Workout Recovery and Overtraining

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Rest and recovery is essential to any training program, especially if you want to train long-term and sustainable growth. From personal experience doing the wrong thing, I think it is more important than training itself. We only workout for a small portion of our days and if we are giving everything we have to that workout we will have nothing left. 

While training is good for your body, the more intense you train the more intensely you need to schedule rest. If you don’t schedule rest, you could stall in your progress, deplete nutrients faster, and sustain injuries. 

It is easy to get caught up in the muscle gains and weight losses and start to train for hours and hours without rest. Kind of leading to an obsession (although you may not realize it or call it that). 

This happened to me this year. I was teaching and training 3-4 hours a day – I couldn’t gain muscle or lose weight so I worked out harder because I had gotten caught in the momentum of training for results. After 3 months of this I experienced great adrenal fatigue. I could barely get out of bed and was forced to stop training at all. My hormones were greatly imbalanced and took over a month for me to even get back to the gym. Even now I have to take it easy and am lifting little volume compared to what I was doing in the spring. 

Here are some of my rest and recovery tips to replenish your body and give you the ability to sustain your training and your life. 

Plan it Out!

• Every 3-5 weeks plan a rest week – half the reps and half the weight used for big lifts. 

• Delayed onset muscle soreness—DOMS, for short—is a common sensation felt after lifting weights. Most trainees actually base the success or effectiveness of their training sessions on how sore they get; however, this is not a good way to think about your progress. Typically, DOMS is characterized by muscle tenderness, stiffness, and reduced joint range of motion, muscle flexibility and force production, about 24 hours after your training session. Compensating for muscle fiber damage and returning to the gym prematurely will increase your risk for injury.
• Ensure you have 24-72 hours rest between intense training sessions involving the same musculature. Less rest is needed between sub-maximal training sessions.

Sleep

• It has been shown that lack of adequate sleep can decrease the tolerance to training, throw off hormone balance, alter mood, increase perception of fatigue and negatively affect the physiological mechanisms responsible for adaptation from the stresses of training. Hormonal secretion during sleep is one of the most important factors influencing recovery; after all, the purpose of sleep is to induce a state of recovery in the body. Anabolic (muscle-building) hormone concentrations and activity increase during sleep while catabolic (muscle-wasting) hormone concentrations and activity decrease. Disrupted or shortened sleep will negatively influence the effects of these anabolic hormones.
• Try to develop a regular sleeping routine where you go to bed at a similar time each night of the week. Remove distractions like light, smartphones, and TVs. If possible, try for 8 hours of sleep per night and/or fit in an afternoon power nap for 30 minutes to rejuvenate the body.

Hydrate

• Dehydration can reduce performance potential, but also delay the recovery process. Exercise and an increased metabolic rate both increase the body’s need for water and electrolytes. So water just isn’t enough. 
• If you are sweating, you are losing not just H2O but magnesium, sodium, and potassium. If you are just drinking water thinking this will do it, you are also just washing out and depleting those micronutrients more. For excessive workouts (intensity and/or longer than 40 minutes), workouts in the heat, or the like, add in an electrolyte. BUT watch those packets for added sugars and make sure they have sodium, potassium, and magnesium… not just one of them. 
• Also, shoot for ½ the ounces of weight in pounds you are. So if I weighed 150lbs I would need at least 75 ounces for a normal day. Add in 8 ounces for every 30-60 minutes of activity too depending on the intensity level. 

Nutrition

• Recovery is a time where proper nutrition is essential. Protein sources are required to rebuild muscle tissue and to supply the building blocks for various cells, tissues, enzymes, and hormones. Depending on how often you train during the week, protein recommendations can range from .08 to 1.2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day.
• Carbohydrates, on the other hand, are muscles’ major source of energy; therefore, eating carbohydrates is essential at refueling your body’s glycogen stores. Your body refuels glycogen at a higher rate within 3.0 to 60 minutes post workout so it’s important to consume a post workout snack or shake during this time. It has also been shown that including a small amount of protein in this snack speeds up the rebuilding and recovery process.
• Eat a post workout snack that contains roughly 50 grams of carbohydrates and 30 grams of protein. A well-balanced meal should be consumed roughly 2 hours post workout to continue the recovery process.
• A great and easy way to do this is to make a protein shake using the rule of 5:
  • Protein Shake
    • Ingredients (one serving)- Follow the Rule of 5
      • 1c. Liquid (almond milk, low fat milk, coconut milk)
      • Handful Greens (spinach or kale – I love frozen chopped spinach)
      • 1c. Fiber (Berries, cherries, banana, apple, tropical fruits, canned pumpkin, etc)
      • 20-30g/one scoop Protein (plant or whey based – look for one with 10g or less of carbs per serving)
      • 1 TBSP Healthy Fat (Chia seeds, flax seeds, nut butters, avocado)
    • Directions
      • Blend over ice and enjoy.
    • Extras
      • I love to make two or three of these for a day. I will just put in extra ice when I blend them, and then take them in a cooler bag for after workout and usually my lunch. This is a complete meal and is fun to play around with. 
      • Sometimes I will add almond, pumpkin spice, vanilla, or coconut extract. I love to add cinnamon or even some stevia drops to change up flavors

Massage

• Massage from a therapist or self-massage AKA self myofascial release (SMR) with foam rollers, massage sticks and even baseballs can reduce muscle stiffness, promote circulation and induce a state of relaxation in the muscle. It might be painful during, but SMR can be performed the night of a hard workout to remove scar tissue, adhesions in the muscle and restrictions in the fascia (a type of connective tissue that wraps around the whole body).
• Gently roll a baseball or massage stick over all major muscle groups until you find a sensitive spot. Apply direct pressure until the pain dissipates. Roll over the muscle again and repeat if necessary. Even if massage doesn’t speed up recovery, it might make you feel better compared to not getting massaged in the first place.

OVER TRAINING

There is a fine line between overtraining and a healthy lifestyle. Many (especially women who have an innate desire to feel confident and beautiful) have no clue how much they actually are overtraining. 

You can overtrain by hitting it too hard in the gym as a beginner. Don’t ever think that the inability to sit on the toilet because you’re sore is a good thing. No go hard or go home mentality here. You can also over train by training too long, too heavy, and too often. 

Symptoms of overtraining are mainly in three categories: performance, physiological, and psychological

• Performance
  • Decreasing in stats
  • Early onset of fatigue during workouts
  • Slowed or delayed recovery
  • Not scheduling rest
  • Not able to lose weight even with extended workout sessions or even gaining in spite of being spot on in nutrition
• Physiological
  • Feeling sore for extended periods of time
  • Increase in injuries
  • Always getting or feeling sick
  • Increase in Resting Heart Rate
  • Feeling low energy and fatigue all the time
  • Not sleeping well
• Psychological 
  • Impatient
  • Irritable
  • Mood swings
  • Large dips in motivation, enthusiasm, and drive
  • Difficulty concentrating

Tips to help overtraining and balance your hormones better – decrease your lifting days, switch up your workout routines, decrease the amount of time in the gym, get more sleep, and make sure you are getting the correct micronutrients.