Without a generally accepted unit of measure, quantifying the “extremeness” levels of an activity can be very difficult. Two ways to measure how extreme your activity is by the level of adrenaline your body produces and the amount of risk involved in your activity.
Adrenaline is a hormone produced by the adrenal glands to stimulate the heart-rate, dilate your blood vessels, and open your air passages. Your body produces adrenaline in high-stress or physically exhilarating situations. So when your body produces adrenaline it means you are doing something extreme right? Well, not necessarily. Although many extreme activities are designed to promote the release of adrenaline to your body, other activities can produce adrenaline in the same way; such as alcohol, stress, caffeine, or sugar. None of those things seem very extreme to me. Maybe sugar and caffeine are what makes Mountain Dew so extreme. So extreme.
I prefer to measure extremeness by the amount of risk you take. A friend was trying to tell me last night that the television show “Man vs. Wild” was extreme. I don’t agree because the host of the show has a safety net, which lowers the risk levels considerably. I will admit, most of the things the host does are risky and difficult (not to mention disgusting), but I assume, based on the presence of the cameraman, that if something horrible were to happen, that they have an a back-up plan. I’m sure they always have an evacuation route, first-aid kit, and probably weapons to heed off wild animals. If this is not true, then the cameraman is the real risk taker on the show, not the host. He does everything the host does but with a camera! AIG took risks but I wouldn’t consider them extreme. Anyone can insure 150 billion dollars worth of assets without any collateral to back them up if they have a safety net in the form of a 70 billion dollar government bail out. Too easy. Put down the Mountain Dew and stop being a poser AIG man.
Extremeness is best measured by the amount of risk you take, without a safety net, and the severity of the potential outcome. This is why trail running is extreme. I admit that the risks of trail running is lower than other activities but the difference is that when you go down on the trail, you’re going down. You can do very little to alter the outcome as the event is happening. Not having control of whether or not you get injured is extreme. Also, the types of injuries that can occur while trail running, broken or twisted joints and bones, can lead to a very detrimental outcome. Runners often run daily, use it to relieve stress, and often don’t “feel right” when they aren’t able to run on a non-rest day. Trail running injuries are often ones where the only thing you can do to recover is not run. Not being able to run can be a very negative outcome to a runner. Not to mention losing all of the ability gained from logging hundreds upon hundreds of miles in all conditions. Other running injuries which are often developed over the long-term allow recovery to include not running as many miles or doing alternate cardiovascular training. Trail running injuries usually require you to go “cold turkey.” I wish trail running injuries would require you to go “jive turkey” instead. That would be awesome.
Taking risks without a safety net and a high negative outcome is extreme so get out on the trail and run…or just put a lot of sugar in your coffee this morning. Extreme!!!