How Many Long Runs Should I Do Before a Marathon?

It seems like common sense that to prepare for a marathon—an event that includes a heck of a lot of running—your training should also include a heck of a lot of running. That’s why marathon preparation dogma preaches that you need to do one long, 12 to 26 mile run each week.

The problem: That often puts too much mileage on your body, says Mark Conover, director of the cross-country and track-and-field programs at California Polytechnic State University.

“The key is to get to the starting line fresh,” says Conover. “You don’t want to arrive at the marathon as damaged goods.”

Stop Stress in 60 Seconds

Severe stress can do more damage than just turning your hair gray and making you shorter. People with chronic stress have a 59 percent increase in their odds of stroke over the next decade, according to new research from the University of Minnesota.

For every single-point increase in test scores measuring stress levels, study participants’ risk of stroke jumped 19 percent. Study authors think chronic activation of the fight-or-flight response may trigger your body’s inflammatory response to go into overdrive, impeding blood flow to the brain.

How to Have Sex for an Hour!

You’ve tried crunching baseball stats. You've mentally replayed your last round of golf. You've outlined the steps to making your favorite sandwich. But the more you try to slow yourself down during sex, the faster you finish—and you’re not alone.

“Premature ejaculation is a problem that affects almost every man at some point in his life,” says Thomas J. Walsh, M.D., a urologist at the University of Washington.

Dr. Walsh says there are primarily two methods of dealing with your speed issues: physical and psychological treatments. While physical remedies target the sensations you feel during sex, psychological solutions address your worry, stress, or other mental factors that may explain your quick trigger, Dr. Walsh explains.

Here, he and other experts break down a few of the most helpful techniques for dealing with premature ejaculation (PE). But be warned: Dr. Walsh recommends trying these out on your own before attempting them during sex.

The Dangerous Disease That 25% of Men Over 40 Have (and Often Don’t Know It)

Your medical history might have some serious holes in it. Nearly 80 percent of people with a common liver disease aren’t diagnosed, finds a new study from Baylor College of Medicine.

In the study, researchers determined that participants had non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD)—an often-symptom-free accumulation of fat in the liver—if their lab work showed persistently elevated liver enzymes and no indication of organ-damaging factors like hepatitis or excessive alcohol use.

Why Working Out With Your Girlfriend Helps You Build Muscle Faster

The first time I joined a gym, I was 24 and scrawny. The jacked guy at the front desk said all new members received a T-shirt and asked me for my size. Small, I said. He threw me a muumuu.

“This is a large,” he replied. “It’s all we have. Once you start lifting, you’ll fill it out.”

Hardly. I lasted 8 months.

But then I proposed to Jen, a onetime runner and yoga nut who had largely abandoned those pursuits to sit around with me. With our upcoming nuptials, the threat of shame finally loomed large: If we didn’t shape up and sharpen our softening bodies, we’d be gathering our loved ones together for a display of our shortcomings.

Drink This, Sleep 90 More Minutes A Night

No, it's not whiskey. New research from Louisiana State University finds that drinking tart cherry juice twice a day can help you sleep nearly 90 more minutes a night.

Researchers had seven older adults with insomnia drink eight ounces of Montmorency tart cherry juice twice a day for two weeks, followed by two weeks of no juice, and then two more weeks of drinking a placebo beverage. Compared to the placebo, drinking the cherry juice resulted in an average of 84 more minutes of sleep time each night.

Cherry juice is a natural source of the sleep-wake cycle hormone melatonin and the amino acid tryptophan, says study coauthor Frank L. Greenway, director of the outpatient research clinic at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center at LSU.

Why Your Grandparents Are Having Better Sex Than You

The perfect 50th anniversary gift? Lingerie.

Married couples’ sex lives start to rebound after half a century together, a new study from Baylor University finds.

Researchers interviewed older spouses about their bedroom habits. True to conventional wisdom, the longer a couple had been married, the less often they slept together. That’s because sex with the same person can get less exciting as the years tick by, says study author Samuel Stroope, Ph.D., a professor of sociology at Baylor.

The Best Things to Say before, during, and after Sex

It doesn’t matter if you’re having a romantic dinner for two or getting busy between the sheets—regardless of the situation, women love to talk to you.

That’s because for women, verbal communication is key to emotional intimacy, says relationship psychologist Terri Orbuch, Ph.D., a research scientist at the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research and author of Finding Love Again.