Couch potatoes no more: Stoners are using cannabis to help them exercise and reach a “runner’s high”

When Mark started jogging again at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, he could barely run a mile. Soon, he signed up for his first-ever marathon, but getting there required the patience to clock in hours upon hours of training. Music helped break up the monotony some, but what really made time fly by was a hit of his vape pen or, sometimes, a cannabis edible.

A year and a half later, Mark, a father of two in his early 40s, ran his first-ever marathon — consuming a couple of gummies along the way.

“That was the longest race I’d done since the 400-meter dash when I was 18 years old,” Mark, who is using his first name only for privacy reasons, told Salon in a phone interview. “I definitely could have run the marathon without the marijuana, but I don’t know how easily I could have completed the training without it.”

Many people associate cannabis with couch time and Netflix, but the “lazy stoner” stereotype has actually been debunked. In fact, runners and gymgoers are increasingly getting high before their workout to enhance the effects.

“Name an activity and someone's getting high and doing it,” said Dr. Whitney Ogle, a physiotherapist at Cal Poly Humboldt University. “From archery to water skiing, someone's getting high and doing that activity.”

Although studies show that cannabis use may reduce exercise performance, they also show that cannabis can help people enter the flow state and make exercise more fun, ultimately promoting physical activity. For Mark, it was a great way to avoid getting bored on long-distance runs.

“I just found it very enjoyable to zone out and have the right kind of music on and just sort of keep going,” Mark said.

Understanding the impact of cannabis on exercise is important for recreational athletes but also for professionals. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) prohibits the use of cannabinoids, saying they “pose a health risk to athletes” and “violate the spirit of sport.” However, many have argued that it’s time to remove cannabis from this ban because it is based on false assumptions about the effect of cannabis on exercise and disproportionately targets athletes of color — similar to the criminalization of cannabis overall.

In general, research shows that cannabis does not help performance. Yet other studies have shown that cannabis users engage in more exercise and have a lower body mass index than nonusers. Whether cannabis use is influencing these outcomes or people with these health metrics tend to use cannabis more for one reason or the other is unclear. But it does suggest that cannabis does seem to have some relationship to physical activity.

To look into this relationship, Dr. Angela Bryan, a psychology and neuroscience professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, conducted a study last year that compared various aspects of participants' runs when they were sober and when they had used cannabis before. These runners had all previously exercised while on cannabis.

What she found was that runners ran the same distance about 31 seconds per mile slower when they used cannabis compared to when they didn’t. In a 2023 study also conducted by Bryan, runners reported feeling like they exerted more energy when they ran while under the influence compared to when they were sober. However, they also reported that they enjoyed the experience more.

In the former study, runners also reported less pain and that they experienced the “runner’s high” phenomenon — in which people enter a state of euphoria after performing demanding exercise — more easily when they used cannabis.

“I think that when you are under the influence, you feel like you want to dial down the intensity and that might be part of why you’re enjoying it more,” Bryan told Salon in a phone interview. “But if you try to go the same pace that you’re used to, it will probably feel like a higher intensity.”

The runner’s high — which can occur with any form of exercise — was originally thought to be caused by the release of feel-good hormones called endorphins after a high intensity workout. However, more recent research has shown that the phenomenon actually involves the same endocannabinoid system that is targeted with cannabis products like tetrahydrocannabinol (THC).

This system works to maintain homeostasis by balancing the body’s temperature, pain and immune response. The body naturally produces endocannabinoids that bind to the cannabinoid receptors in the brain and other parts of the body. THC targets the same receptors but typically at a far higher dose than what is naturally produced, said Dr. Hilary Marusak, an assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral neurosciences at Wayne State University.

“When you get binding at that receptor, you get a lot of those euphoric properties,” Marusak told Salon in a phone interview. “It can also lower stress and anxiety.”

It’s unclear what part of exercise is activating the endocannabinoid system when a runner’s high happens. In small studies, endocannabinoid levels have been shown to be particularly elevated in hikers at higher altitudes and among choir singers, indicating that it could be caused by restricting the body’s oxygen to some degree, Marusak said.

“I think [it could be] this hypoxic state where you are taking in lower oxygen… or maybe doing some breathing that itself might actually modulate the endocannabinoid system,” Marusak said.

Because of the endocannabinoid system’s role in mood, researchers are looking into whether they can create drugs that target it to treat psychiatric illness. The runner’s high, which targets this system, tends to boost one’s mood and well-being naturally. Some have theorized that this may be an evolutionary trait built in to provide humans with a reward for being able to outrun predators and stay fit. Cannabis use might be piggybacking on that natural system to produce a similar effect.

Still, too much activation of the endocannabinoid system could lead to health problems as well. Some research suggests that people who chronically use THC have less active endocannabinoid systems, suggesting that overstimulation could reduce the body’s ability to naturally produce or bind endocannabinoids.

Scientists also once thought obesity was in part caused by excess cannabinoids and designed a drug called rimonabant to block this system. However, this also ran into problems, and rimonabant was ultimately withdrawn from the market because people taking it experienced depression and suicidal thoughts.

The endocannabinoid system was discovered in the 1980s, roughly a century after many other parts of the brain had been identified. As such, there is a lot left to be discovered about the role it plays in the body. That includes a lot of unknowns about how cannabinoids are influencing the body and exercise.

Cannabis can have a wide range of effects on individuals, and this is influenced by the setting in which it is taken and the balance of cannabinoids — like THC vs CBD — in it. In one 2022 survey of cannabis users Ogle conducted, about a quarter of people reported experiencing something undesirable while using cannabis to exercise. The most common outcome was that they got “too high to be effective at exercise.” Some also reported their heartracing and feeling lightheaded.

“While our participants felt they personally benefited from pairing cannabis and exercise, it may not be beneficial to all,” the study stated.

Still, many cannabis users are finding the benefits of using it for exercise outweigh any potential reductions in performance. Most people who use cannabis to exercise aren’t doing it for performance, anyways. In the 2022 survey, people reported hiking, doing yoga and aerobic exercises most commonly to help them focus and enjoy the experience.

Exercise in general has been shown to improve depression and reduce the risk of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer. The important thing is that people exercise, so whatever gets them moving — be it a runner’s high, a cannabis high or something else specific to them — may be ultimately beneficial.

“If it's something that can get more people to exercise and to enjoy it, then that's definitely worth it,” Marusak said.