WTF? Study: Too much jogging can lead to early death
Replies
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Wow!0
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I could see a leap of logic where too much running without resistance training could lead to decreased muscle mass which could lead to earlier death from inability to recover from major injury/illness...
but that's as big a leap as too much saturated fat in your diet leading to high cholesterol leading to heart disease...0 -
Didn't 2 runners just die this week at the finish line of a half marathon
Probably because of a pre-existing heart condition:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkroll/2014/04/15/why-do-healthy-people-die-running-marathons/
so had they not been running they might not have died as fast and had more time to find out they had a pre-existing heart condition?
no, they would have just died the next time they had the sex.
That sounds way better, to be honest.
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I could see a leap of logic where too much running without resistance training could lead to decreased muscle mass which could lead to earlier death from inability to recover from major injury/illness...
but that's as big a leap as too much saturated fat in your diet leading to high cholesterol leading to heart disease...
:indifferent:0 -
Didn't 2 runners just die this week at the finish line of a half marathon
Probably because of a pre-existing heart condition:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkroll/2014/04/15/why-do-healthy-people-die-running-marathons/
so had they not been running they might not have died as fast and had more time to find out they had a pre-existing heart condition?
As the article points out, it's a real dilemma. There are some people who are literally ticking time bombs. We could pre-screen to see who is likely to die following an extended cardio session, but that would be expensive and might lead to false positives. Interestingly, this problem seems to mostly affect people under 40.
We had a local runner die while running a half marathon at a major city marathon last year, not long after Boston. She was a high school student. It was not her first half marathon and she was an accomplished athlete. Naturally these kinds of questions were brought up. In her case, like so many others, it was a pre-existing condition. The head of our running club, also a medical doctor and her family put out a lot of information about it. There is no screening for it, at least nothing that isn't very invasive. And that is exactly how they described it - a ticking time bomb. It could have happened when she was running for the bus. Her family wanted people to know it as not running that caused it, and she would be sad if people stopped running because of what happened to her.
I am also aware of a 40 year old local guy who dropped during a game of hockey, same condition
Oddly enough, I just saw a Facebook post on her memorial race coming up. She also had run her last race wearing her mom's Boston finisher shirt in honour of the Boston victims. Funny I should be relating this today.0 -
Everybody should do what they like and what works for them to get their exercise. I have just had enough with aerobics only myself, sure I got results, but I never felt like I got out of it anything approaching what I put into it.
Giving strength training a try, we will see how it goes.0 -
Well, considering that damage to your DNA from oxygen ages you, breathing more because of exercise would kill you faster.
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Didn't 2 runners just die this week at the finish line of a half marathon
Probably because of a pre-existing heart condition:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkroll/2014/04/15/why-do-healthy-people-die-running-marathons/
so had they not been running they might not have died as fast and had more time to find out they had a pre-existing heart condition?
no, they would have just died the next time they had the sex.
Exactly. Or swimming, a pickup game of football, etc., sadly.0 -
Even I heard this and I'm not even a runner! Sudden death in athletic individual is usually caused by Marfan disorder or another genetic disorder that is hard to detect. I cannot remember the name of the one that killed the ice skater but basically the walls of his heart had thickened due to bad genetics. Marfan, a disorder that can affect tall, lanky folks like myself, causes aortic dissection and sudden death in basketball players. Nothing catches a head line like YOUNG, HEALTHY ATHLETE DROPS OVER FROM HEART DISEASE!!!! Totally not letting the public know it's a genetic thing not life style. They can also use these instances to skew stats also to make headlines. *Roll eyes* media BS is rather irritating.0
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Absolutely true: Jogging on rail road tracks, freeways and in bad neighbor hoods is dangerous to your health!0
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Interestingly, this problem seems to mostly affect people under 40.
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That is because pre-existing heart conditions are usually from birth. Anomalous coronary artery, long q-t syndrome, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (athough this typically shows up after infancy).
Screening doesn't always pick these up either. You need a VERY good pediatric echo tech to pick up anomalous coronary artery. Adult echo techs don't even look.0 -
As the article points out, it's a real dilemma. There are some people who are literally ticking time bombs. We could pre-screen to see who is likely to die following an extended cardio session, but that would be expensive and might lead to false positives. Interestingly, this problem seems to mostly affect people under 40.
I'm safe. 0 -
Phew this was just the excuse I needed to sit on the couch tonight and do nothing. Thanks! :yawn:
People who believe this kind of nonsense make my head hurt.
