Marathons in Mid- and Later-Life

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⏰ IN A RUSH?

Today’s 30-Second Summary

If you don’t have time to read the whole email today, here are some key takeaways:

• Marathon-running in one’s 40s and older continues to be a very healthful activity

  • Studies have shown that age is broadly not a factor when it comes to health benefits (or risks) of marathon-running

• E-word dysfunction (pardon, we have to avoid a spam filter here) can be frustrating, but has three approaches that can be taken, based on paying attention to the following three factors (about which we include specific advice in today’s main feature!):

  • Hormonal health

  • Circulatory health

  • Psychological health

• Tea is a very healthful drink, with many benefits to body and mind alike.

  • Check out today’s sponsor section for a chance to uplift your daily tea-making with Mosi!

Read on to learn about these things and more…

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❓ MAIN FEATURE

It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!

Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!

In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!

As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!

So, no question/request too big or small 😎 

As for questions we’re answering today…

Q: Is there any data on immediate and long term effects of running marathons in one's forties?

An interesting and very specific question! We didn’t find an overabundance of studies specifically for the short- and long-term effects of marathon-running in one’s 40s, but we did find a couple of relevant ones:

The first looked at marathon-runners of various ages, and found that…

• there are virtually no relevant running time differences (p<0.01) per age in marathon finishers from 20 to 55 years

• the majority of middle-aged and elderly athletes have training histories of less than seven years of running

From which they concluded:

❝The present findings strengthen the concept that considers aging as a biological process that can be considerably speeded up or slowed down by multiple lifestyle related factors.❞

See the study: Performance, training and lifestyle parameters of marathon runners aged 20–80 years: results of the PACE-study

The other looked specifically at the impact of running on cartilage, controlled for age (45 and under vs 46 and older) and activity level (marathon-runners vs sedentary people).

The study had the people, of various ages and habitual activity levels, run for 30 minutes, and measured their knee cartilage thickness (using MRI) before and after running.

They found that regardless of age or habitual activity level, running compressed the cartilage tissue to a similar extent. From this, it can be concluded that neither age nor marathon-running result in long-term changes to cartilage response to running.

Or in lay terms: there’s no reason that marathon-running at 40 should ruin your knees (unless you are doing something wrong).

That may or may not have been a concern you have, but it’s what the study looked at, so hey, it’s information.

Here’s the study: Functional cartilage MRI T2 mapping: evaluating the effect of age and training on knee cartilage response to running

Q: Information on [e-word] dysfunction for those who have negative reactions to [the most common medications]?

When it comes to that particular issue, one or more of these three factors are often involved:

• Hormones

• Circulation

• Psychology

The most common drugs (that we can’t name here) work on the circulation side of things—specifically, by increasing the localized blood pressure. The exact mechanism of this drug action is interesting, albeit beyond the scope of a quick answer here today. On the other hand, the way that they work can cause adverse blood-pressure-related side effects for some people; perhaps you’re one of them.

To take matters into your own hands, so to speak, you can address each of those three things we just mentioned:

Hormones

Ask your doctor (or a reputable phlebotomy service) for a hormone test. If your free/serum testosterone levels are low (which becomes increasingly common in men over the age of 45), they may prescribe something—such as testosterone shots—specifically for that.

This way, it treats the underlying cause, rather than offering a workaround like those common pills whose names we can’t mention here.

Circulation

Look after your heart health; eat for your heart health, and exercise regularly!

Cold showers/baths also work wonders for vascular tone—which is precisely what you need in this matter. By rapidly changing temperatures (such as by turning off the hot water for the last couple of minutes of your shower, or by plunging into a cold bath), your blood vessels will get practice at constricting and maintaining that constriction as necessary.

Psychology

[E-word] dysfunction can also have a psychological basis. Unfortunately, this can also then be self-reinforcing, if recalling previous difficulties causes you to get distracted/insecure and lose the moment. One of the best things you can do to get out of this catch-22 situation is to not worry about it in the moment. Depending on what you and your partner(s) like to do in bed, there are plenty of other equally respectable options, so just switch track!

Having a conversation about this in advance will probably be helpful, so that everyone’s on the same page of the script in that eventuality, and it becomes “no big deal”. Without that conversation, misunderstandings and insecurities could arise for your partner(s) as well as yourself (“aren’t I desirable enough?” etc).

So, to recap, we recommend:

• Have your hormones checked

• Look after your circulation

• Make the decision to have fun!

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🌍 AROUND THE WEB

What’s happening in the health world…

• Sleep apnea and lack of deep sleep associated with brain biomarkers of cerebrovascular disease

• Beyond salt: research highlights under-appreciated sources of high blood pressure

• Older adults may have heightened distractibility, study suggests

More to come tomorrow!

📖 ONE-MINUTE BOOK REVIEW

Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity - by Dr. Peter Attia

"We know, we know; this diet, that exercise, don't smoke or drink, get decent sleep"—a lot of books don't go beyond this level of advice!

What Dr. Attia offers is a multi-vector approach that covers the above and a lot more.

Themes of the book include:

• The above-mentioned things, of course

• Rethinking medicine for the age of chronic disease

• The pros and cons of...

  • caloric restriction

  • dietary restriction

  • intermittent fasting

• Pre-emptive interventions for...

  • specific common cause-of-death conditions

  • specific common age-related degenerative conditions

• The oft-forgotten extra pillar of longevity: mental health

The last one in the list there is covered mostly in the last chapter of the book, but it's there as a matter of importance, not as an afterthought. As Dr. Attia puts it, not only are you less likely to take care of your physical health if you are (for example) depressed, but also... "Longevity is meaningless if your life sucks!"

So, it's important to do things that promote and maintain good physical and mental health.

Bottom line: if you're interested in happy, healthy, longevity, this is a book for you.

Click here to check out Dr. Attia's "Outlive" on Amazon today!

Wishing you every success in the marathon of life,

The 10almonds Team