On the face of it, running and rowing share little in common. One is an upright activity, performed on land. The other is a sit-down activity, performed on the water. Elite runners tend to be lean and lightweight; elite rowers tall and muscled. Look under the hood, however, and you’ll find running and rowing are more similar than you might assume. Both are great cardiovascular workouts; both largely depend on the lower body; and both require a great deal of discipline and mental strength. Here’s how they match up across some key categories...
Calories burned
Why I pulled out of the London n Harvard Health, a 155lb (70.3kg) person rowing moderately for 30 minutes burns 252 calories. The same person running moderately (10 min/mile pace) burns 360 calories. A vigorous 30-minute row burns 369 calories; a vigorous run (8 min/miles) burns 450 calories. Up the pace to 6 min/miles and that same person burns 562 calories. When it comes to burning calories, running’s pretty much unbeatable.
Bone density
The vigorous, high-impact nature of running is good news for bone health. One study found that runners had better leg bone density than cyclists, and you’d imagine they might also trump rowers in this area. However, in terms of upper-body bone density, rowers are likely to better runners, thanks to the pulling motion of the arms.
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VO2 max
Why I pulled out of the London n VO2 max stakes. For the uninitiated, VO2 max is seen as the gold standard measurement of aerobic fitness and refers to the amount of oxygen your body can effectively use during exercise. It’s represented by a number: the higher this is, the fitter the person. Rowers tend to have a higher absolute VO2 max, while runners tend to have a higher relative VO2 max. If this sounds like a ‘sore loser’ excuse from runners, hear us out. Rowers tend to be bigger than runners, and their sport requires them to use more of their muscles, which in turn leads to higher VO2 max scores. But once VO2 max is adjusted to bodyweight, the weedier runner often wins.
Joint health
Runners World, Part of the Hearst UK Wellbeing Network, How to choose between morning and evening runs suggest our sport is actually good for your knees. Even so, it would take a biased runner indeed to make the case for running being better than rowing in terms of joint health. Due to its low-impact nature and ability to strength the muscles around joints, rowing is considered to be very beneficial to joint health. The key, however, is to learn to use the rowing machine with proper technique. Rowing is a very complicated, technical movement that rewards good form and punishes bad.
Muscle building
If you’ve run for a while, you’re likely already aware that our sport does not provide an express ticket to Muscle Beach. Calorie burn? Sure. Aerobic fitness. You bet. Muscle building? Not so much. That’s one of the reasons that strength training is so important to our cohort. With rowing, though, strength training is baked in to the activity itself. After all, it’s an activity that reportedly works more than 80% of the muscles in your body. Whack up the resistance and you have a cardio- and muscle-building workout. And running can’t quite compete with that.
Mental strength
Mental strength is unlike VO2 max or calorie burn: there’s no objective measure. However, in terms of discipline, fortitude and willingness to suffer, runners and rowers must have it in spades. When done vigorously, they are activities that require the participant to manage high levels of discomfort. Pain is all part of the deal. Because while there’s a skill element to both –particularly rowing – they are simple activities and, as such, there’s nowhere to hide. If you want to succeed, you have to give it everything.