I don't follow. Why would a suggested correlation between running > 20 miles a week and earlier death be an excuse to so do nothing. Are you incapable of any movement other than a 20 mile run?0 -
Too much of anything can lead to an early death.0
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I wrote a blog post about this a while ago: http://cavepeopleandstuff.wordpress.com/2013/05/16/running-is-bad-for-you-because-what/
did the study separate people who went jogging for the sake of going jogging and ate enough to sustain the amount of jogging they're doing from people who ate starvation diets and went jogging for 2+ hours a day while not eating enough to even sustain their body if sedentary? Because that kind of thing can really skew the statistics...
Humans seem very well adapted for long distance running, in fact it's hypothesised that Homo erectus hunted by chasing prey for hours on end, running them to complete exhaustion - similar how the !kung san people hunt (a modern hunter-gatherer population who live in the Kalahari), which is what my blog posts discusses. There's quite a lot of morphological evidence from humans that we're adapted for this kind of long distance endurance running. The fact we have very little hair compared to other mammals and sweat with our whole bodies, which most mammals don't do, are two examples. Another example is the efficiency of the human gait (both the walking and running gait). We're terrible sprinters compared to other mammals, but we're really good at endurance running compared to other mammals.0 -
Didn't 2 runners just die this week at the finish line of a half marathon
Probably because of a pre-existing heart condition:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkroll/2014/04/15/why-do-healthy-people-die-running-marathons/
so had they not been running they might not have died as fast and had more time to find out they had a pre-existing heart condition?
As the article points out, it's a real dilemma. There are some people who are literally ticking time bombs. We could pre-screen to see who is likely to die following an extended cardio session, but that would be expensive and might lead to false positives. Interestingly, this problem seems to mostly affect people under 40.
We had a local runner die while running a half marathon at a major city marathon last year, not long after Boston. She was a high school student. It was not her first half marathon and she was an accomplished athlete. Naturally these kinds of questions were brought up. In her case, like so many others, it was a pre-existing condition. The head of our running club, also a medical doctor and her family put out a lot of information about it. There is no screening for it, at least nothing that isn't very invasive. And that is exactly how they described it - a ticking time bomb. It could have happened when she was running for the bus. Her family wanted people to know it as not running that caused it, and she would be sad if people stopped running because of what happened to her.
I am also aware of a 40 year old local guy who dropped during a game of hockey, same condition
Oddly enough, I just saw a Facebook post on her memorial race coming up. She also had run her last race wearing her mom's Boston finisher shirt in honour of the Boston victims. Funny I should be relating this today.
A former colleage dropped dead at work (not the same place I worked, she'd left and gone to work somewhere else, this happened a few months after she left where I worked).... she wasn't even doing exercise, she was just doing paperwork. Sometimes people just drop dead. Some heart conditions are like it says above, a ticking time bomb.0 -
0
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It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.0 -
It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.
Premature mortality compared to what though?0 -
It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.
Premature mortality compared to what though?
Well...... dying versus not dying?
"Premature mortality" among a group or cohort means that they are dying earlier than they should be.0 -
It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.
Premature mortality compared to what though?
Well...... dying versus not dying?
"Premature mortality" among a group or cohort means that they are dying earlier than they should be.
Yes, but what group is what I mean. Are they dying earlier than the average person overall?0 -
I have heard about running damaging joints in the long term.
Another fable disproved by actual science.
The wear and tear on your body of being sedentary trumps the wear and tear of activity.0 -
Premature mortality compared to what though?
Well...... dying versus not dying?
"Premature mortality" among a group or cohort means that they are dying earlier than they should be.
Yes, but what group is what I mean. Are they dying earlier than the average person overall?
Depends on the particular study design. The idea is that you design your study (whether it's a cross-sectional, cohort, RCT study, etc). You then select your control and study groups and collect your data. Then you perform your statistical analysis.
If one of the outcomes you're looking at is mortality, and your analysis indicates that the study group had a higher mortality rate than the control group to a high degree of significance, then you can conclude that some factor in the study group is causing premature mortality. If it's a well-designed study, it can suggest what the causative factor is. If a number of studies implicate the same causative factor in a particular outcome, then you can say with confidence that this factor appears to cause premature mortality as compared to those without that factor.0 -
It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0021915096059503
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3055708/
http://www.unm.edu/~lkravitz/Article folder/hypertension.html0 -
Premature mortality compared to what though?
Well...... dying versus not dying?
"Premature mortality" among a group or cohort means that they are dying earlier than they should be.
Yes, but what group is what I mean. Are they dying earlier than the average person overall?
Depends on the particular study design. The idea is that you design your study (whether it's a cross-sectional, cohort, RCT study, etc). You then select your control and study groups and collect your data. Then you perform your statistical analysis.
