Quit sports and start smoking?

For many years I was ignorant – and happy. I honestly believed that participating in sports would do me good; make me stronger and healthier. Then I discovered that I have developed an overgrown heart and abnormal heartbeat. Since I wrote a few lines about this problem (see “A good heart” here below) my attention has been brought to numerous articles about sports and heart disease.

A recent research in Australia shows that endurance athletes are in a risk of developing malfunction in the right ventricle of the heart.  Much to my relief, a researcher was quoted saying “Endurance athletes like marathon runners may suffer damage to their hearts but it doesn't mean that exercise is unhealthy” (see here).  Great news that we can damage our hearts in a healthy way !   

An older research in France showed numerous heart-related problems and deaths amongst bikers who participated in the Tour de France after 1960. A research in Iceland seems to show that many athletes develop abnormal heart function which, I understand, may be connected to the scary cases we occasionally hear about, of athletes dying sudden death while training or racing. The list goes on.

I know that my doctor told me not to worry, just keep on living, training and racing as I have always done.  This does, however, make me wonder how precise science really is.  Don’t we have countless examples of “scientific facts” that suddenly loose their validity and some new "truth" takes over?   Will we, after 5 or 10 years, see an announcement saying: “Please note that due to some minor error in calculation, the results of all previous research on smoking have been misleading. After recalculating all available data, it is now evident that smoking substantially benefits health and is especially effective in countering the damaging effects on the heart and lungs, caused by involvement in the so-called sports.”

I admit that after briefing through some of the research on the Internet last night, I felt like quitting all sports, taking up smoking and joining a poker club. I decided to sleep on it. Then, at 5:00 AM this morning, I woke up to attend my tri-club’s swim practice. After two miles of drills and sprints I felt a little bit better.