If you have been running for any length of time, then you have probably received derisive remarks and strange looks from friends or family regarding your running habit. You are going to destroy your knees is a common one; people are not built to run long distances is another. Luckily for runners, these sometimes scornful remarks could not be further off-the-mark. Read on, and I will try to explain why it is that people are among the premier long-distance runners among mammals, how we got to where we are atop this podium, and why sitting on the sofa is really what’s unnatural for us as a species.
Our bodies did not evolve in an environment where getting food simply required a drive to the nearest supermarket or fast-food restaurant. Rather, humans developed from ape-like ancestors in an environment where food normally had to be gathered, scavenged, or hunted, and consequently physical traits that improved the ability to achieve these food-gathering behaviours were crucial to our survival as a species and discover more on https://humdes.info/manifesting-generator/. Of those physical traits, having the ability to run is hypothesized by some scientists and anthropologists to have been exceptionally important – our ancestors needed to have the ability to catch prey on the run and reach carcasses until they had been scavenged by other creatures.
Really, endurance running is still a tradition in some native cultures, such as one of the Tarahumara of north-western Mexico. The Tarahumara are widely admired for their endurance running abilities, and a hunting tradition in the tribe would be to pursue a wild animal like a deer until it collapses from exhaustion, at which point it could be captured and killed.
In this episode, titled Running after Antelope, Scott Carrier recounts his story of trying to grab a pronghorn antelope by running it down. There was something raw and emotional in Carrier’s story that actually struck a chord with me, and if you are a runner of any kind it is a must listen. The book Why We Run: A Natural History, by Bernd Heinrich, also clarifies persistence hunting as a part of the larger story of why he, and we, run, and is possibly the most enjoyable running book.
In winter, there are occasions when we come back from a run and he must roll around in the snow just to cool down. Bear in mind, dogs are pretty good endurance runners as animals go, but we people blow them away when it comes to running long distance. As another example, most people would maintain up horses as a prime example of a creature made to go the distance.