E-Coach Training Tips
Here is this week’s E-coaching tip….
It’s getting late in the season and it has been a long year of training and racing. We may still have one more key late season race to cap off 2009. Let’s talk about Overtraining and Prevention. This discussion could very well have great importance back in late June or early July as well.
We are probably all guilty of this at least once a season. You don’t feel you are making tremendous fitness gains or you aren’t seeing results fast enough. What do you do, must need to train longer and/or at higher intensity. On a well planned training program, this is probably not the case. This may work once, but more often than not, you won’t see the gains or may even feel worse because our bodies are not getting the proper recovery it needs to grow from the training or racing stresses being put on it.
What are some of key signs and symptoms of overtraining?
- Inability to sustain certain power or heart rate levels that were reached in previous good training sessions. May be decreased HR levels and/or take longer to reach a target HR Zone.
- Increased resting heart rate (watch that it is not a sign of a cold or other illness)
- Muscle pain or fatigue (do your legs feel cooked after climbing some stairs at home or work?)
- Mental fatigue from your training and racing focus can cause burnout
- Interruption of your normal sleep pattern and possible mood disturbances
- Loss of appetite
- Loss of desire to train
Many athletes underestimate how essential it is for rest and recovery to gain fitness, especially have heavy training periods. So what we can we do to prevent overtraining???
- Have a good training periodization planned out between coach and athlete with rest/active recovery days noted
- Proper nutrition to refuel the body after training and racing
- Sleep
- Learn to listen to your body and see the warning signs before it’s too late.
You will know when you are ready to train hard again because you will be vaulting up those stairs with no pain and your legs will be itching to get out. Remember that as fitness increases, so does the ability to recover. Every individual is different so know your body and listen to your head. It is always better to be over-rested than over-trained.