Did You Know Runners Are More "Financially Conscious"? Me Neither

Amby Burfoot Wednesday, August 31, 2011, 12:20 pm

I've long had a pet theory that physicists, engineers, mathematicians, and the like are over-represented in the running community. This notion possibly extends back to the 1970s when math-prof and tough New Jersey road runner Tom Osler began publishing some of his detailed ideas on running.
I surmise that the mathematically-inclined appreciate the essential simplicity of running, and also enjoy counting all their strides, miles, calories, paces, and such. Running produces lots of numbers, if you look for them.
This isn't a subject deserving of scrutiny, and I'm not aware that anyone has ever bothered to look closely. It would be easy to survey a few college faculties to see what academic department has the highest percent of runners: English, Math, History, and so forth. But I'm not sure the outcome would change the world.
Still, I enjoyed a loosely-related piece of research I skimmed the other day. Some behavioral sciences researchers at Boise State decided to find out a little about women ultra marathoners. Prepare yourself not to be shocked. These women had a strong healthy-lifestyles orientation, and scored high in psychological coping and task-orientation. They trained nearly 12.5 hours a week, 64 percent of the time solo, and 80 percent were self-coached. Sounds like an ultra-runner to me.
Here's the curious finding--the thing I didn't expect to read about. These ultra running women were "financially conscious."
Now, I know a number of runners who are accountants of one type or another, but I had never thought about this piece of the running-numbers game: financial smarts. It makes sense, however.
Running is all about return on investment. We all know that running burns more calories/minute than just about anything else you can do. Likewise, we all have limited amounts of time, and we want to make our workouts as efficient as possible. I'd wager most runners have pondered this question: I've only got 30 minutes today, so what's the best workout I can do?
A key physiological measure in running is something called Running Economy. Here, the goal is to burn as little oxygen as possible at a certain running speed. It's a little like shopping, where the goal is to spend as little money as possible for the product you need.
When you think about running and numbers and financial matters, what comes to mind?