Jogging Can Be Bad for Your Health!

Have you ever seen a happy jogger? You know what I mean; you’ve seen them racing through the park, eyes fixed firmly forward, face in a grimace, ear buds inserted, occasionally looking at their Apple watch to see if their time is better than it was yesterday. All sorts of wearable devices monitor everything from blood pressure to heart rate, to whether your cappuccino is ready or the postman is walking up your driveway.

I love walking along Shoreline Park and through Elings Park or along the Jesusita trail. I try to say good day to the joggers who whizz past, but they are too wired up, too intense. I smile. They look at me with either detachment or disdain or both.

Some walkers still wear the technology, talking on their iPhones to somebody in the ether, sharing their innermost thoughts to all within earshot, and often look as stressed as the joggers. But most walkers will say “good morning” or “good afternoon” and often engage in conversation with strangers. They know that a good walk is to be tuned in to the environment not the Android, to smell the flowers, to listen to birdsong, to breathe in the cool ocean air, and feel the wind on their face, aware of the beauty and frailty of their surroundings.

Don’t get me wrong I used to jog myself back in the 1970s when I lived in Australia. I was young and reasonably fit then from working as a deckhand on a Sydney Harbor ferry. One summer evening, I heard a knock on my apartment door. My roommate, Peter, stood there dressed in shorts, singlet, and running shoes.

“Come with me, John,” he said. “I’m just gonna do a couple of lengths of the beach to blow away the cobwebs.” Peter used to wax lyrical about how jogging gave him an endorphin high. He might have been on the magic mushrooms, but I’ve no reason to doubt jogging worked for him.

Peter was a proponent of Jim Fixx, who’d just appeared on the scene with a book titled The Complete Book of Running. Fixx is credited with helping start America’s fitness revolution by demonstrating the health benefits of regular jogging. A whole industry grew up around him.

You had to be seen in the right type of footwear. Nike emerged with shoes for jogging, then clothing for jogging, then hats for jogging, and eventually apparel for every other sport on earth. An old pair of tennis shoes, shorts and T-shirt didn’t cut it anymore. America had a knack of latching on to the latest fad and convincing people they had to buy into it.

I’d studiously managed to avoid these nightly marathons up and down Bondi Beach, often stating that this imported American craze for jogging could do more harm than good. I didn’t actually mean it at the time, it was more my sheer laziness than anything else. So I followed along as Peter streaked over Campbell Parade and down to the promenade. I managed to keep up for one length of the beach, then I started dropping back. As I staggered toward the south end, I met him jogging north, back toward me. Enough was enough.

At the south end, a saltwater pool filled and emptied with the rising of the tide. I don’t know if it was my sweat-filled eyes that made me miss the sign that said Danger – No Swimming or just my overheated thermostat, but I dived headlong into the pool, the cool sea water invigorating every part of my body. Through a watery film I could make out a group of people waving and shouting. I nonchalantly waved back. The waving became more vigorous, then the word “shark” rang out loud and clear. Somebody pointed toward the other end of the pool where a grey fin slid menacingly through the water … toward me. I never thought it possible to leave a pool faster than one could dive into it, but somehow I managed the feat.

Standing there wet and shaking — not from cold, but from fear — I noted the shark was only about 18 inches long, a Port Jackson, someone said. This episode only highlighted for me that jogging is indeed bad for your health.

Then when Jim Fixx died at the age of 47 from a heart attack, while jogging (to be fair the poor chap had extremely high cholesterol levels), I knew it was time for me to hang up the running shoes.