Recovering from overtraining

Patto said:

Unfortunately i have ventured into overtraining territory. I have been off the bike pretty much since the 20/12/04, do i just keep waiting untill the tiredness in my legs disapears? Every now and then i have a light 1 hr spin but my legs remain sore and tired. Any tips on recovery?

Are you sure it's overtraining? Could it be nutrition related? Have you seen a doctor or have you had any blood work done? While it can take a month or more to overcome, it is probably a good idea to rule out other medical causes of your fatigue since you've felt this way for a long time.

I agree with 10 city.

My past experience from overtraining I have generally recovered within a week from muscular fatigue or over exertion by applying recovery nutrition, rest, massage therapy and stretching. There have been times that the overtraining led to an illness from lowering the immune system and most of the time the symptoms would be like a head or chest cold, throat infection or flu like symptoms. However, I have never had an experience where overtraining lasted for weeks on end. Not saying it couldn't happen, but if you are applying recovery techniques you should be able to recover within a couple weeks.

Hopefully one of the cycling coaches will chime in and give you some advice.

From personal experience a deep overtraining syndrome can take quite long to get back from. Last winter-season I made the mistake of spending waayyyy to much time doing anaerobic training in spin-classes and as a result went total bunk by November. Throughout Nov. and Dec. I was unable to train more that 1-2hrs/week before almost faling of the bike. A full 8 weeks went by, before I was able to undertake any serious training again :eek:

Quoted post said:

From Friels "the cyclists training bible"
Page 230, Fig 17.1 overtraining indicators:

Behavioral:[indent]Apathy, Lethargy, Depression, Poor concentration, Sleep patterns change, Irritability, Decreased libido, Clumsiness, Increased thirst, Sluggishness, Craving for sugar
[/indent]Physical:
[indent]Reduced performance, Weight change, Morning heart rate change, Musle sorenss, Swollen lymhps glands, Diarrhea, Injury, Infection, Amoenorrhea, Decreased exercise heart rate, Slow-healing cuts[/indent]

One of the things I learned the hard way last season, is to avoid any heavy dieting while training hard. I tried going for a 1000 calories deficit/day for a week, while doing lots of endurace riding and deep-end anaerobic intervals, well by sunday I completely 'dried' out, took me two weeks to get back to baseline performance 🙁

I'd recommend getting Burkes "Serious cycling" and/or Friels "The cyclists training bible", these books are pratically tomes nicely outlining all the mistakes I've made over the last 18 months of trying to get fit enough to race 😄.

Hey i know how u feel i have been feelining ill and fatigued since Feb 04 i didn't know i was in the overtraining state until i saw a specialist in dec 04. I play Soccer and played on until the end of the season even tho iwas dead on my feet in work for the entire week. iam in my 3rd week of rest and iam feeling a little better but have a few days when iam so tired and thirsty its so hard. i have had all the blood test done and they havent found anything. Any ideas on how how to recover from this "syndrome"

Patto said:

Unfortunately i have ventured into overtraining territory. I have been off the bike pretty much since the 20/12/04, do i just keep waiting untill the tiredness in my legs disapears? Every now and then i have a light 1 hr spin but my legs remain sore and tired. Any tips on recovery?

toa said:

One of the things I learned the hard way last season, is to avoid any heavy dieting while training hard. I tried going for a 1000 calories deficit/day for a week, while doing lots of endurace riding and deep-end anaerobic intervals, well by sunday I completely 'dried' out, took me two weeks to get back to baseline performance 🙁

Unfortunately I had to learn this the hard way to. Too long/hard workouts for several weeks with calorie dificiency resulted in a complete loss of power / feeling of fatigue. I ate lots of carbohydrates many days in a row and was back within a few days.

To the orginal question: My experience with recovering from overtraining/overreaching/deep fatigue is to do short, low intensity (recovery training) and eat those carbohydrates. Do not push yourself. If you feel you have no power, back off! Do only what your body/legs *wants* to do, you should not push yourself. In a recovery period like this, I would say it's much better to hold back a little in every workout, rather than pushing a little in every workout. Eat your carbohydrates. Drink. Do only what your body wants to do.

______
Aaberg

matt501 said:

Hey i know how u feel i have been feelining ill and fatigued since Feb 04 i didn't know i was in the overtraining state until i saw a specialist in dec 04. I play Soccer and played on until the end of the season even tho iwas dead on my feet in work for the entire week. iam in my 3rd week of rest and iam feeling a little better but have a few days when iam so tired and thirsty its so hard. i have had all the blood test done and they havent found anything. Any ideas on how how to recover from this "syndrome"

I'm no doctor but I would suspect that your dealing with a diet issue. It shouldn't take 3 weeks to recover, anything more than a week and something is wrong. You might want to look at your intake, how much and what types of foods your eating.

Just my thoughts.
Dan.

i have breakfast cerial before work then at 10am i have some toast and a banana the at 1pm i have a meal filled sandwich with a yoghurt and a piece of fruit and a biscuit. then a main meal about 7 pm with a piece of fruit. Any ideas on wot i should be eating to help recover?

