Many athletes have learned to exploit this benefit. In carefully controlled experiments, adding a soundtrack helps rowers, sprinters, and swimmers shave seconds off their times. Runners can tolerate extreme heat and humidity longer, and triathletes can push themselves farther before reaching exhaustion. Moving to music even leads athletes to consume less oxygen as they exert themselves, as if the song itself supplies some of the energy they need. Findings like this led the authors of a scientific review in the Annals of Sports Medicine and Research to conclude that music is a legal
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