I think you have a good point here and glad you pointed that out. I wondered as well whether the people who train enough to be fit, whether more of them die and are therefore not represented at all in this study because they’re dead and gone.
training risks (in the cardiac context) appear across fitness classes
There aren’t training risks for the bottom 20%, unless walking from the grocery store to the car counts.
# VO2 Max Just Turned 100. Here’s What It Means - Outside Magazine
Excellent article and review of VO2 max based on " A new commentary in the International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance , led by Grégoire Millet of the University of Lausanne, marks the 100th anniversary of the landmark paper by A. V. Hill and Hartley Lupton that first described VO2 max."
I found the following intriguing " The reason for all these criteria is that the idealized picture of a steady increase in oxygen consumption followed by a plateau often doesn’t show up in real life. And even when it does, it’s not an invariant number: your VO2 max when kayaking will be smaller than when you’re running, for example, because you’re using smaller muscles that can’t gobble up as much oxygen. (That’s why rowers tend to have some of the highest absolute VO2 max values, because they’re huge and they’re using both arm and leg muscles. Cross-country skiers have some of the highest relative values, because they’re also using arms and legs but are generally much lighter than rowers.)" - I think rowing is the best measuring protocol.
LaraPo, do you recall where you read that? (10 minutes on a vibrating platform equals 40 min in a gym)
I do not unfortunately. It was some time ago and I read a lot and every day. Have you ever tried a vibrating platform? My sessions are only 10 min, but my leg muscles feel sore as if I had a very intensive workout.
Per ChatGPT 5, power marching on vibration platform
(excellent FMU (fast motor units) stimulus)
10–15 seconds fast march → 30s rest × 5
Vibration increases fast-twitch activation at low joint load.
Should add that the above exercise is part of my weekly program designed (by AI) with taking into account my fitness level, age, and equipment that I have at home. It is 70-year-old–specific adaptation of my motor-unit–centric weekly program. It preserves fast motor units (FMUs), NMJ integrity, firing-rate capacity, explosive ability, and reactive “neural nutrition”, while materially lowering orthopedic, tendon, and cardiovascular risk—the priorities for a 70-year-old, especially one wanting longevity of performance, not wear-and-tear.
I’ve always considered marathons, not to mention ultramarathons, to be extremely destructive to the body’s immediate and long-term health. Some of the more common risks include stress fractures, heat stroke, and dehydration.
This is why I love the hundred-yard dash. It has a lower injury risk while spiking the heart rate and boosting metabolism, which has direct effect on VO2 Max. Plus, the all-out effort floods me with endorphins.
Causality is increasingly in evidence, as in this Phase 3 RCT showing that exercise improved survival in colon cancer patients., as well as the many trials showing that exercise improves glycemia in diabetes and function in frail people and people with advanced ASCVD.
It’s a matter of competing risks, like most things. Keep it in proportion.
between 2010-2023 … Among 29 311 597 [marathon and half-marathon ] finishers, 176 cardiac arrests (127 men, 19 women, 30 sex unknown) occurred during US long-distance running races. Compared with 2000-2009, cardiac arrest incidence remained unchanged (incidence rate, 0.54 per 100 000 participants [95% CI, 0.41-0.70] vs 0.60 per 100 000 [95% CI, 0.52-0.70], respectively). However, there were significant declines in cardiac death incidence (0.20 per 100 000 [95% CI, 0.15-0.26] vs 0.39 per 100 000 [95% CI, 0.28-0.52]) and case fatality rate (34% vs 71%). … Among runners for which a definitive cause of cardiac arrest could be determined (n = 67/128 [52%]), coronary artery disease rather than hypertrophic cardiomyopathy was the most common etiology.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2832121
The clear dose-response across all quintiles and age groups strongly argues against that.