Conference Agenda

Purpose: More frequent and intense heat waves resulting from the climate crisis require endurance runners to adopt effective heat‑adaptation strategies, especially in urban environments affected by heat‑island effects. This study aimed to compare heat adaptation strategies among endurance runners training in urban versus rural environments.

Methods: An online questionnaire using 5-point Likert scales to assess the use and feasibility of heat adaptation strategies was completed by 303 endurance runners of varying training levels (45% male, 38.2 ± 11.3 years). Mann–Whitney U tests compared responses between runners reporting to primarily train in urban (n=60) versus rural (n=239) environments.

Results: Both groups reported similar availability of shade along their regular running routes (p = 0.57), and no significant differences were found in their use of strategies such as training at cooler times, selecting alternative routes, seeking extra shade, lowering pace, or reducing distance (p from 0.16 to 0.97). However, urban runners rated finding another route (p = 0.012) and more shade (p = 0.009) as less feasible. Runners from both environments equally expect an increased exposure to hot days (p = 0.67) but reported relatively low concern (p = 0.66) about managing heat during exercise.

Conclusion: Urban and rural runners report similar use of heat‑adaptation strategies, although urban runners perceive adjusting their route or seeking more shade as less feasible. Therefore, policy makers should focus on creating more natural shaded areas, particularly in cities. Despite anticipating more frequent hot‑weather exposure, runners express limited concern about coping with heat during training.