Chronic cardio is forcing your body to kill you

Wow, what a great sales pitch for crossfit.

Interesting that palaeo/primal diet people can get palaeoanthropology so wrong.

It's believed that Homo erectus ran the equivalent of marathons in order to hunt meat. Running/cardio does *NOT* equal being chased by a lion!!!

Here's how homo erectus probably hunted... (some homo sapiens hunter-gatherers hunt this way, only with much more sophisticated weapons, which would mean that Homo erectus would have had to run longer as they only had rocks and pointy sticks as weapons, so would have found it a lot more difficult to inflict an injury on an animal it was hunting from a distance.)

You find a herd of animals, and start chasing one of the weaker ones. It runs away, and you can't catch it because humans can't run fast enough. (and you think if a lion started chasing a human they'd get away? LOL no. A human can't outrun a lion. The best chance it has against a lion is to fight it and kill it with a spear or for the other humans to intervene and throw rocks to chase the lion away). The animal escapes, but Homo erectus can track it down, following footprints and so on... it finds where the animal is hiding/resting, and chases it .... tracks it... chases it... tracks it.. chases it... (alternating jogging and sprinting for hours, in other words...) in modern Homo sapiens hunter-gatherers who have projectile weapons such as throwing spears, bows and arrows etc, this hunt lasts hours and they run the equivalent of a marathon or more. Homo erectus would have had to run longer to compensate for the lack of weapons other than stones and pointy sticks. This kind of hunting in modern hunter-gatherers is done at midday in the intense heat of the savannah, because humans can stay cool much more effectively than other mammals, due to having very little body hair and sweating over the whole body. The animal eventually is chased to the point that it dies of heat exhaustion, while the human has managed to stay cool. Homo erectus lived on the African savannah, so would also probably have hunted at midday.

This explains why humans have much less hair than other mammals and also why we're so good at endurance cardio. The fact we can run marathons is due to this. We evolved as long distance endurance runners and as persistence hunters. The fact that people can continue to do so much cardio while eating very few calories, is because this is how early humans hunted, so the body evolved to carry on doing lots of running even while the body starved (up to a point, because the body can only take so much starvation before breaking down) in the hope that running would lead to finally catching an animal and getting a decent amount of fat and protein to eat.

If there's an increased level of heart disease in people who run marathons and do loads of running, I'd question whether they have accounted for the fact that so many people do so much cardio while not eating properly, and those people are confounding the statistics. Maybe marathon runners should eat meat after they finish, so their body thinks they're succeeding at hunting and not failing.

The idea that "when you run long distances your body thinks you're being chased by a lion" is silly though. A lion would catch a human within a minute. If you're running long distances, your body thinks you're hunting.

I am not a fan of the whole crossfit thing, but it is pertinent to note: the hunting methodology you describe isn't the only or even the most logical one to have occurred. There was likely alot of sneaking up on prey, of lying in wait for prey, of using snares and traps, of driving prey into an ambush. And historical man would have done alot more load bearing work carrying possession and what not too. None of it is so very cut and dried.

I think if people truly believe that we would all do drugs and be fat obviously we want to deter death as long as possible isn't tht why we are here?

I'm going to ignore the (very lengthy) ad for Crossfit.

But taking the above point, just because something is going to kill us eventually it doesn't mean everyone would want it to be by drugs or obesity!

Wanting to deter death is futile, none of us know how long we have and life can end at any time, with or without warning. Wanting to live a happy life, whatever it is that makes that happiness (such as with MFP either getting fitter or losing weight or both), is very worthwhile.

I want it to be drugs. I've always said that if I make it to 90, I'm going to pick up a heroin habit for the last couple years of my life.

Interesting that palaeo/primal diet people can get palaeoanthropology so wrong.

It's believed that Homo erectus ran the equivalent of marathons in order to hunt meat. Running/cardio does *NOT* equal being chased by a lion!!!

Here's how homo erectus probably hunted... (some homo sapiens hunter-gatherers hunt this way, only with much more sophisticated weapons, which would mean that Homo erectus would have had to run longer as they only had rocks and pointy sticks as weapons, so would have found it a lot more difficult to inflict an injury on an animal it was hunting from a distance.)

You find a herd of animals, and start chasing one of the weaker ones. It runs away, and you can't catch it because humans can't run fast enough. (and you think if a lion started chasing a human they'd get away? LOL no. A human can't outrun a lion. The best chance it has against a lion is to fight it and kill it with a spear or for the other humans to intervene and throw rocks to chase the lion away). The animal escapes, but Homo erectus can track it down, following footprints and so on... it finds where the animal is hiding/resting, and chases it .... tracks it... chases it... tracks it.. chases it... (alternating jogging and sprinting for hours, in other words...) in modern Homo sapiens hunter-gatherers who have projectile weapons such as throwing spears, bows and arrows etc, this hunt lasts hours and they run the equivalent of a marathon or more. Homo erectus would have had to run longer to compensate for the lack of weapons other than stones and pointy sticks. This kind of hunting in modern hunter-gatherers is done at midday in the intense heat of the savannah, because humans can stay cool much more effectively than other mammals, due to having very little body hair and sweating over the whole body. The animal eventually is chased to the point that it dies of heat exhaustion, while the human has managed to stay cool. Homo erectus lived on the African savannah, so would also probably have hunted at midday.

This explains why humans have much less hair than other mammals and also why we're so good at endurance cardio. The fact we can run marathons is due to this. We evolved as long distance endurance runners and as persistence hunters. The fact that people can continue to do so much cardio while eating very few calories, is because this is how early humans hunted, so the body evolved to carry on doing lots of running even while the body starved (up to a point, because the body can only take so much starvation before breaking down) in the hope that running would lead to finally catching an animal and getting a decent amount of fat and protein to eat.

If there's an increased level of heart disease in people who run marathons and do loads of running, I'd question whether they have accounted for the fact that so many people do so much cardio while not eating properly, and those people are confounding the statistics. Maybe marathon runners should eat meat after they finish, so their body thinks they're succeeding at hunting and not failing.

The idea that "when you run long distances your body thinks you're being chased by a lion" is silly though. A lion would catch a human within a minute. If you're running long distances, your body thinks you're hunting.

In response to this topic, I am going to train lions using Crossfit. There will be no escape!