Positive And Negative Effects Of Running Essay

The exercise of running continues to be a popular and effective way to prevent unhealthy weight gain. Running motivates many people to maintain their healthy lifestyle. Runners often highlight the benefits of running whereas people who do not run often describe the negative effects of running. While both sides are correct at times, most of running’s negative effects are not inevitable. Thus, running has many positive and negative effects on the musculoskeletal and cardiovascular systems of the human body. Running yields positive impacts on bone compactness. Bone is a hard tissue in the body that stores minerals, especially calcium. Any physical exercise strengthens not only muscles, but also bones. Nina Combs, author of Men’s Fitness article “Fitness,” states, “Bone rigidity, which is directly related to bone density, is much higher in runners of endurance-length distances (10Ks, half-marathons) than in people who are sedentary, according to a study in the European Journal of Applied Physiology.” With this increased density of rigidity, runners’ bones are thus less susceptible to osteoporosis later in life. Aging causes bones to gradually become more brittle, so running throughout one’s lifetime largely reduces the risk of bone breaking and fracturing. Running during adolescence also impacts bone

Most runners in any stage of life experience muscular injuries. Muscle cramps, though temporary, are a familiar injury to many athletes and occur in the majority of runners, especially marathoners (Tucker et al. 112). Stretching before and after a run does not guarantee a cramp-free run, but stretching does decrease the chance of having a muscle cramp. Other muscle injuries are also present in the running population. For example, nearly half of adult marathoners fit the requirements for acute kidney injury (Traiperm et al. 27). Muscle cramps and other injuries often lead people away from