Weather: Death in Disguise

As a follow up to the last blog I have about the death of two marathon runners, I thought I would look into ways to lower your chances of dying during or after the marathon. The first thing that I found was the weather. It seems strange that on a 50 degree day you could die with a body temperature over 105, isn't it? Well climate is one of the major impacts on many runners death. I'm sure this is something we can all talk about knowingly, even if you haven't ran a marathon. You get up in the morning and it is 40 outside. So you bundle up in a sweatshirt and sweatpants. But, as your run progresses, you start to feel hot. What do you do? Do you stop and unlayer? Do you keep running regardless? This is something that doctors have looked into and tried to find ways to lower this problem because face it, everybodys body temperature rises when we run, it is only natural. The process of dying due to the body overheating is referred to as hyperthermia.

Now you may be thinking if this is the case, how can I lower my chances of dying due to high body temperatures? First, hydrate. Hydration is very important because it helps to lower body temperatures naturally. So therefore if you are dehydrated, your body has no natural way of cooling itself, which causes the spike in temperature. Also, start with layers but listen to your body. As the temperature increases, remove layers. If you start to feel warm, take the clothing off regardless of how cold it is out. In other words, allow your body to tell you what is comfortable. Lastly, the speed and amount of work it takes to push yourself to run harder plays a role in this. If you push harder, your body uses energy less effectively. This then raises body temperature, which obviously leads to hyperthermia.

As you can see, there are many things that you can do to lower this chance of you getting hyperthermia. Simply by hydrating, not overdressing, and pushing yourself wisely, you can lower your risk. Good luck and keep on running!