If one of the outcomes you're looking at is mortality, and your analysis indicates that the study group had a higher mortality rate than the control group to a high degree of significance, then you can conclude that some factor in the study group is causing premature mortality. If it's a well-designed study, it can suggest what the causative factor is. If a number of studies implicate the same causative factor in a particular outcome, then you can say with confidence that this factor appears to cause premature mortality as compared to those without that factor.
But, if high blood pressure CAUSES death and you control for high blood pressure, then you will eliminate the impact of all the people who died of high blood pressure in the sedentary group.0 -
It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.
Most of the studies I've read on health issues caused by overtraining (which admittedly was a long time ago, I haven't read more recent studies) the majority of cases of overtraining were actually cases of undereating and the problems went away by increasing the amount of food the athletes ate. Reducing the amount of training also helped, but it seemed only because that also reduced the calorie deficit that the athlete was in (i.e. exercise was reduced but food wasn't)
While it is true that there must be some point at which the human body can't take greater amounts of exercise without there being a health cost, I'd guess that increased morbidity and mortality in cohort studies comparing runners to non runners would be the result of undereating. It's unfortunately common for people to do a lot of cardio on an inadequate diet. People with eating/exercise disorders in particular, but also in misinformed people who have a health relationship with food but just have no idea of how much extra they need to eat to fuel regular long runs.
Also, death from insufficient salt/too much plain water while doing long runs is another risk that people tend not to be clued up about. Some people eat very low levels of sodium in their diet because that's what they're told is healthier, without realising that they're sweating out a lot of electrolytes while running and so need to eat more sodium and maybe use a sports drink that contains electrolytes to compensate. Most people know that too much salt is bad but many don't know that you can die from too little salt.
I'd be concerned from cohort studies like this as to whether runners are dying from the above things because they are preventable with proper information about nutrition, hydration and electrolytes. Some causes of mortality in runners like undiagnosed heart problems are hard to prevent, but if runners have an increased mortality because of preventable issues then blaming running itself is counterproductive. While I agree with you that the human body can only take so much... I think most runners are not pushing themselves to that point.0 -
Premature mortality compared to what though?
Well...... dying versus not dying?
"Premature mortality" among a group or cohort means that they are dying earlier than they should be.
Yes, but what group is what I mean. Are they dying earlier than the average person overall?
Depends on the particular study design. The idea is that you design your study (whether it's a cross-sectional, cohort, RCT study, etc). You then select your control and study groups and collect your data. Then you perform your statistical analysis.
If one of the outcomes you're looking at is mortality, and your analysis indicates that the study group had a higher mortality rate than the control group to a high degree of significance, then you can conclude that some factor in the study group is causing premature mortality. If it's a well-designed study, it can suggest what the causative factor is. If a number of studies implicate the same causative factor in a particular outcome, then you can say with confidence that this factor appears to cause premature mortality as compared to those without that factor.
But, if high blood pressure CAUSES death and you control for high blood pressure, then you will eliminate the impact of all the people who died of high blood pressure in the sedentary group.
Controlling for blood pressure does not mean ignoring blood pressure. And if you're looking at whether extreme amounts of exercise influence mortality, the control group wouldn't simply be sedentary.0 -
It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.
Most of the studies I've read on health issues caused by overtraining (which admittedly was a long time ago, I haven't read more recent studies) the majority of cases of overtraining were actually cases of undereating and the problems went away by increasing the amount of food the athletes ate. Reducing the amount of training also helped, but it seemed only because that also reduced the calorie deficit that the athlete was in (i.e. exercise was reduced but food wasn't)
While it is true that there must be some point at which the human body can't take greater amounts of exercise without there being a health cost, I'd guess that increased morbidity and mortality in cohort studies comparing runners to non runners would be the result of undereating. It's unfortunately common for people to do a lot of cardio on an inadequate diet. People with eating/exercise disorders in particular, but also in misinformed people who have a health relationship with food but just have no idea of how much extra they need to eat to fuel regular long runs.
Also, death from insufficient salt/too much plain water while doing long runs is another risk that people tend not to be clued up about. Some people eat very low levels of sodium in their diet because that's what they're told is healthier, without realising that they're sweating out a lot of electrolytes while running and so need to eat more sodium and maybe use a sports drink that contains electrolytes to compensate. Most people know that too much salt is bad but many don't know that you can die from too little salt.
