Dean Karnazes is an ultramarathoner whose most recent exploit was to run 50 marathons in 50 consecutive states in 50 consecutive days.  Not a bad feat.  His endurance seems almost superhuman, and, based on what I’ve read about him, I suspect it is.  A recent article in the magazine Wired explained how he got started running 14 years ago.

DEAN KARNAZES WAS SLOBBERING DRUNK. IT WAS HIS 30TH BIRTHDAY, and he’d started with beer and moved on to tequila shots at a bar near his home in San Francisco. Now, after midnight, an attractive young woman – not his wife – was hitting on him. This was not the life he’d imagined for himself. He was a corporate hack desperately running the rat race. The company had just bought him a new Lexus. He wanted to vomit. Karnazes resisted the urge and, instead, slipped out the bar’s back door and walked the few blocks to his house. On the back porch, he found an old pair of sneakers. He stripped down to his T-shirt and underwear, laced up the shoes, and started running. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

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Gary and me on our front porch. Photo by MD Eades 8/13/2008

A couple of days ago Gary Taubes, who was visiting family in Los Angeles, drove up to Santa Barbara, and he, MD and I got together for a long lunch. We talked about all the things we always discuss, most of which have nothing to do with nutrition or nutritional science. But, as always when we get together, talk did turn to science and the sorry state of nutritional science in the world today.

We discussed a Stanford study that was recently published in the Archives of Internal Medicine demonstrating that those who are runners live longer and have less disability. The paper proves absolutely nothing, yet an enormous number of people, many of whom should know better, profess that this study is the smoking gun that ties exercise to longevity and health.

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It should come as no surprise to anyone that the media in general dislike low-carb diets. They use a number of tricks to denigrate carbohydrate-restricted diets at every opportunity. I’m going to start a series of posts showing the different methods used by our friends in the press to downplay the efficacy of the diets that millions of people have found so effective.

One of the most common methods the media uses to disparage low-carb diets is to give any study that makes these diets look bad, no matter how suspect such a study might be, full coverage. We saw this in the mega coverage a few weeks ago of a poster presentation (not even an article in a peer-reviewed journal) allegedly showing that the Atkins diet causes vascular damage. I dissected this ‘study’ and the media coverage of it in a previous post. This method isn’t particularly subtle, so we’ll leave it because I want to deal with the sort of crafty, underhanded ways that the media work to bring about their ends.

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While catching up on my reading on the flight to Dallas I came across an article in the New York Times written by our old friend Gina Kolata. I read the piece and couldn’t believe it: I guess on occasion Gina has an outbreak of good sense. At least such appears the case with her discussion of calories and exercise.

She starts by describing a scenario I’ve witnessed myself all too often.

The Spinning class at our local gym was winding down. People were wiping off their bikes, gathering their towels and water bottles, and walking out the door when a woman shouted to the instructor, “How many calories did we burn?”

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