With the actual data, this phantom increase in risk disappears. That's exactly why the original presentation of the data (which, as a conference abstract, was not peer-reviewed) was so problematic.

Now, there are still some very interesting insights to glean from this paper. For most of their analyses, they find that the health benefits from running just a little (i.e. ~5 miles a week) are essentially equivalent to the health benefits of running a lot. This stands in contrast to findings from other studies like Paul Williams's National Runners' Health Study, so further research will be needed to understand what factors differ between the two study groups. But it certainly strengthens the view that even very small doses of vigorous exercise have big health benefits, and that you don't need to train like a marathoner to max out the benefits of aerobic exercise. I think that's a great message – but it's very different from the original message sounded by the authors, which was that running more than 20 miles per week "may speed one's progress toward the finish line of life."