I'd be concerned from cohort studies like this as to whether runners are dying from the above things because they are preventable with proper information about nutrition, hydration and electrolytes. Some causes of mortality in runners like undiagnosed heart problems are hard to prevent, but if runners have an increased mortality because of preventable issues then blaming running itself is counterproductive. While I agree with you that the human body can only take so much... I think most runners are not pushing themselves to that point.
This is a fine post and I can't argue with any of it. This isn't a topic I've researched exhaustively. All I can say is that the small amount of research I've read has been compelling, and conceptually the idea makes sense to me.0 -
There have been many studies on this that warn of risks associated with extreme running. Some cardiologists have questioned whether the running was the cause or whether it was the high consumption of food (meaning more fats, more sugars, more starches, more protein, whatever they ate) that was needed to fuel these runs. If you're running over 50 miles in a week or regularly running marathons, you need to consume a lot of foods to fuel these workouts. Some runners do this with mounds of spaghetti and others do it with mounds of Dairy Queen. If you're eating foods in the quantities of morbidly obese and putting that much pressure on your heart at the same time, who knows whether it's one or the other or a combination of both. (http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303949704579461381883678174)
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/08/100831073517.htm - In this study, there were 45 participants in the Lakeland run in Northern England. ECGs were performed and Troponin I levels were taken for all 45. 25 participants completed the race. Of the 25 finishers, 96%(21) had significantly elevated Troponin I levels and 12 percent showed significant actual cardiac damage, including structural changes to the muscle. That is significant, but really, how many of us are running more than 50 miles, or 100 miles, in a stretch?
And another study: http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0037887
Is moderation really controversial? Run extreme distances if that floats your boat, but just like doing anything to the extreme, there are risks.0 -
It's a total BS study that get's trotted out by the media about twice a year.
http://sciencebasedrunning.com/2013/05/omg-were-all-gonna-dieeleventy/
http://www.runnersworld.com/health/too-much-running-myth-rises-again
Money quote:
What this means is that they used statistical methods to effectively “equalize” everyone’s weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on. But this is absurd when you think about it. Why do we think running is good for health? In part because it plays a role in reducing weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and so on.... They’re effectively saying, “If we ignore the known health benefits of greater amounts of aerobic exercise, then greater amounts of aerobic exercise don’t have any health benefits.”
Thanks to DaveMunger for the links and quote.
The implication here is that the more you run, the better your weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol will be. I assert that this is not necessarily true and your criticism is invalid.
I haven't looked at this study yet, but there is significant evidence indicating that extreme amounts of exercise can indeed cause a deterioration of health or premature mortality. It makes sense intuitively; a moderate or even high amount of stress to the body's systems create a response by which it becomes stronger and more efficient. Too much stress can overwhelm it.
I haven't seen enough research to conclude how much exercise is definitely too much, but we can't just throw the idea out the window. More is not necessarily better. Achieving extremely high levels of performance does not necessarily improve health or decrease mortality.
Most of the studies I've read on health issues caused by overtraining (which admittedly was a long time ago, I haven't read more recent studies) the majority of cases of overtraining were actually cases of undereating and the problems went away by increasing the amount of food the athletes ate. Reducing the amount of training also helped, but it seemed only because that also reduced the calorie deficit that the athlete was in (i.e. exercise was reduced but food wasn't)
While it is true that there must be some point at which the human body can't take greater amounts of exercise without there being a health cost, I'd guess that increased morbidity and mortality in cohort studies comparing runners to non runners would be the result of undereating. It's unfortunately common for people to do a lot of cardio on an inadequate diet. People with eating/exercise disorders in particular, but also in misinformed people who have a health relationship with food but just have no idea of how much extra they need to eat to fuel regular long runs.
Also, death from insufficient salt/too much plain water while doing long runs is another risk that people tend not to be clued up about. Some people eat very low levels of sodium in their diet because that's what they're told is healthier, without realising that they're sweating out a lot of electrolytes while running and so need to eat more sodium and maybe use a sports drink that contains electrolytes to compensate. Most people know that too much salt is bad but many don't know that you can die from too little salt.
I'd be concerned from cohort studies like this as to whether runners are dying from the above things because they are preventable with proper information about nutrition, hydration and electrolytes. Some causes of mortality in runners like undiagnosed heart problems are hard to prevent, but if runners have an increased mortality because of preventable issues then blaming running itself is counterproductive. While I agree with you that the human body can only take so much... I think most runners are not pushing themselves to that point.
I think the majority of runners who are running marathon and beyond are pretty smart about the needs for hydration and probably incorporate fueling during their run. I would be concerned with general calories consumed however. Some of the ideal racing weights I've seen thrown around are really low.0
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