Eight out of ten marijuana users in states wherever cannabis is legal say they partake within the drug shortly before or when exercise, and most report that it motivates them to figure out, helps them relish exercise a lot of and improves their recovery, in line with stunning new metal Boulder analysis.

The paper, to be revealed Tues within the journal Frontiers publically Health, is among the primary to explore the sophisticated intersection between cannabis use and physical activity.

While several assume the previous impedes the later, the information recommend otherwise.

“There could be a stereotype that cannabis use leads folks to be lazy and couch-locked and not physically active, however these information recommend that this can be not the case,” same senior author Angela Bryan, a prof within the Department of science and neurobiology and also the Institute for science.

She stresses that she is in no approach recommending mistreatment cannabis as AN adjunct to exercise.

“The proof isn't there however,” she said. “But i'm conjointly not convinced it's harmful.”

Questioning the ‘couch potato’ story
Marijuana is currently legal for recreational use in ten states and healthful use in dozens a lot of. Yet, very little is understood concerning however rising acceptance may impact public health measures like physical activity and avoirdupois.

Some have speculated that accumulated use may worsen the avoirdupois epidemic by supply a inactive manner. On the opposite hand, the authors note, the globe Anti-Doping Agency prohibits cannabis use in sporting competitions because of its potential to boost performance.

Anecdotally, ultrarunners typically use marijuana to battle nausea and tedium on long runs. And epidemiologic studies show cannabis-users tend to be throw, less susceptible to polygenic disorder and have healthier blood glucose levels.

“There are plenty of attention-grabbing information points and hypotheses out there however not a lot of them are tested,” says Bryan.

In a opening move toward filling the analysis gap, she and her colleagues surveyed 600 adult marijuana users in California, Colorado, Nevada, Oregon and Washington, asking—among different questions—if they ever used cannabis at intervals one hour before or four hours when exercise.

Eighty-two p.c same affirmative.

“We were surprised it had been that top,” says Bryan.

A follow-up question of 345 “co-users” (people World Health Organization use cannabis with exercise) found they were a lot of probably to use it when than before. however sixty seven same they did each.

Among people who co-used, seventieth same it accumulated enjoyment of exercise, seventy eight same it boosted recovery, and fifty two same it heightened motivation.

“Given that these are all recognized barriers to exercise, it's doable that cannabis may really function a profit to exercise engagement,” the authors write.

Only thirty eight same it boosted performance, and of course some little previous studies have urged it's going to damage it.

Notably, people who co-used conjointly got concerning forty three minutes a lot of exercise per week than those who didn’t.

The runner’s high affiliation
How may cannabis, physiologically, impact physical activity?

“There is proof to recommend that sure cannabinoids dampen pain perception, and that we conjointly apprehend that the receptors cannabis binds to within the brain are terribly almost like the receptors that are activated naturally throughout the runners high,” same author Arielle Gillman, a former degree student in Bryan’s laboratory World Health Organization recently revealed a review paper on the topic.

“Theoretically, you may imagine that if it could dampen pain and induce a man-made ‘runner’s high,’ it may keep folks driven.”

Cannabis is additionally medicine, that may aid recovery.

The study failed to study which type of cannabis (edibles, smoke-dried flower, etc.) folks use aboard exercise.

The authors note that the survey has limitations, therein it looked solely at those who use cannabis frequently and targeted on states that have already legalized it. however a lot of analysis is already within the works at metal Boulder, comparison the activity levels of older adults who use cannabis with people who don't.

Preliminary results of that separate study show that when embarking on a 16-week exercise program, the cannabis users exercised quite the non-users.

“As we have a tendency to age, exercise starts to harm, which is one reason older adults don’t exercise the maximum amount,” Bryan same. “If cannabis may ease pain and inflammation, serving to older adults to be a lot of active that would be another profit.”