Before running the New York City Marathon, NPR’s Elissa Nadworny gets a bone scan, blood work and a treadmill test to settle a question from Mom: Is this bad for my body?
Transcript
ELISSA NADWORNY, HOST:
About a million people will attempt to run a marathon this year, and I am one of them. I signed up for the New York City Marathon in November – 26.2 miles.
Completing the first run of this marathon training cycle. About 2 miles in, and I’m already tired.
This will be my fifth marathon. After my fourth, I said it was going to be my last. But how could I pass up New York? When I told my mom…
Hi, Mom.
JAN BRYDON: Hi, Liss (ph).
NADWORNY: …She was, let’s say, less than enthused.
BRYDON: I think I said something like, another marathon? I’m not sure that’s so good for your body.
NADWORNY: (Laughter) Why not?
BRYDON: Well, that’s a lot of pounding and a lot of stress ’cause you’ve got to do all that training.
NADWORNY: Yeah.
BRYDON: I mean, I know it’s good to run, and that’s healthy for you. I just worry about all your joints, and training for a marathon requires so much time and so much running.
NADWORNY: I couldn’t stop thinking about this. What does marathon training do to the body? Yes, it’s true – the marathon distance comes from a story from 490 BC when a courier ran from Marathon to Athens and then collapsed and died from exhaustion. I mean, was my mom right?
I guess my question to you is very simple, which is, like, is training for a marathon good for your body, good for your age?
SCOTT TRAPPE: Yes.
NADWORNY: Scott Trappe runs the Human Performance Lab at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. He’s been researching running for years and coauthored the book “Running: The Athlete Within.”
TRAPPE: It’s going to improve cardiovascular health. It’s going to improve your blood volume, your red cell mass, your plasma volume. Your muscle health is going to improve. All these things gradually improve over the, you know, three months or whatever it is of training.
NADWORNY: I ask him about my mom’s worries about stress on the body or my bones.
TRAPPE: The adaptations that happen related to that – they’re all very, very positive, but we can have overuse injuries.
NADWORNY: In one study in the U.K., a group of researchers did MRIs on marathon runners’ knees. They found cartilage and bone improvements in the subjects’ knees during four months of training. Yes, immediately following the marathon, there was worsening of the cartilage to the kneecap because running a marathon is intense. But this was reversed by the six-month follow-up MRI.
TRAPPE: So I think if done smartly, it’s a very healthy activity.
NADWORNY: To prove that the science is on his side, he invites me to come out to his lab in Indiana for some before and after testing. So three months before the race, I fly there for my before testing.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOOR CLOSING)
TRAPPE: Welcome.
NADWORNY: Thank you so much.
TRAPPE: Well, this is a big trip for you to come out here…
NADWORNY: I know.
TRAPPE: …To get tortured, right?
NADWORNY: I know. I’m so excited.
The plan is to do a DEXA body scan, draw some blood and then do a VO2 max test on the treadmill. We start with the scan.
(SOUNDBITE OF MACHINE WHIRRING)
TRAPPE: You just have to lay there. (Laughter) This is the easiest thing you’re going to do all day.
NADWORNY: It’s not dissimilar from an MRI machine, and it’s going to measure my bone density, inflammation around joints and my percent body fat, among other things.
(SOUNDBITE OF MACHINE BEEPING)
NADWORNY: Next, they draw my blood, and then we start the test I’ve been dreading – the VO2 max test. It’s going to measure how much my body can take.
(SOUNDBITE OF TREADMILL RUNNING)
TRAPPE: All right. Put her at 70.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: In about 20 seconds, we’re going to bump up that speed.
NADWORNY: I’m running on a treadmill in the middle of the lab with 10 electrodes measuring my cardiovascular strength and heart rate.
TRAPPE: All right. Just a little bit quicker here, Elissa.
NADWORNY: And I’m wearing a breathing tube to monitor my oxygen efficiency.
TRAPPE: Going to give you a little more hill, all right?
NADWORNY: They dial up the speed and the incline, and it feels like I’m sprinting up a mountain.
(APPLAUSE)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Keep that form. Keep that form. You’re doing great.
TRAPPE: You got this.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Here for two minutes.
NADWORNY: Now, I should say, I’m surrounded here by about 10 research assistants, people who work at the lab. They’re cheering me on while I’m just, like, killing myself on the treadmill.
(CROSSTALK)
NADWORNY: They’ll get data for every 30 seconds that I can hold on and keep going.
(APPLAUSE)
TRAPPE: One. OK. Let’s shut it down. Shut it down. Great job. Great job. Great job.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Woo.
NADWORNY: While the team at Ball State crunches my numbers, I get deep into marathon training – three runs a week, gradually peaking with a 20-mile run about three weeks before the race. I also talk with scientists about what I should be focused on in addition to running.
TIM ROBERTS: When you think of what it means to recover, your top three are always going to be nutrition, hydration and then sleep. Nothing really can outperform those three.
NADWORNY: Tim Roberts is the chief science officer at Therabody – maker of recovery tools, including a massage gun and compression boots.
ROBERTS: When we train, we create stress. And the body responds to stress in different ways. And its goal is to use that stress to come back a little bit better.
(SOUNDBITE OF TREADMILL RUNNING)
NADWORNY: Joe Norton is a physical therapist in D.C., with a focus on marathoners. He filmed me on the treadmill to look at the way I was running.
JOE NORTON: This really tells us a lot about your posture, your mechanics.
NADWORNY: I was having some back pain, some quad pain, some hip pain, some foot pain. You get the idea. I added his suggestions for exercises in addition to all the miles…
(Inaudible).
…And miles and miles…
Today, we’re going to try to do 7 miles.
OK. I just finished 9 miles.
…Of running.
Pretty tired but getting it done.
Hi, Scott (laughter).
TRAPPE: Hello. How are you?
NADWORNY: I did 18 miles on Monday.
TRAPPE: OK. How’d that go?
NADWORNY: Honestly, it went pretty great.
With about six weeks to go, Scott Trappe from Ball State sent over the results of my testing in Indiana.
TRAPPE: Well, there’s a couple things I can conclude from your data.
NADWORNY: He tells me my VO2 max test gave me a score of 37 – good but with room to improve.
TRAPPE: I think the nice thing about the VO2 max is it’s not a number that’s stuck in stone. We can manipulate that.
NADWORNY: The test also gave insights on what I should be eating during my runs.
TRAPPE: If you end up with a hot day in New York, you’re going to have to modify your strategy even more because what you’re going to need to do – A, you’re going to need to slow down, pay attention to your heart rate, and you’re going to need to drink more.
NADWORNY: Finally, he tells me something I can go back to my mom with – the DEXA scan. It showed that my bone density looks really strong.
So she shouldn’t worry.
TRAPPE: She should cheer.
NADWORNY: (Laughter) I will give her that.
I’ve got four more weeks of training, one hilly New York City marathon, and then I’ll head back to Ball State University to find out what running a marathon really did to my body.
(SOUNDBITE OF JACKSON BROWNE SONG, “RUNNING ON EMPTY”)
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