• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Home
  • About Us
  • STEPS Virtual
  • FAQ
  • Links
  • Contact Us
  • Facebook
  • Google+
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
  • 615.269.8844

STEPS Fitness

Nashville's Premier Personal Fitness Training Center

  • STEPS Virtual
  • Programs
    • STEPS Fitness Presents Events
    • DR. Irv’s Perfect Exercise Minute
    • Training Packages
    • Group Offerings
    • Corporate Wellness
    • Traveler’s Special
  • Personal Trainers
    • Dr. Irv Rubenstein
  • Testimonials
  • Fitness Blog
    • Dr Irv’s Fitness Blog
    • Exercise of the Month
  • Newsletters
    • Fit Happens
    • Real News Newsletter
  • Search

October 18, 2017 By Irv Rubenstein

King of Hearts: The One Bet That’s Well Worth It

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Last summer I went to the American College of Sports Medicine (www.acsm.org) Annual Meeting in Denver where I sat in on a lecture about the dangers of overexercise. The doctor who presented it was from a Midwestern City University where he’d seen many patients come in with cardiac troubles from shoveling snow.

His basic thesis was that sudden overexercise is more dangerous than chronic overexercise…but, due to the ubiquity of the former, the latter gets more press.

No death is a good one but, for those who train and compete vigorously in aerobic sports like jogging, running, cycling, cross country skiing, etc., the one death that hurts the most is the one that keeps them from doing their sport of choice. For some, as a good friend attested to even before he got diagnosed with a cardiac condition, which has not stopped him from completing several half and full marathons, and triathlons while living at 9000 ft in Colorado. They’d rather “bust than rust”.

Thus, when I get to re-read an article in the lay press that, of course, tries to catch eyeballs, I get defensively testy. This one in the Washington Post strikes fear into aerobic athletes and those who are considering becoming so with a dooming headline only to complete the tale with encouraging news.

It is true that ones genetic predisposition and pre-healthy lifestyle impacts ones heart health such that no amount of cardio conditioning and/or perfect diet can totally reverse ones heart disease risk. That said, no matter how healthy one lives ones life, you’re still going to die…of something. It may be now, it may be way later, but even elite athletes’ hearts will give out on them someday.

So, while the title to the article – “If you exercise a lot, you probably think your heart is in good shape. Maybe not” – conveys a warning sufficient to justify not exercising a lot. The rest of the article supports the one factoid we do know: even with a bad heart, the ability to exercise, especially vigorously, makes the heart stronger.

Going back to the lecture at the ACSM meeting. The doc pointed out, as did the article in the Washington Post, that cardio athletes who incur a cardiac event are both rare and more resistant to persistent reductions in quality as well as quantity of life.

King of Hearts: The One Bet That's Well Worth It1

Those who suffer a heart attack shoveling snow – which is a particularly dangerous activity for a variety of reasons not the least of which is that it entails a powerful isometric component – tend to be less fit and less trained in that type of activity, unless digging is their job. So not only is it a relatively rare event, it is also one that requires going from a seated position, post-meal, to an active movement just a few times or more a season.

Imagine a healthy person jumping up from breakfast and running a half marathon without prior training. Now imagine how many injuries and cardiac events will happen under those circumstances. Salt intake can also cause high blood pressure , in turn causing cardiac events.  Read more here, and here

Runners, even marathoners, train regularly for their events. They may have less than healthy hearts but ones that are sufficiently strong enough to even support their entry into the event due to prior training. So that when the race starts, they are in fact fit and ready, generally warmed up and near steady state, aerobically-speaking, and had trained close to if not up to the length of the race itself priorly.

When such an athlete has a cardiac event, as the WaPo article and ACSM lecturer noted, it has generally been the case that they’d had some adverse symptoms they failed or chose to respect, and had not seen a doctor. Denial? Sure, but what athlete hasn’t?

Bottom line, though, is that these are so few – out of 10.9 million runners of half and whole marathons over an 11 year period. There were only 42 cardiac deaths among a paltry 59 cases of cardiac events. That means the odds of a heart attack while running are 0.00000541, or 1 out of 185,000. This is slightly less than pulling 4 of a kind in poker: 1 out of 4,165.

If I were a betting man, I’d put my money on the King of Hearts – running or any other aerobic conditioning activity – well before I put my money on drawing four of them at a Vegas poker table.

Related Posts:

  • Feet: From the Ground Up
    Feet: From the Ground Up
  • REAL News - February 2023
    REAL News - February 2023
  • There is No Such Thing as "Normal"
    There is No Such Thing as "Normal"
  • Exercise and Depression: A 2-Way Street
    Exercise and Depression: A 2-Way Street
  • REAL News - June 2021
    REAL News - June 2021
  • REAL News - August 2021
    REAL News - August 2021
  • REAL News - January 2022
    REAL News - January 2022
  • Covid-19 Workouts by Dr Irv: #3
    Covid-19 Workouts by Dr Irv: #3

Comments

comments

Filed Under: Fitness Blog Tagged With: achieve well-being, cardiovascular, field of health or exercise science, Heart Health

sidebar

Blog Sidebar

FREE Consultation!

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Categories

  • Exercise of the Month
  • Fit Happens
  • Fitness Blog
  • General News
  • Newsletters
  • Real News
  • Trainers

Tags

achieve well-being aging Alzheimer's disease barefoot running body fat bone density burn off excess weight calories cardio cardiovascular childhood obesity coronavirus covid diabetes diet dieting eating disorders Exercise exercise intensity field of health or exercise science fitness flexibility functional fitness health Heart Health higher risk of obesity lose weight mental health musculoskeletal improvements obesity osteoporosis physical activity physically active protein reduce your risk of falling resistance training running Senior Training slows cognitive decline strength training Stretching training weight loss Weight loss vs Exercise gain weight management

Recent News

Feb 01

REAL News – February 2023

Jan 15

Fit Happens – Winter 2023

Jan 01

REAL News – January 2023

Dec 01

REAL News – December 2022

Nov 01

REAL News – November 2022

Reviews

Search Our Directory

Footer Widget Header

Affiliations

  • american-college-of-sports-medicine
  • american-council-on-exercise
  • biometrics
  • exercise-etc-inc
  • national-strength-and-conditioning-association
  • renewed-support

STEPS Fitness | 2424 21st Ave. S. Suite #100 | Nashville, TN 37212 | 615.269.8844 p

© 2023 Nashville's Premier Personal Fitness Training Center | Designed by Ponder Consulting ®