RUNNING
IN THE HEAT

How to face meteorological summer

When summer comes, runners usually have problems in organising their trainings according to the weather. During this period people try to minimize physical troubles avoiding hot temperatures, for example they run early in the morning or after the sunset. In the morning, temperatures are lower than in the other parts of the day, but the humidity rate gets very high. On the other hand, in the evening the humidity decreases but temperature is still high; in fact you should wait at least one hour after the sunset to feel a lower temperature.

Different people perceive hot weather in different ways.
This perception depends not only on subjective elements, but also on physical factors. Many physiologists say thin people are less likely to accumulate heat compared with overweight people.

Therefore, being thin is an advantage
as regards thermoregulation. Changes in the body temperature under exertion depend on the quantity of heat produced by the body and on the ability to eliminate it. The heat we produce during the run is influenced by two factors:

1)     the athlete’s body mass
2)     the running speed

The fatter is the runner and the faster he runs, the more heat he produce. The ability of dispersing the heat produced during the run depends on two elements:

1)     the athlete’s body surface
2)     the speed of air on the skin

Even though these considerations could make you think that fat runners have advantage in running, it's common knowledge that actually successful long-distance runners are thin. On one hand, a bigger body mass determines a higher heat production, on the other hand a larger body surface helps to eliminate it. Yet, the heat produced by the body is higher than the heat it eliminates. Thin runners, on the contrary, have less body surface, but they produce much less heat; that’s the reason why they get better results.

Orlando Pizzolato