cause gut discomfort. Other fueling options showed slight differences but not enough to be certain one was better than the other.

As usual, though, we’re all individuals. My suggestion: try your options in training and figure out what works for you individually. Personally, I prefer to try what the goal race will be offering as you then don’t have to carry things with you and it’s one more logistical issue on race day you can let someone else take care of.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

LCHF charts

I’ve written about low carb, high fat (LCHF) diets previously (see here and here for examples of what I’ve written before, there may be more). However, people still question me about this. Can’t you teach your body to burn enough fat to never have to worry about running out of fuel.

As I stated previously, the evidence suggests the answer to that is no for most runners.

Well, here’s more evidence. This study looked at elite race walkers and followed what happened with them after 3 weeks of three different diets (high carb, “periodized” carb, and low carb high fat). The three charts at that link summed up the result pretty well.

1) The LCHF group burned a lot more fat after completing the LCHF period.

2) The LCHF group burned more oxygen to complete a 50K race (they were less efficient).

3) The LCHF group was the only group to not improve their 10K performances over the course of the study.

In short, the LCHF group could burn more fat but, due apparently to losses in efficiency, they didn’t get faster while both other groups did.

Stress fracture warning signs

To me, stress fractures are possibly the most scary running injury. Why wouldn’t a broken bone be?

What if we had a list of warning signs to tell us when the risk of stress fractures is higher? Well, we do. This is a list of warning signs for female runners and some are gender specific but I suspect those that are not gender specific would be helpful for everyone.