Trail running vs. road and treadmill running

7 reasons you should hit the trails.

Sep 09, 2024

Post summary:

Trail running has unique advantages over roads and treadmill running.
You’ll learn 7 unique benefits of trail running.
- The mindset differences between trail and road/treadmill running.
- Why outdoor runners are more likely to stick to exercise.
- The cognitive benefits of trail running.
- The calorie burn differences between running trails and roads/treadmills.
- Strength and power differences between running trails and roads/treadmills.
- Why trail running can lead you to run farther on accident.
- The injury rate differences between running trails and roads.
These benefits apply any cardio you can do on a trail: Walking (weighted or otherwise), hiking, biking, etc.

Housekeeping

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The post

Fall is coming. I can feel it.

As the weather cools, my dog, Stockton, and I head into the Mojave desert on Sunday mornings. We run a network of fantastically named trails: Jenny From the Block, Bob Gnarly, Black Friday, Supply Chain, Flow Job, and on and on.

Stockton spends little time on the trail and prefers sprinting in a sort of frenzied S pattern to chase varmint and birds.

I, meanwhile, lapse into a sort of effortful flow state, moving through the landscape on two feet like humans have for millions of years.

We pass towering cliffs, spiny cacti, agave, and Joshua tree.

It’s quieter and more peaceful out there. The air is clean. There are no cars, crowds, smog, or traffic lights.

And then there’s this:

I’ve become fitter and healthier faster by hitting the trail than pounding the pavement or treadmill.
I’m stronger and more durable.
My endurance and mindset are better.

Running trails gives you more benefits per mile. Some thinkers in the space, like the ultramarathoner Ian Torrence, think of trail running as an entirely different sport than road running. It’s more varied, unpredictable, and muscular.

All exercise anywhere you do it is great. Do what you’ll do most often and don’t feel bad if you’d rather run on a treadmill. But trail running does seem to have a handful of legit upsides.

The good news is that these upsides apply to most anything you can do on a trail: walking (weighted or otherwise), hiking, biking, etc.

Let’s roll …

1. You’ll get more mindset benefits

There are inventions that free us. That lift our souls and spirits and help us find peace, serenity, and deeper meaning in life. And then there is the treadmill.

The device was invented 200 years ago for prisons. It was pitched as a sort of torture device to force prisoners to atone for their crimes through physical suffering.

Around 1900, the treadmill was banned for being cruel and inhumane. But since then, the device has apparently acquired an excellent PR team and resurged as the most popular modern exercise contraption.

I’ll admit I use treadmills occasionally—typically on days when it’s over 110 degrees outside. And it still feels like prison labor.

A long weekly trail run, on the other hand, is freeing. After a good trail run, I feel uplifted and have a clearer, happier, calmer mind.

And the science suggests outdoor exercise is like a fistful of organic Prozac. Researchers in the UK reviewed the differences between indoor and outdoor exercise. They found:

Compared with exercising indoors, exercising in natural environments was associated with greater feelings of revitalization and positive engagement, decreases in tension, confusion, anger, and depression, and increased energy …

The more wild the outdoors, the stronger the effect. Another study found that the more time people spent on trails, the better their outlook and mindset.

2. You’ll have more fun and exercise more often

Sometimes exercise can indeed feel like forced labor. Like another chore on the to-do list.

Here’s some common sense: We do more of the things we like. So if you find an exercise you like, you’re more likely to do it more often.

Science has confirmed this common sense. It’s also helped us understand what kind of exercise people stay consistent with.

Those UK scientists discovered that people reported greater enjoyment and satisfaction with outdoor activity. In turn, the people were more likely to repeat the activity later.

And I will tell you this: I look forward to my long weekly runs with Stockton. They’re a highlight of my week.

3. You’ll get more cognitive benefits

Exercise benefits our brains. This we know. It seems to increase the volume of areas of the brain associated with memory and thinking.

But not all exercise is equally brain-building. If running on a treadmill is like addition and subtraction, running on a trail is more like multivariable calculus.

“When you combine physical acts with cognitive acts, it tends to have a really beneficial effect on the brain,” researchers at USC told me.

To understand this, consider my experience on a treadmill versus running in the desert.

On a treadmill, I pre-select my pace and zone out until my time is up.

