Ten thousand steps and more. “Each time, after fifteen or twenty minutes of racing, I have the impression of seeing more clearly in my head”, says this colleague who jogs three times a week. Over the course of its session, for example, new ideas for topics arise, the attack on an article (its beginning) which was slow to come. It also defuses concerns, by “Finding in [sa] head running the right way to talk to someone, organize something “.
Running fondue – sport to which she devoted a test, Little praise of running (François Bourin editions, 2018) -, the young writer Cécile Coulon has, for her part, described at length on the airwaves of France Culture how his practice helps him build the story, the characters, the suspense of his books. Over the strides and the concentration they impose, “All that is useless leaves the thought”, she assures. And to summarize: “Intellectually, we refine ourselves while running. “
This observation that head and legs go hand in hand is not new. “The moment my legs start to move my thoughts begin to sink, as if I had given air to the stream at the lower end and as a result new fountains were pouring into it at the upper end. “, theorized the philosopher Henry David Thoreau, in the middle of the XIXe century. His contemporary Friedrich Nietzsche, a great walker, even went so far as to claim that “Only the thoughts that we have while walking are worth anything”.
Improved cognitive performance
What does science say? Regarding the regular practice of physical activity (PA), its multiple benefits for the brain have been well documented. In particular, it has been shown that moving improves cognitive performance and protects against neurodegenerative diseases. The data are more nuanced when it comes to the “acute” effects of a sports session. “Almost all the studies find an increase in cognitive performance, more or less marked according to the type of physical activity, the age of the participants, the functions tested, summarizes Olivier Dupuy, teacher-researcher at the MOVE laboratory (mobility, aging and exercise), at the University of Poitiers. The benefits are present from the first fifteen minutes of the session and persist for up to an hour, or even two, after the end of it. “ These acute effects on cognitive performance are more marked on so-called “executive” functions: working memory, flexibility, inhibition and planning. These functions correspond mainly to the prefrontal cortex.
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