San Marcos — The past few weeks have presented sort of a paradox for me.

A paradox according to Webster’s dictionary is “a statement that seems contradictory, but may be true in fact.” This is also the season for running half and full marathons.

The paradox comes when I hear statements like, “Anyone who would run more than 26 miles at once has got to be crazy,” or “Those runners out there on the roads running 20 miles or so have no sense at all.”

Where the paradox came about was when I started reading the book, “Spark, The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain.”

It seems to be a popular book as when my wife tried buying it online, it is always sold out. Thank goodness for Kindle.

This book presents some solid facts and research about how exercise increases brain nerves and makes people smarter.

One example mentions a school in Naperville, Ill. that took an international test that competes with China, Japan and Korea who are usually at the top of the list. Students at Naperville gathered in a first place in the science category and sixth in the math section. It was the only school in the nation to be listed in this test.

One factor seems to be that students at the school have a “zero hour” class. Zero hour is voluntary and starts before first period in school — hence the zero classification. It is a class where students run a mile, do exercises and play vigorous games that hour before school officially starts.

The book is designed to make some of this research understandable for a lay person, but even at that it is somewhat hard to understand. The research shows that exercise makes the nerve paths more efficient, encourages new growth in brain cells, makes the path between synapses stronger and helps improve memory.

If that is the case, then marathon runners must be getting smarter while out there on the roads.

There is a product called BDNF (brain-derived neurotropic factor) and the author uses the term as the ‘Miracle-Gro’ for the brain. Pictures of the brain after activity showed various sections of the brain being activated.

Studies with mice who were put on a voluntary program of exercise showed that the mice that ran the longest time on a wheel showed the greatest gain in weight of their brains.

A comment from the book fits this column when it states, “This remodeling of the synapses has a huge impact on the circuits capacity to process information, which is profoundly good news. What it means is that you have the power to change your brain. All you have to do is lace up your running shoes.”

Then I read this week’s Newsweek magazine and the cover and main topic was, “31 ways to get smarter, faster.”

The third way mentioned in the feature was basically telling you to do an activity. “Look for an activity that raises your heart rate and requires a lot of coordination.”

Following that article the recent issue of Time magazine featured another story on exercise and the brain in its ‘Health and Science’ section. The article had a title of, “The reason for recess. Children who are more physically active may do better in school.”

The article mentions several studies of how students do better when they get exercise. “Students need about one hour of physical activity EVERY (my emphasis) day to remain healthy...”

The problem with this, and where that paradox pops up, is that only 18 percent of high schools met this requirement, and 23 percent had not exercised at all during that period.

While running may make it easier to learn the one statement in the book mentions that while learning can be increased, you have to have something to learn or it won’t work.

The one consolation to all of this information coming out is that it came out over the vacation time for schools, and administrators won’t have to justify cutting back on physical education classes, because who ever studies over vacation time?

Dr. Maurice Johnson is a former professor at Texas State University in the Department of Health and Exercise Science. His column appears every Sunday in the Daily Record.