BanditManDan said:

I'm no doctor but I would suspect that your dealing with a diet issue. It shouldn't take 3 weeks to recover, anything more than a week and something is wrong. You might want to look at your intake, how much and what types of foods your eating.

Just my thoughts.
Dan.

matt501 said:

i have breakfast cerial before work then at 10am i have some toast and a banana the at 1pm i have a meal filled sandwich with a yoghurt and a piece of fruit and a biscuit. then a main meal about 7 pm with a piece of fruit. Any ideas on wot i should be eating to help recover?

I can't say if your getting enough calories or not based on your response, it sounds healthy enough though. What I typically do after a workout is eat a faily large amount of both carbs and protien. After a vigarous workout you need to replace the glycogen in the muscles since they have been depleated. This should be done in the first 1 to 2 hours after a workout by eating or drinking high carb foods/drinks. Secondly you'll want to eat some lean protein to help your body repair the damaged muscle tissues.

As a pre-workout meal I would go heavy on carb's (i.e. rice, pasta). This should provide your muscles with the energy it needs for intense sessions.

Again, this is just my opinion based on my experiences.

Hope it helps.

Dan.

I too have had leg fatigue for about a week now. I've condluded it is not normal since my legs are still fatigued after a day of complete rest. I'm thinking of taking a week off and swimming. Maybe a few very light spins (3 in the week).

Could this be a good idea?

sparknote_s said:

I too have had leg fatigue for about a week now. I've condluded it is not normal since my legs are still fatigued after a day of complete rest. I'm thinking of taking a week off and swimming. Maybe a few very light spins (3 in the week).

Could this be a good idea?

When it comes to regular training, and we find ourselves pushing out of the comfort zone, then there will be soreness and the usual tiredness.

I'm just wondering what 'fatigue' means to most of the cyclists here. If it is very sore but not swollen then I guess proper warm up and cool down sessions with lots of stretching help. If however the fatigue means 'noticeable weakness' in the limbs, then I think this is caused by pushing too hard, too often, too soon. In this situation, it's best to reduce the intensity of the power workouts and just go for aerobic training.

Assuming that there is proper nutrition and rest. The gradual building up of training intensity should not lead to deep fatigue. In my personal experience, dehydration led to a state of tiredness which lasted 2 weeks; also in another case, over supply of vitamins and supplements led to shortness of breath and the legs feeling very stiff during training.

Felt_Rider said:

I agree with 10 city.

My past experience from overtraining I have generally recovered within a week from muscular fatigue or over exertion by applying recovery nutrition, rest, massage therapy and stretching. There have been times that the overtraining led to an illness from lowering the immune system and most of the time the symptoms would be like a head or chest cold, throat infection or flu like symptoms. However, I have never had an experience where overtraining lasted for weeks on end. Not saying it couldn't happen, but if you are applying recovery techniques you should be able to recover within a couple weeks.

Hopefully one of the cycling coaches will chime in and give you some advice.

if you're overtrained the recovery from it can take many weeks to months to years. if you recover within a week or some such small time frame it isn't overtraining.

ric

So is this why iam taking so long!! I Was feeling Fatigued, ill, rundown and generaly unwell for well over a year!! I keep getting Colds and chest infections too. So How long would you say it takes to recover from a bad case of overtraining syndrome? I wasn't just overtraining i was working really hard, just bought a house and was doing it and the garden up, as well as traiining twice a week and playing a hard game of football (Soccer) on a saturday. I have changed my eating habbits since and try to eat more fruit and veg and more carbs such as pasta and potatoes.

After 3 weeks rest iam still struggling!!!

ric_stern/RST said:

if you're overtrained the recovery from it can take many weeks to months to years. if you recover within a week or some such small time frame it isn't overtraining.

ric

If you recover within a small time frame (e.g.) a week or so, this is likely due to under eating (not enough carbohydrates), lack of sufficient rest, incorrect training, it was planned (i.e., over reaching - which is followed by a rest period and then you 'super compensate'😉 or some such.

Overtraining or unexplained under performance syndrome is a somewhat different animal in that it will generally take months to years to recover from (anecdotally i have heard of people not recovering after several years).

With overtraining/UUPS there are no biological markers for the condition available yet (i.e., you can't go for a blood test to be diagnosed) and the mechanism responsible for the syndrome has yet to be fully ellucidated. The condition is poorly understood (especially by e.g., family doctors).

The only 'marker' of the condition is continuous poor performance that can't be explained by other factors. Rest appears to be currently the only option to encourge recovery.

ric

matt501 said:

So is this why iam taking so long!! I Was feeling Fatigued, ill, rundown and generaly unwell for well over a year!! I keep getting Colds and chest infections too. So How long would you say it takes to recover from a bad case of overtraining syndrome? I wasn't just overtraining i was working really hard, just bought a house and was doing it and the garden up, as well as traiining twice a week and playing a hard game of football (Soccer) on a saturday. I have changed my eating habbits since and try to eat more fruit and veg and more carbs such as pasta and potatoes.

