Cardio and Music Videos

Want to run faster and farther on the treadmill? Try watching music videos. In a 2009 study published in the Journal of Sports Science and Medicine, researchers had test subjects run on the treadmill during three separate occasions. During one session, the subjects ran on the treadmill and watched music videos with interjected scenes of influential sporting events (think sport highlights). On another occasion, the subjects watched political trials while they ran. On the third trial, they ran on the treadmill and watched nothing. (Note: The duration for all the trials was the same, which was 15 minutes of maximal effort.)

The results showed that when test subjects watched the music videos they ran significantly faster and, therefore, farther than they did during the other two trials. Additionally, there was no significant distance between the other two trials.

So, what were they listening to? Well, the researchers picked a few retro tracks, but, apparently, they still do the trick. The test subjects listened to “Slam” by Pendulum, “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor (this is the theme music from the Rocky movie) and “Rise Above It” by Lock, Stock and Barrel.

WIth the above in mind, I’m not sure you can even watch music videos on TV anymore, but you can always YouTube them or download the tracks and play them while you watch the highlight reel on a sports channel. There’s also some fairly good “montages” on YouTube to get you pumped to train. That being said, check out the Rocky montage with Eye of the Tiger playing in the background in the first comment of this post. It got me pumped!