Trail running, on the other hand, forces mental engagement. The rocky ground forces me to play something like moving Tetris as I run. With each step, I must quickly angle and land my feet in slits of flat ground between serrated rocks, pivot on loose dirt, sidestep spiny cacti, or hurtle tiny cliffs.

Each step is new, and nothing is pre-programmed. I have to quickly consider so many variables:

How should I pace myself?
Should I hammer up this hill, or will that lead me to bonk later on?
If I bomb down a downhill section, how should I position my body and pace myself relative to the slope of the hill, given that it’s covered in loose dirt?
Are those rocks I need to run up sharp enough to cut into my shoes, and should I go around them?
How should I angle my foot as I run through a patch of rocks?
Are there agave or cactus hanging onto the trail that could cut me? (I come home bloody 25 percent of the time, FWIW).

If I zone out, I’ll be hobbling home on a twisted ankle or eating schist.

To get a sense of this foot Tetris, here’s a clip of one of the trails I frequently run:

The benefits of more complex exercise likely go back to how our ancestors evolved. When our ancestors did physical work, it was paired with mental work—think running while tracking an animal during a hunt.

The researchers at USC told me this marriage of physical and mental work still matters today. It’s likely one reason people who exercise outside tend to age better.

4. You’ll burn more calories

The trails Stockton and I run aren’t wide, flat, plush, and pre-programmed.

They run up desert mountains, atop a jagged ancient sea bed, along narrow cliffs, down into sandy arroyos, through rock beds, and across ridges.

The effort packed into one mile feels like two or three on a treadmill.

Trails, indeed, challenge our bodies more.

Biomechanists at the University of Michigan discovered that the increased challenge of walking or running on rough, uneven ground leads people to burn 28 percent more energy per step. That bears repeating: 28.

Of course, that figure is a generality. A tame, supple, flat trail would likely out-edge a treadmill by, say, 12 percent. That’s according to a small study published in the Journal of Sports Science & Medicine.

But a rough, up-and-down trail like the one I was on might push us to burn perhaps 50 to 100 percent more calories per step.

5. You’ll improve your leg and core strength

Sometimes Stockton and I will climb 2,000 vertical feet in a run.

The steep trails require hammering up steep, rocky pitches. Bounding. Jumping. I’m talking big lower body pushes that build legs like pistons.

Not to mention, I’ve got to engage my core so I don’t topple over.

One study noted:

Trail running tends to invoke higher challenges for the neuromuscular system, especially regarding involved muscle coordination, proprioception, and activation compared to road running.

Another study found trail runners could generate more lower body power than road runners.

Funny enough, I’ve found I have to do fewer lower-body lifting exercises to maintain strength when I trail run.

Of course, you can set a treadmill to 15% and run. Or just find a steep road. That is true.

But I’ve found the pitches on trails are steeper, and the shaky ground requires more push and core engagement per step.

6. You’ll probably run farther

The beauty of an out-and-back trail is that once you go out, you must come back. For example, If I run five mile out, I must run, walk, or crawl five miles back home. I’m all in.

When I get tired on a treadmill, on the other hand, I can press stop and go home (which I’ve been guilty of!). If I’m on a road, I can call someone to pick me up.

I use the out-and-back to my advantage. On the way out, I go a little bit farther than I’m comfortable with so I end up going farther overall.

Not to mention, being outside is much more engaging. There are new, different, beautiful things to see outdoors, which motivates me to keep going.

7. You won’t smoke your joints

Trails are generally softer than roads. Hence, one paper found “road runners may be at greater risk for running-related injuries in comparison to trail runners.”

Some experts also believe that overuse injuries are less common in trail running because your foot strike varies greatly.

Note that this doesn’t mean you’ll be injury-free. Trail running, like all running, has higher injury rates than, say, hiking or walking with weight.

My experience has been this: Trail running gives me fewer nagging running injuries (knee, hip, etc) but does increase my risk of more acute injuries, like rolled ankles.

And, indeed, one study found:

Injuries in trail running are different than observed in road running where traumatic injuries to the ankle are more prevalent in trail running and where chronic injuries to the knee prevail in road running.

But I’ve solved that problem by doing a few ankle bulletproofing exercises. I can publish those if you’re interested. Just comment below.

Have fun, don’t die, run trails.

-Michael