What Are The Effects Of Overtraining?

Over-training is becoming  a serious issue with many women and men who exercise often! The way to beat it or avoid over-training is not easy for some, since intense exercising is very hard to track and monitor, plus you love to workout hard!

Normally the effects of over-training are often hard to spot, but the evidence becomes quite clear when drops in strength and gains show. Over-training is very common and occurs frequently when a person training goes over their maximum limit of exercise and create more catabolism rather than inducing anabolism.

When training most people are looking for the anabolism which causes muscles to form and strength to build. What they don’t want is catabolism, which happens when the body’s performance drops and the intense fatigue or exhaustion kicks in.

The body responds in many different ways to over-training than just getting tired or sore muscles after a workout. Studies have shown that the body actually gets fatigued and mental health is in jeopardy. It’s been proved that over-training is actually liked to depression and can cause anxiety, sleeplessness, stress, irritability and even heart problems.

The strange part about athletes who over-train is that most of the time they are unaware that they are doing it. But symptoms like these make it much more easy to spot, then corrective action can be taken to ensure that overt-training is avoided and can be monitored.

Athletes who over-train tend to experience a lack of motivation and a feeling of failure after then workout. Since the body is not able to continue the strain of the workout, they are forced to give up and leave the exercise feeling at a loss.

Common Ways To Avoid The Effects Of Over-training

  • Balance Diet – Many people don’t realize that they need to eat carbohydrates, and they are extremely important for post workouts. Protein, Carbohydrates, Electrolytes all play an important role in the recovery from exercises and so does having a complete balance diet. A proper nutrition filled with all the essential vitamins and nutrients is very important, which is why you should be taking a multi-vitamin to avoid deficiencies.
  • Glycogen Levels – Glycogen is what your body uses for energy for workouts and regular daily activities. Without energy the body will have trouble functioning and repair or growing muscle tissues. So it’s important to maintain glycogen stores before and after workouts especially to avoid over-training. Do this by eating complex carbohydrates frequently.
  • Rest – Days off are just as important as workout days, the more you rest the more chance your muscles have to grow and recover. So it doesn’t hurt to take an extra day off now and then, doing so will help avoid over-training issues.
  • Workout Plan – Sticking to a regular or monitored workout plan can help athletes avoid the pitfalls of over-training. Without a plan, you won’t know when to stop or finish, thus making it easy to fall into the over-training trap. Even if you feel like doing more exercises, you may not want to because you will over train. So a plan keeps your workouts in check!
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2 Responses to What Are The Effects Of Overtraining?

  1. Pingback: 5k: The Training Effect – Some Thoughts « The 5k Runner

  2. Pingback: The Three Cornerstones of Training « From the Flight Deck

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