You feel the wind on your face while deeply inhaling the redemptive aroma of nature, a last nod to your comfort zone and throw yourself into the void with the heart to a thousand. A few minutes late, back, A smile illuminates your face while your body returns to his routine after his hormonal outbreak. And you just think about repeating.

Risk sports are a more frequent activity between people of all condition to the point that Many proudly point out and without a guilt apex that “are hooked”. But what is behind this addiction to extreme sports? Why do some people like risk sports, not others?

Risk sports chemistry

Why do some people like risk sports and others not? Source: Unspash

Love hooks, the same as travel or sports themselves. But, What have in common an ephemeral passionate relationship, one trip to the other of the world or a base jump? The chemistry of our body, the cause for which we hook ourselves to extreme experiences, intense experiences.

Adrenalin

How many times have we heard that ‘Liberate adrenaline’how our body is put in tension in the unusual situation of danger, fear or excitement. In this sense, adrenaline is hormone responsible for preparing physically for ‘high’ which occurs during the practice of a risk sport.

Segregated to blood circulation by the adrenal gland, it has A considerable instant impact on our body: Stimulates heart rate, dilates pupils to improve the visual field, has a bronchodilator effect to favor air entry into the lungs, in addition to increasing blood glucose concentration to load us with extra energy.

In this way, adrenaline has been One of our great allies to survive throughout the history of evolution since it enhances our physical abilities during short periods in order to overcome dangers, preparing to react quickly and effectively to extreme situations. In this sense, its role is vertebral in the preparation of the body during the execution of a risk sport.

Dopamine

Adrenaline is also responsible for the stimulation of the central nervous system for the release of dopamine, A neurotransmitter that activates up to five types of different cell receptors With various functions, among them not only the feeling of pleasure and happiness that is usually popularly associated with this hormone, but also motor functions Very important in physical activity.

While dopamine in moderate quantities provides pleasure to the exercise of physical activity, an excess of it can produce pernicious effects such as hallucinations or even schizophrenia. In this sense, some recent studies work with dopamine control among other neurotransmission systems to investigate the neurochemical mechanism of this terrible and enigmatic disease.

Serotonin

Popularly known as the hormone of happiness, serotonin is a neurotransmitter that is synthesized from the transformation of the tryptophan amino acid. Its main function is regulate moodsas well as physiological functions and behaviors, in addition to sleep, anxiety and generation of rhythmic motor patterns.

As well as serotonin It is released in large quantities after an orgasma similar effect occurs with the practice of certain activities of great intensity such as risk sports. This Explain that feeling of fullness that we have after participating in one of those acts of high physical intensity.

Endorphins

Produced by the hypothalamus and the pituitary, Its effects are compared to synthetic opiatesproducing sensations of well -being and euphoria. As well as orgasm itself also releases endorphins, the same happens with the consumption of foods such as chocolate or the practice of strength and intensity activities.

By momentarily calm pain thanks to its analgesic effect, It is explained that “we do not feel pain” in the peak of sports intensity and that, however, after a few hours, once the activity and Already at rest, physical discomfort appears product of the execution of an intense activity that tests a good part of our body capacity.

Addiction to risk sports

Why do some people like risk sports and others not? Source: Pexels

After checking the segregation of numerous hormones that occur during the practice of risk sports, it should not be surprised that these activities generate a certain addiction in their participants. After all, Everyone likes to feel pleasure, fullness and happiness.

Nevertheless, That plethoric state that our physique feels and that moves to the mood is not permanentnor can we pretend that it is, just as it happens with happiness. It is not possible to stay in that condition constantly since it would be harmful to the body.

At the time when risk sports, like any other pleasant activity, stop being an option to become an obligationwe are developing a problem. Of course not all addictions are equally dangerous, but at the time we lose control over the exercise of an activity, It’s time to reflect.

There is nothing wrong with feeling the chemical that characterizes risk sports, but pretending to take it to other everyday situations is a nonsense, as well as it is reject other types of more serene activities for the fact that “adrenaline lacks”.

Ultimately, engaging adrenaline peaks can have an obvious counterproductive effect. As we seek to add a little more risk to an activity to increase adrenaline, in addition to raising the threshold, we will achieve the opposite effect: A hormonal overproduction that will no longer lead to overcoming fear, but to the loss of perception of fearwhich is more dangerous than any risk sport.

I don’t like risk sports, any problem?

Why do some people like risk sports and others not? Source: Unspash

None, no problem. Each person segregates adrenaline as he wants. And there are those who do not need to practice risk sports because they already drive every morning for the M-30 or battle every day with three young children. Routine life also offers innumerable situations of great intensityso there is no obligation to participate every weekend in a base jump to be complete both physically and psychologically.

In this sense, there are already those who say that this increasingly popular trend to practice increasingly intense and impressive experiences is A symptom of a squalid society at the spiritual levelas if the lack of stimuli in routines tried to be compensated with a torrent of rabidly extreme experiences, Like the child who seeks desperate for a slide at the exit of school.

If our comfort zones are so monotonous, boring and irritating, doIt would not be more logical to change comfort zone Before looking for extreme hobbies to flee from her?

Anyway, and as with an unusual gastronomic recipe, We will never know if we like risk sports or not if we don’t try them at least once. Because this is also a fact: most people who practice extreme sport end up repeating. For something it will be, right?