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The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running

Background and objectives: The COVID-19 outbreak has become a major health and economic crisis. The World Health Organization declared it a pandemic in March 2020, and many sporting events were canceled. Materials and Methods: We examined the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on endurance and ultra-e...

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Autores principales: Scheer, Volker, Valero, David, Villiger, Elias, Rosemann, Thomas, Knechtle, Beat
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7827107/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33435292
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/medicina57010052
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author Scheer, Volker
Valero, David
Villiger, Elias
Rosemann, Thomas
Knechtle, Beat
author_facet Scheer, Volker
Valero, David
Villiger, Elias
Rosemann, Thomas
Knechtle, Beat
author_sort Scheer, Volker
collection PubMed
description Background and objectives: The COVID-19 outbreak has become a major health and economic crisis. The World Health Organization declared it a pandemic in March 2020, and many sporting events were canceled. Materials and Methods: We examined the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on endurance and ultra-endurance running (UER) and analyzed finishes and events during the COVID-19 pandemic (observation period March 2020–October 2020) to the same time period pre-COVID-19 outbreak (March 2019–October 2019). Results: Endurance finishes decreased during the pandemic (459,029 to 42,656 (male: 277,493 to 25,582; female 181,536 to 17,074; all p < 0.001). Similarly, the numbers of endurance events decreased (213 vs. 61 events; p < 0.001). Average marathon finishing times decreased during the pandemic in men (5:18:03 ± 0:16:34 vs. 4:43:08 ± 0:25:08 h:min:s (p = 0.006)) and women (5:39:32 ± 0:19:29 vs. 5:14:29 ± 0:26:36 h:min:s (p = 0.02)). In UER, finishes decreased significantly (580,289 to 110,055; p < 0.001) as did events (5839 to 1791; p < 0.001). Popular event locations in United States, France, UK, and Germany decreased significantly (p < 0.05). All distance and time-limited UER events saw significant decreases (p < 0.05). Conclusions: The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant effect on endurance and UER, and it is unlikely that running activities return to pre-pandemic levels any time soon. Mitigation strategies and safety protocols should be established.
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spelling pubmed-78271072021-01-25 The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running Scheer, Volker Valero, David Villiger, Elias Rosemann, Thomas Knechtle, Beat Medicina (Kaunas) Article Background and objectives: The COVID-19 outbreak has become a major health and economic crisis. The World Health Organization declared it a pandemic in March 2020, and many sporting events were canceled. Materials and Methods: We examined the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on endurance and ultra-endurance running (UER) and analyzed finishes and events during the COVID-19 pandemic (observation period March 2020–October 2020) to the same time period pre-COVID-19 outbreak (March 2019–October 2019). Results: Endurance finishes decreased during the pandemic (459,029 to 42,656 (male: 277,493 to 25,582; female 181,536 to 17,074; all p < 0.001). Similarly, the numbers of endurance events decreased (213 vs. 61 events; p < 0.001). Average marathon finishing times decreased during the pandemic in men (5:18:03 ± 0:16:34 vs. 4:43:08 ± 0:25:08 h:min:s (p = 0.006)) and women (5:39:32 ± 0:19:29 vs. 5:14:29 ± 0:26:36 h:min:s (p = 0.02)). In UER, finishes decreased significantly (580,289 to 110,055; p < 0.001) as did events (5839 to 1791; p < 0.001). Popular event locations in United States, France, UK, and Germany decreased significantly (p < 0.05). All distance and time-limited UER events saw significant decreases (p < 0.05). Conclusions: The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant effect on endurance and UER, and it is unlikely that running activities return to pre-pandemic levels any time soon. Mitigation strategies and safety protocols should be established. MDPI 2021-01-09 /pmc/articles/PMC7827107/ /pubmed/33435292 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/medicina57010052 Text en © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Scheer, Volker
Valero, David
Villiger, Elias
Rosemann, Thomas
Knechtle, Beat
The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running
title The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running
title_full The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running
title_fullStr The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running
title_full_unstemmed The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running
title_short The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Endurance and Ultra-Endurance Running
title_sort impact of the covid-19 pandemic on endurance and ultra-endurance running
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7827107/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33435292
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/medicina57010052
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