Twenty Points To Choose Between Treadmills & Outdoor Running

Here are twenty considerations for choosing between treadmills and outdoor running. If you are too busy to read the whole article, see this table and the summary at the end.

Treadmill Treadoffs for Novice Runners

Weather

• Running on treadmills, you do not face heavy rains, hot weather, or bone-chilling cold.
• But that removes some excuses to not run!
• You can use the same gear throughout the year: no need for special socks, rain jackets, or hats.

Safety

• Traffic is a concern on roads.
• Even if you run in parks, nighttime safety needs to be considered.
• In my hometown—Mumbai, India—the main issues are potholes and encroached sidewalks.
• If you are visiting an unknown location, it may not be safe to head outside your hotel for a run. Use a hotel treadmill.
• Have you been chased by a dog during a run?

Refuelling

• Outdoors, you have to plan your water breaks well in advance.

First Aid

• If you get injured running outdoors, it is difficult to get medical assistance.

Surface Impact

• Many new runners have incorrect gait and weaker running muscles. Hard and improper landings on the road can lead to common running injuries.
• Treadmill belts are softer and absorb the running impact, which is better for preventing injuries.

Boredom

• Treadmill runs are boring.
• Running in a loop inside a park is monotonous, too. But there are levels of boredom, and treadmills surely take the first place.

Multi-Tasking

• Run on a home treadmill if you need to keep an eye on children or the elderly.

Mood Improvement

• Road running is usually associated with fresh air, sunshine, and an improved feel-good factor.
• Being outdoors is a mood elevator with reduced anxiety, stress, or depression.

Information Tracking

• Most inexperienced runners overestimate their running effort—speed and distance.
• Treadmills help you track your speed and distance covered, though the calorie count shown on most treadmills is wrong.

Treadmill Treadoffs for Intermediate Runners

Muscle Strengthening

• Roads are often banked and have slight imperfections. Your ankle muscles have to control stability you run on roads, which strengthens them and helps in an actual race.

Effort Index

• The amount of oxygen consumed during exercise—VO2—is the same for a speed whether you are running on the road or treadmill. So both involve the same aerobic effort. This is true below a certain high speed, which is explained later.
• Some people wrongly think that since the treadmill belt moves under you even when you are airborne, a treadmill run will involve less effort than running on the road. Think of it: If your treadmill were a very long and wide belt stretching hundreds of metres in all directions around you and moving backwards, how would you possibly know that you are jogging on a treadmill and not a road?
• Even running at an incline on a treadmill consumes the same VO2 as running on a road with an identical incline—identical aerobic effort.

Uphill Running

• Uphill runs are great conditioning exercises with less impact compared to running on flat roads.
• If you live in an area that is mostly flat, treadmills are your only option.
• After an outdoor uphill run, you have to trudge back downhill, which can hurt the knees and front muscles around your shin (anterior tibialis). Treadmills can bypass this need.
• Treadmills allow you precise adjustments of inclines.

Biomechanics

Biomechanical patterns do not change whether you run on a treadmill or on the road. So treadmill running can train your brain in the same neuromuscular sequences that road running does.

Recoil Energy

• Road asphalt and concrete are harder than treadmill belt rubber. Road surfaces benefit good runners as their leg muscles, tendons, and ligaments stretch, absorb, and store the impact energy of foot landing, which is given back in recoil during the bounce-back stage of the step.

Treadmill Treadoffs for Advanced Runners

Air Resistance

• At speeds above 14 km/hour, outdoor running adds significant air resistance. A treadmill can simulate that if you add a 1% incline to the same speed. In other words, running at 14 km/hour on the road is as hard as running at 14 km/hour on a treadmill with a 1% incline.
• At higher speeds, you will face even more air resistance when running outdoors but remember that air resistance increases with the square of running speed. Forty per cent higher speed would double the air resistance; use a 2% incline setting above 19.5 km/hour if you ever get that fast.
• Such adjustment is needed at lower speeds, too. As speeds fall below 14 km/hour, the air drag drops rapidly. For the speed of 10 km/hour, a 0.5% treadmill incline might be appropriate. But most treadmills don’t have fractional percentage incline settings.

Downhill Running

• Most treadmills don’t simulate downhill running, especially a down-gradient of more than 3% (3 metres decline every hundred metres).
• In a race with hilly terrain, you will need strong downhill running ability and your anterior tibialis muscles (around your shin) should be strong enough to cushion the impacts. Without that strength, your thighs and knees take the hammering, tire out, and prevent you from peak performance.

Lateral Agility

• Treadmill running does not involve turning left or right. For a good runner, lateral agility is important as many courses have bends or even sharp turns that need to be navigated without losing speed.
• On a treadmill, you run in a straight line and the muscles that control your sideways movement during a run stay weaker.

Event Specificity

If you are taking part in a trail run, treadmills simply cannot help you beyond basic fitness; you will need to train on trails.

Pacing

• The main difference between a treadmill and outdoor runs is that the former is a constant speed run and the latter is usually a constant perceived effort one.
• When we run outdoors, we may run hard or easy depending on our feel instinctively. Outdoor runs can help our bodies hone that pacing ability, which is crucial in a race.

Mindgames

• In racing, and to a lesser extent in running, mind control is important.
• On a treadmill, you may set goals based on the displayed numbers (“I will run hard for the next 800 meters” or “…for the next 5 minutes”).
• In an outdoor race, you cannot check your watch all the time. So you will set mental targets based on landmarks (“I will run hard till the next bend”, or “…till the top of the hill”, etc).
• Since the two types of runs train your mind on different parameters, they are not equivalent.

Did I miss out on any other factor in the above list? Please mention that in the comments below.

Summary

• Novice runners can do 100% of their running on treadmills if required. They will benefit more from the controlled environment of indoor treadmills.
• Intermediate runners should not do more than 70% of their running on treadmills. They should add some ‘road feel’ and leg-muscle-strengthening by running outdoors.
• Advanced runners should not do more than 40% of their running on treadmills. They should treat treadmill runs almost like cross-training. They should set the treadmill at an incline of 1%–2%, as appropriate, to simulate a road run.
• When running on a treadmill, always wear the safety harness: this is a clip with an attached rope that is connected to the Emergency Stoppage switch on the treadmill.
• Treadmills are great for runners coming off an injury, as they put less impact on the body.
• Finally, it is better to run either way than not run at all.

This article is based on my original write-up on my Health Sachet website. That article has a more detailed discussion, links to research papers and additional reading material. Go to www.healthsachet.com and search for the following article (LinkedIn does not like external links)