A brief history
Humans have been running for around 2.6 million years. We evolved to run, it’s on our DNA. It is strongly suggested that we left our tree-swinging ancestors behind, because the adaptations helped us hunt and chase down prey, giving us a physical advantage when competing with the speedier carnivores on the open plains of Africa.
Some of our early adaptations, include long, spring like tendons, such as the Achilles tendon, which store energy and reduce the metabolic cost of running by half. As well as a longitudinal arch of the foot, longer legs and lower joint surfaces that act as shock absorbers. The evolution of broader shoulders, a narrower waist, and shorter forearms, all helped our upper bodies to counterbalance our lower bodies when running.
I could go on. My point is, it’s innate to us, we are built for it. Therefore if you physically are able to, it is a brilliant, natural and one of the oldest forms of human exercise.
Health & physical benefits
There are many, many health and physical benefits to running. Literally everything from improving your eye health, bowels, liver, blood vessels and glucose regulation. The list is almost endless.
However, I have chosen some of my favourite health and physical benefits, that help to keep me motivated to run on a regularly basis:
Protects your heart
Running helps to protect your heart in two main ways. Firstly it lowers your blood pressure and cholesterol levels by reduce low density lipoprotein (LDL) and increasing high density lipoprotein (HDL). Regulating your cholesterol levels helps prevent to high-blood pressure, which can lead to heart disease or a heart attack.
Secondly, it helps to build a stronger heart. Your heart is the most important muscle in your body and fortunately overtime, running strengthens the walls of the heart, which increases its overall efficiency. With a stronger heart, comes a lower resting heartbeat, which means you can consume more oxygen enabling you to pump a larger amount of blood per beat, which ultimately helps your heart to perform its job easier.
Helps to improve your overall immunity
In a year that has been devastated by the biggest pandemic in recent history, it is more important than ever to think about our immune defence.
David Nieman, an exercise scientist and marathon runner, has spent the past 40 years researching the correlation between exercise and immunity. He concluded that running regularly can improve the body’s surveillance against disease, lower inflammation, enhance gut microbiota composition, reduce risk of upper respiratory infections and influenza, and improve antibody response. Click here to read his article The compelling link between physical activity and the body’s defense system.
Keeps joints healthy, strengthen muscles & improves bone density
Firstly, you may be shocked to hear that running (being an impact sport) can actually be beneficial for your joints. An American study into the effects of arthritis in 675 active marathon runners, actually concluded that they had a lower prevalence of arthritis than the general U.S. population. Another study concluded that “The knees of novice runners achieved sustained improvement, for at least 6 months post-marathon, in the condition of their bone marrow and articular cartilage.”.
Running is also a good way to strengthen your muscles, particularly your lower body like the glutes, hamstrings, and quads. It also works core muscles like the obliques and rectus abdominis, as well helping to strengthen your back.
In regards to helping to improve bone density; well, bones respond to stress by reforming to better handle that stress. Which means for runners, the weight-bearing bones of the legs, pelvis and spine tend to be stronger than the same bones in inactive people.
One of the best forms of losing weight
If you’re looking to lose or maintain your weight, running is a brilliant way to do so. Maintain a six-mile per hour pace, and you’ll burn upwards of 557 calories an hour. Calorie burning doesn’t just stop after your run though, if you train strategically you’ll benefit from an “afterburn effect”, which means your body will continue to burn calories while it replenishes, repairs itself and removes lactic acid.
As a side note, personally, I often find running actually supresses my appetite. At least for the first hour or two after a run, anyway.
Reduces your risk of cancer
The Journal of the American Medical Association published a paper back in 2016, which concluded that out of a pool of 1.44 million American and European adults, high-fitness exercises (such as runners) had a lower risk of developing 26 types of cancers.
There is an added benefit, that if you are unfortunate enough to develop cancer that running can help minimise the side effects from treatments, as well as boosting your mood and helping to support you emotionally. It can also help to reduce mortality and the likelihood of you going on to develop any other forms of cancer in the future.
Gives you better skin
Let’s face it, if we like it or not, your skin is one of the first things a person notices. When you run you release endorphins, this helps to regulate and control your cortisol levels. High levels of cortisol can make your sebaceous glands produce more oil, which can cause acne. For me healthy-looking skin is definitely a big benefit reaped from my regular runs.
Psychological benefits
Again, the psychological benefits of running also help to keep me focused and motivated. Trust me, there are fewer greater feelings than having just come back from a 10 mile run. Here are some of my favourite psychological benefits:
Decreases stress & depression
The effects of running on stress levels and depression have been conclusive for many years and there are numerous studies to back this up. As mentioned above when you run your brain releases endorphins, a feel-good neurotransmitter that helps to relieve pain and stress. On top of this when you physically exert yourself it stimulates the release of dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin. All three of which help to regulate your mood.
Serotonin levels in your brain are directly linked to depression. By raising your serotonin levels you increase your overall sense of well-being, thus helping to stave off depression and depressive thoughts.
Running can also help keep your stress hormones in check, in particularly adrenaline, which is responsible for your “flight-or-fight” response. Adrenaline is certainly important, but too much of it can have an adverse effect on your health.
Helps you get a better nights sleep
Exercise in general is great for helping you to get a good nights sleep and running is no exception. An review in 2019 concluded that has a positive effect on your sleep, however it should be noted that some studies have found that exercising less than one hour before bed can actually a detrimental effect on your sleep.
An article in the American Journal of Lifestyle Exercise states that exercise-sleep relationship works both ways. The more you exercise, the more you need quality sleep. And, the worse your sleep habits, the less likely you are to exercise regularly. Consequently it is important to maintain a healthy sleep/exercise cycle and habit.
Boosts your self-esteem and confidence
Running is a brilliant way to boost your self-esteem and self-confidence. Not only does it help to keep you trim, have clearer skin and physically look better (which can all help your confidence and esteem), it also gives you a vice to fall-back on, something on which you can rely on to make you feel better, which can really help when dealing with every day life and difficult scenarios.
All though there hasn’t been any extensive research into this specific topic, it is evident from the thousands of runners who have come forward to say how running has helped them achieve their life goals or tackle challenging situations, be that starting a business, recovering from loss or disease, getting fit for their wedding, and so on.
Personally, running has helped me immensely with my overall self-esteem, so I can definitely vouch for its benefits.
Improves your cognitive function
When you run your heart beats faster, this means there is more oxygen-rich blood being pushed to your brain. One meta-analysis study has suggested that running improves your brain health by stimulating the release of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). This is a type of protein that helps to grow and protect neurons in your brain.
Another study concluded that running (and other high fitness exercises) help to improve your overall brain volume, including grey matter, a major component of your central nervous system. Even if you are in your middle-aged or approaching old age, it is not too late to start running and reap the benefits on your brain. This study concluded that running helps you to protect your brain against amyloid plaques linked to cognitive decline (and Alzheimers).
In conclusion
There are very few exercises that are as good for your overall physical and mental health as running. It is one of the oldest and most natural forms of human exercise and involves very limited specialist equipment, skill or cost. You can run virtually anywhere (that is well-lit and safe to do so).
So why not start running today? Your body will certainly thank you for it.