After 3 weeks rest iam still struggling!!!

Although overtraining is no longer an area of specialisation for me, it's highly unlikely that training 3x's/week plus fairly normal life stresses are going to cause overtraining. Thus far researchers haven't been able to cause overtraining in subjects even with a doubling of training loads in well trained athletes.

It could be that you are training incorrectly, not sufficiently, not enough rest or simply haven't recovered properly from your infections.

ric

some basics i can offer on overtraining:
there is a concept of a training triangle. side one : training (exertion)
side two: recuperation (rest/sleep)
side three: nutrition (refueling)

when we have the above with unequal sides we cannot get maximum benefits from training.

for example, if you train like a S@B and don't get the sleep, no recovery.

or, you could skimp on the training yet get sleep and not get max benefits.

maybe eat poorly, become poorly fueled and replenished.

if you can afford the time it is difficult to become overtrained if these sides of the triangle are balanced. but most have a demanding life outside cycling and must compromise. this prvent us from maximizing the three components, as does each person's individual capacity for training intensities, durations and
recuperative needs.
most people have some imbalance with this, you can get by with a a bit of imbalance and just get a diminishing level of return on your investment.

or, you can go into the symptoms of what is conceptualy known as the overtraining spiral. works like this,

you are too shot to train hard, but keep at it. eventualy, you can only train a a level too low to be productive, but you keep at it and further deplete your stores, lose immune defenses, forget were you parked your car, get cranky.
probably be prone to sickness and injury.
yet still can train hard once in a while if only from dedication and nervous system exertion. probably you will lose appetite and have unsettled sleep.

but mostly you are practicing going slow, and as specificty dictates, you become adapted to going slow. not to be confused with productive base training.
by this time there are few endorphins to be activating the "runner's high" available.

even though the evidence of the truth in this is right in our faces, the cycling enthusiast refuses to face reality. what is needed is a week off. a week off is unimaginable for many. "won't i lose fitness?" "get slow?"
time to stop denial.

you can come back with fresh legs, clear head, and be ready to train in a productive manner where overload is applied and recovered from.
a good basis for training with periodic cycles of improved fitness can then be practically established.

now if you need more than a week, it might be wise to get a blood panel workup to identify any serious diagnosis such as chronic fatigue syndrome or it's counterparts...

Patto said:

Unfortunately i have ventured into overtraining territory. I have been off the bike pretty much since the 20/12/04, do i just keep waiting untill the tiredness in my legs disapears? Every now and then i have a light 1 hr spin but my legs remain sore and tired. Any tips on recovery?

Hypnospin said:

now if you need more than a week, it might be wise to get a blood panel workup to identify any serious diagnosis such as chronic fatigue syndrome or it's counterparts...

as i stated in my previous post -- if you are overtrained it won't be cured with a weeks rest. It requires many months to years to recover from, and possibly years. There are no indicators either, other than continued, decreased unexplained under performance (hence the name unexplained under performance syndrome as another name for overtraining).

ric

no indicators then? a reccomend from a coach can serve as an indicator i would respectfuly submit, and that then would qualify.
and some knowledgeable, respected and successful coaches do indeed schedule a week off as a matter of course...
it seems our nomenclature is vague here. overtraining by definition could be resolved in a week, if only in certain cases.
we just define our terms or risk making blanket statements that may not apply to the majority.

ric_stern/RST said:

as i stated in my previous post -- if you are overtrained it won't be cured with a weeks rest. It requires many months to years to recover from, and possibly years. There are no indicators either, other than continued, decreased unexplained under performance (hence the name unexplained under performance syndrome as another name for overtraining).

ric

Hypnospin said:

no indicators then? a reccomend from a coach can serve as an indicator i would respectfuly submit, and that then would qualify.
and some knowledgeable, respected and successful coaches do indeed schedule a week off as a matter of course...
it seems our nomenclature is vague here. overtraining by definition could be resolved in a week, if only in certain cases.
we just define our terms or risk making blanket statements that may not apply to the majority.

having a week off will not solve overtraining, it is a serious issue that requires a long period of recovery. i suggest you read some of the primary literature

ric

ric_stern/RST said:

having a week off will not solve overtraining, it is a serious issue that requires a long period of recovery. i suggest you read some of the primary literature

ric

Overtraining leads to a state of reduced performance. Mostly requires longer recovery times. Just listen to your heart, monitor heart rate during rest and during training, it helps prevent it. If overtrained but not injured, just train at a lower intensity and lower output than usual.

I wondering.... if the overtraining discussed here takes many weeks to even a year to recover from, isn't that "burnout?" That sounds more like injury. Stuff like that tends to happen when using performance enhancing drugs or pain-killers to force through training.

I'm also interested to know what are the 'primary literature' refered to. Can anyone suggest a few sources or authors.