The findings come from a study by the Medical University of Graz, Austria.
From Fox News.com:
They compared the runners’ skin cancer risks with those of 210 men and women matched for age and gender who were not long-distance runners. All participants underwent a skin cancer exam and answered questions about personal and family skin cancer history, as well as changes in skin lesions, sunburn history, sun sensitivity, and physical characteristics such as skin and eye color.
Even though more of the nonrunners had higher sun sensitivity, reflected by their light eyes and sensitive skin types, the runners had more atypical moles and more lesions called solar lentigines -- often called "liver spots" -- which are associated with a higher risk of malignant melanoma.
Not surprisingly, the more intense the training regimen, the more likely a marathon runner was to have the lesions and moles, Ambros-Rudolph found. While some runners logged about 25 miles a week, others put in more than 44 miles a week.
I'm in the latter group. Worse for me, is that I'm pretty much bald, but I often wear a hat, as the picture on my blog shows--which was taken before the start of the 2005 Chicago Marathon.
However, I tried once wearing sunscreen--my wife made me do it on vacation in Florida a few years ago before a run, but the damn stuff got in my eyes--so I said "Never again" with the sunscreen before a run.
But according to the Austrian study, 56 percent of marathon runners sometime use sunblock, two percent never too. I guess I should join the larger group.
And I may have to look at a new band of sunscreen. In the short term, November is Illinois' cloudiest month, so I can take my time before changing my no-sunscreen habit. But not for long. I've gotten sunburned running in February in Chicago.
Technorati tags: Running Marathon Fitness cancer skin cancer
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