A 70kg bloke (normal BMI) who runs regularly and eats healthily, etc. is highly unlikely to cause OA because of running.
A obese 130kg guy with a bad diet is putting a lot more load through his knees for each step and his body has a lot of inflammation alreay. This guy could more easily give himself OA.
I remember hearing Scott Tinley talk in about 2004, he had just retired as a pro and had hip issues, i think he said bilateral OA. It was quite painful seeing him hobble up to the microphone to talk. I remember having a wobble thinking, is this whatās in store? Is this a great idea?
But then you see other ex pros with years of top level tri who still seem pretty nimble.
Itās confusing. My intuition (which may be wrong) is that runners who develop OA hip or knee probably do so for a mix of reasons and those reasons are often to do with the way they are put together, as much as the stuff they do. Maybe their femur has a cam shape which is slowly mashing their acetabular labrum. Maybe one leg is 2cm longer than the over causing asymmetric load. Maybe they just have OA prone genes, granny had it although she was built like a bird and never ran a step in her life.
HGH abuse is linked to OA though, so I wouldnāt read too much into what āex-prosā do unless youāre on a similar set up, which is of course a problem with looking at pros for anything - you donāt actually know what theyāre doing.
Weāre pretty much programmed to identify simple correlations and take action from them. Works fine for fire ant mounds perhaps, but not complex medical conditions.
It looks to me that this has far too many factors to conclude simply that running leads osteoarthritis
agree
But some people are actually suggesting the opposite too.
On a practical level I decided not to overthink it too much and just keep doing it because itās mostly fun.
After 32 years of running round in circles with joints pretty intact Iām probably more concerned about the risk of AF actually. But again, kind of feel what will be will be.
Itāll probably be something random and unexpected that strikes in the end anyway, thereās a cheery thought
Check out all cause mortality and relax.
Pour yourself another coffee, snap off one chunk of dark chocolate and see if you can get laid.
Iām planning a deep dive and look into it soon, so will post if I find something more interesting.
Iād step back from my blanket statement to acknowledge that yes previous injury and trauma is hugely correlated with future OA. But I still think itās one of the biggest and problematic myths/cases of common knowledge waiting to catch up with newer learnings. It scares people into avoiding exercise with the assumption theyāll make things worse, horrible images of ābone on boneā etc.
The false correlation between sports people and OA I believe is just because they moan about it more and it disrupts their lives so we notice it, when genetics is by far the bigger predictor.
On a risk of side-lining the thread (may need a new one), an interesting few studies on children running marathons:
Study 1:
310 youth finishers of twin City marathons over 25 years age 7-17. Finishing time 2:52 to 6:10 (eyeball median appears around 4hr). Only 4 have ever been seen in the medical tent afterwards (2x16 and 2x17). All for fatigue which didnāt receive any intervention. Thatās half the rate of adults being seen in medical tent after (although not statistically significant due to low child numbers).
Study 2:
1927 students doing the 2018 Student Run Los Angeles programme (which has ~2000 students every year). 18% injury rate over a 28 week programme , 4d mean missed training days. Mostly acute lower limb soft tissue injuries with knee predominant. Lots of limitations (other sport not recorded, injuries reported by non-medical coaches, some incomplete reporting of dropouts)
But thatās again less than half the typical injury rates seen in adult studies, which slightly surprised me.
different post to ejcs argument about performance and biomechanics, but did slightly impress me.
Quite a few other studies that Iāve only read abstracts for seem to say similar, including for kids doing ultras
Agree. And Iād go one step further to say a 120kg bodybuilder is less at risk than a sedentary 85kg carrying excess fat, genetics etc being equal.
Iāve got a heavily overweight friend who ran a lot when he was young. Convincing him to run regularly is countered by the āits bad for my kneesā and āIāll run when Iām lighterā fallacies. Itās a shame. So that circle of negative reinforcement is pretty much unbreakable.
Yes, because we have an accepted opinion including most med school teaching that itās a wear and tear condition. So of course it would be silly to go and run if thatās your belief.
Not to say that they should start running straight away, with likely lack of relative strength and risk of other tendinopathies etc.
But motion is lotion (Lorimer Moseley)
stumbled across this nice Dan Empfield article from 2018 which seems kind of relevant to the last few posts in this thread: the risks of NOT being a triathlete