How Little Can You Run to Reap All the Benefits?

If people who run all. The. Time. make you LOL, there's a new reason to make fun of their certifiably crazy habits: In a recent review of 15 years' worth of studies on the health benefits of running, researchers found that you don't have to run all that much to max out on running's health benefits. Lacing up just once or twice a week for just 50 cumulative minutes (no more than 6 miles per week!) provides plenty of protection against cardiovascular disease, chronic disease, and early death by any cause, according to the researchers' findings, which were recently published in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings.

​Because the government recommends doing much more physical activity (at least 150 minutes of moderate movement, or 75 minutes of vigorous exercise per week), the findings should come as welcome news — unless you see exercise as a means to lose weight, in which case nothing's changed: The more you run, the more calories you'll burn and the more weight you'll lose, assuming you don't make up for all that effort by eating ​compensatory​ calories. That said, most people only burn about 100 calories for every mile traveled by foot, so you'd need to run roughly 35 miles — ​? — ​​ to lose 1 pound of body fat, according to lead study author  Carl J. Lavie, MD, medical director of cardiac rehabilitation and prevention at the Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans​.

Dr. Lavie adds there are other reasons to run more than the bare minimum: Putting one foot in front of the other can alleviate stress, make you faster and stronger, and even bring you joy — you know, if running is your thing. That said, some research suggests more exercise isn't necessarily better. People who run more than three times a week for longer than 150 minutes or at especially high speeds are no healthier than people who don't run at all, according a separate review comparing running habits and mortality rates​ published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

What's that? OHHH, it's the perfect excuse to opt out of tonight's regularly scheduled run in lieu of happy hour. (You're welcome.)

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