Monday, July 25, 2011

Myths About Running in Heat

From Running Times online

Myths About Running in Heat

Current advice on training and racing in the summer heat

By Phil Latter

As featured in the JulAug 2011 issue of Running Times Magazine

After hundreds of thousands of years, you might think that we as a species would have our physiology down pat. The process of working hard, recovering and getting stronger seems almost instinctual these days, even if in many ways its application to running is somewhat recent. Yet if science has shown us anything since the days of Descartes, it's that one minute's moment of genius insight ("Drink as many fluids as you can in a marathon") is the next moment's blunder ("Drink too much water and you could die of hyponatremia"). Science, it seems, is an evolving art.

The process of heat training and acclimatization is no exception. Ever since Italian marathoner Dorando Pietri collapsed near the finish line at the 1908 Olympics (never mind Alberto Salazar being read his last rites after the Falmouth Road Race in 1978), caution has been the keyword used when discussing how to tackle hot and muggy conditions. Train early, train slower and train with lots of fluids on your back has been the advice passed down now through many a running generation. But like all conventional wisdom, there comes a time when the basis of that wisdom needs to be re-examined.

Particularly after what happened in a University of Oregon lab.

Read on here.

 

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