How to Start Running for Mental Health-Boosting?
Posted On
Running is known to be a golden exercise that keeps on giving. You can use running for a workout, you can use running for mental health-boosting as well as burning your calories and getting rid of extra fat. No matter what you choose or how you live, running plays a very important part in your daily life. This doesn’t just impact people who are professional runners, this is also very important for people who are just starting their running journey or using running for a simple daily workout to meet their goal of staying fit, losing weight, or getting rid of extra fat from their body.
When most people think about professional runners, they either think very highly of them. They feel a runner must be very fit. He must have good strength and endurance. They also expect that a runner will have very good cardiac health along with good mental health and another impact on their body. On the contrary, there is a different school of thought that feels running comes with a major disadvantage because you are practically straining your body by working too hard. This also means that your body will go through injuries. Most runners face long-term health issues and they have also addressed foot-related problems and bone-related diseases in the long run. No matter what school you follow you need to keep in mind that running is just a very small part of your daily exercise process. You will have a lot more to look at once you assess the life of a runner.
With the help of this article, we will mainly address the second school of thought that feels running comes with a lot of injuries. We will also see what kind of measures help runners to stay healthy for the long term without feeling the strain on their bones and muscles. Finally, we will look at if this notion connected with running is true or just a myth.
Other Less Known Benefits of Running: Bone Density
Most people relate running directly with an injury which means that they feel running will cause the bone to deform. This mainly happens when people wear very tight shoes or they wear shoes for a very long time. Eventually wearing these shoes for a very long time, causes injuries or their bones take the shape of their shoes. Research by Havard health explains that running is a very good exercise that can help you bone in improving bone density. It also explains that when you exercise, you will be able to see that your bones are getting improved mainly because the capillary supplies oxygen to the skeletal muscles and the bone marrow increases the flow. This has a very strong healing effect causing your body to heal much faster as compared to people who do not run or get involved in any kind of physical activity.
How to Get Your Body Ready For Strain?
When you get involved in any brutal exercise there is no way that your body doesn’t get the impact. You will always feel the impact directly and sometimes it can become very brutal. This mainly happens when the runner doesn’t take care of recovery. To help your body heal after a brutal workout you also need to give your body some time for recovery. The recovery period mainly starts right after you are done working but something you need to probe the recovery period as well.
Get a Good Diet to Recover Faster
For this reason, you need to start by taking care of your diet. A good diet means you need to have a good pre-workout and post-workout meal. Your meal should mainly consist of vitamin D, and vitamin C along with calcium and phosphorus that will help you improve your bone health. Apart from this, your food must also consist of a lot of protein and carbs so you can avoid muscle cramps while you run.
Maintain a Healthy Workout Frequency
Along with food, your workout frequency is also very important for recovery. Most people think that recovery means you need to go to sleep and only then your body will enter the recovery phase but in real life, good frequency management will improve your progress a lot. You need to start with four days of workout time with three days of just gentle stretching so you can help your body recover faster. Apart from this, giving your body enough comfort time is also very important.
Focus On Your Breathing Technique
Apart from this, you also need to maintain a very good breathing technique so your body doesn’t convert to an anaerobic exercise method. This is mainly because when the body enters the anaerobic respiration cycle it has a byproduct of lactic acid that gets stored in the muscle because it serves cramps that can result in extreme pain. To avoid these cramps you need to make sure you maintain a good steady running pace without sprinting or testing the limits of your body. A good workout and respiration balance will also help you in the long run when you opt for running professionally.
Pre and Post Workout Routine
Finally, after a very brutal workout, you should maintain a good and healthy post-workout routine. This workout routine must consist of relaxing bath time with a little hot water and some Epsom salt. Most people use the cold shower which is very good for soothing skin but it will mainly soothe pain after a beat when everything is puffy and you want to get rid of the pain. However, when you have been running for a long time, you need something to ease your muscles because they are not throbbing pan, they are just aching because of all the exercise.
Bottom Line
To sum it all up, no doubt running professionally will have a strain on your body. However, being a professional you will also know how to cater to health-related issues. Most runners have a very tough pre and post-workout routine that they need to follow just to boost their energy and work on their health. Apart from this, runners have a very good diet that mainly helps them maintain a good muscle as well as a good bone density so they do not have to face any issues in the long run. However in case you have seen some runners complain about injuries, these injuries are not because of strain or muscle pull, these injuries are mainly because of falls or broken bones. In most cases when the runner does not maintain a good shape, they fall and this fall sometimes damages their bones. If they do not get medical attention right away, these broken bones and injuries get worse and in the long run, they have a huge impact on the body.
Mental Health Benefits of Running
John Hopkins Medicine: The Truth Behind ‘Runner’s High’ and Other Mental Benefits of Running
Just 10 Minutes of Running Improves Mood and Executive Function, Research Says
