MIDDLE AND DISTANCE RUNNING 33 



Breaking Training. — One hundred and twelve athletes quit run- 

 ning abruptly, and all but one of them are in vigorous health to-day, 

 apparently having experienced no ill effects, either from breaking 

 training suddenly or from that overdevelopment of heart and lungs 

 which is supposed to result from athletics. This seems to indicate, first, 

 that unnecessary emphasis has been laid upon breaking training gradu- 

 ally and, second, that abnormal development of the heart and lungs 

 leading to serious affections of these organs is not to be feared. 



The entire physical organism is developed by training to a condi- 

 tion of unusual efficiency in order to meet the demands made upon 

 it. It is generally believed that when these demands cease suddenly 

 — through abruptly breaking training — tissue degeneration follows, 

 inducing physical ailments of greater or less severity. There is, un- 

 doubtedly, an alteration in the tissues when the organism is no longer 

 called upon for vigorous activity, but the theory that this change is a 

 pathological one is not sustained by the facts, in so far at least as 

 distance runners are concerned, save when it is aggravated by bad 

 habits, dissipation or close confinement. It has not been sustained 

 in my experience with school-boy athletes, for in fifteen years I can 

 recall but two cases of indisposition after the season, both temporary, 

 both in football men, big and full blooded, of the type that require an 

 active life. I think it is not sustained by the experience of the vast 

 majority of athletes graduated from our colleges year by year, who 

 from choice or necessity engage in business activities which deny leis- 

 ure for indulgence in sport, for, if so, it should by this time show 

 negatively in the national health statistics, whereas, on the contrary, 

 the spread of athletics in the past generation is believed to have raised 

 the standard of national physical efficiency. It seems to me likely that 

 the ordinary activities of life are sufficient to bridge over the transition 

 period, especially as men who have been accustomed to a great deal 

 of exercise, and who feel the need of it, will, as a rule, manage to 

 get more or less of it into or in connection with their work. I am 

 of the opinion that, save in rare instances, the development produced 

 by college athletics is not abnormal — as is that of professional strong 

 men, weight lifters, acrobats, etc., in whom vitality is sacrificed to 

 muscular development — but that it is normal, and constitutional as 

 distinguished from muscular development, for none of the college 

 sports, except perhaps the hammer throw, develop great muscular 

 strength. The character of the athlete's training supports this belief. 

 He trains hard for a season or two (twelve to thirty weeks), but during 

 the intermittent periods and the summer his exercise is much less 

 severe, and is engaged in solely for pleasure. He works during the 

 training season and plays in between, the mid-seasons in this way 

 providing just the type of letting down that is supposed to be neces- 



VOL. LXXVII. — 3. 



