EXERCISE PRESCRIPTION AREA   

Medicina dello Sport 2021 June;74(2):295-312

DOI: 10.23736/S0025-7826.21.03771-6

Copyright © 2021 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English, Italian

Variables related to exercise dependence and quality of life in amateur long-distance runners

Eladio COLLADO-BOIRA ¹, Maria D. TEMPRADO-ALBALAT ² ✉, Ignacio MARTÍNEZ-NAVARRO ³, Kavita GANDHI-MORAR ¹, Bárbara HERNANDO-FUSTER ¹, Vicente BERNALTE-MARTÍ ¹, Carlos HERNANDO-DOMINGO ⁴

¹ Faculty of Health Sciences, Jaume I University, Castellón de la Plana, Spain; ² Department of Medicine, Cardenal Herrera-CEU, CEU Universities, Valencia, Spain; ³ Unit of Sports Medicine 9 de Octubre Hospital, Valencia, Spain; ⁴ Department of Specific Education and Didactics, Jaime I University, Castellón de la Plana, Spain

BACKGROUND: Physical exercise is an important factor in the protection of health. However, excessive and uncontrolled exercise can result in addiction and have negative consequences. The objective was to determine the prevalence of addiction according to the type of race; with which sociodemographic and training variables it is related. And how does it relate to the level of quality of life.
METHODS: This observational study involved 317 runners, of whom 31.9% were specialized amateur road marathon, 28.7% in mountain marathon, and 39.4% in ultratrail.
RESULTS: The mean EDS-R was 57.18, with 15.4% exercise dependence, 43.0% nondependent-symptomatic, and 41.6% nondependent-asymptomatic.
CONCLUSIONS: The characteristics of the races and the environment influence levels of dependency. The risk of dependency is higher in women, youth and high work activity. The greater the distance traveled weekly the greater the dependency, and that having a coach would be a protective factor. Lastly, quality of life by runners is higher than general population.

KEY WORDS: Exercise; Psychological dependency; Quality of life; Athletes; Marathon running