Hi all!
Some recent posts just got me to thinking. Now, I know that the recommendations from personal trainers etc. are that you work one body part and give it time to rest. And there are lots of questions about overtraining.
But I just remembered by DH on basic training -- from zero to 100 mph for 3 months without the "train one day and rest" philosophy. And his activity ranged from daily PT/runs, followed by marches with backpacks, digging of trenches, night manoeuvers, etc. All of this without the care and attention of the "work a bit, rest alot" philosophy. At the end of this training, he was uninjured and ripped!
Now I know you can't you sustain this intensity indefinitely. But then how did my grandmother work the fields by hand all those years without taking time off between stooking sessions (where they put the hay up in stooks, or bundles, by hand) unless she was birthing her 16 kids (3 sets of twins)? And all the cooking, and laundry, and maintaining the kitchen garden so noone starved???
So, the question is this: should the average person even worry about overtraining?
My grandfather exercises seven days per week for three - four hours a day, same exercises every single day, plus he works in his garden every day (and it is huge, so lots of physical work) and runs a construction company so often goes out on paving jobs and the like. He doesn't seem concerned about 'overtraining' either. Now, he doesn't do heavy lifting or anything - treadmill, walking, push ups, situps, then then manual labor or gardening, paving, etc.
Me, if I exercise too many days in a row I'm pooped and then miss a few to make up for it...
Good question - I'm interested to see what people have to say.
My take: most of us are at far greater risk of undertraining than overtraining. Women, especially, seem to underestimate what they can do and not work hard enough at the gym. This is especially the case when it comes to lifting weights. (Men, by contrast, are more likely to choose weights that are too heavy for their ability, because of the whole "I can bench press 4-bazillion" macho thing.)
That being said, I'd make a distinction between the average person who is an occasional exerciser and moderately healthy eater and the average "completely untrained overweight 55-year old beer-drinking and french-fry eating couch potato." The latter do occasionally die from overdoing it -- e.g., shoveling heavy snow. It's hard to call that "overtraining", though, because there wasn't any training in the first place!
I think it all comes down to age and general physical activity. If your body isn't used to working hard 7 days a week for hours at a time, you're going to feel it after a couple days. And the younger you are, the better your body will adapt to major changes like boot camp. But for those of us in our 30's that haven't had a life of hard work or constant exercise, it takes longer to get our resilience up and be able to exercise for longer periods of time every day.
I think I've only experienced overtraining once in my life and that was last year. If you are overtraining, you will know it.
Having said that, there are things that work better than others in many aspects. Like rotating muscle groups helps give your body time to build the muscle. If you are using light weights/no weights (and not body weight), then resting the muscle usually doesn't make sense. If you are sore, I find doing some light workout actually helps rather than hurts.
I personally enjoy pushing myself a bit but I do realize there have been times when I've pushed myself too much.
Although I can't do it anymore, when I first started and doing serious workouts in a gym, I did a 600 lb leg press. It was very odd to move that many 25 lb plates to the leg press and it was a bit scary. I got a few comments from the guys in the gym about it.
I'm more about squats these days and home workouts rather than the gym.
Kira - I recommend the New Rules of Lifting for Women, its awesome.
I've never really been much of an exerciser but I gained weight gradually over the years. When I decided in 2007 that enough was enough, I started to exercise and watch my diet and lost 33 pounds that year. I also ended up doing some damage to my left knee, so that for the last 2 years, it clicks everytime I go up stairs and it gets sore sooner than the other one. I'm thinking the damage may seem minor now but I wonder what'll happen in the future. On the one hand, I want the weight to come off because that's less pressure on the knees in the first place but, on the other hand, I do worry about making it worse with exercise, since that is what caused the damage in the first place. A few weeks ago I gave myself shin splints, the effects of which I felt for a week. It makes me nervous because when I get sore, it doesn't go away in a day or two, it takes a while longer, and that tends to make me wonder if I'm doing more harm than good to myself.
Last edited by trekkiegirl; 06-08-2009 at 11:54 PM.
I was raised in a home where good girls sat quietly.
I remember being in my mid thirties ... I stenciled an archway in our house. My neck and shoulders ached! I took meds, went to the chiropractor. I considered myself ill from overwork. When the chiropractor suggested some exercises that would strengthen and supple-up my shoulders ... I was aghast! I'd assumed he would tell me to take some bedrest.
Later, I learned the difference between nicely aching post-workout muscles and legs so sore (from attempting heavy lifting) that it interfered with my work.
I've learned the differences in my body. An ache is not a pain. Hurting won't necessarily harm me. But pain is a signal.
The beautiful ache is relieved by gentle exercise. For instance "It felt OK once I got going".
If I have overdone an exercise (for me it's often bicep curls with my left arm) I can't do the reps near as well as last time. There's pain in my elbow, sheer weariness in the muscles. Failure comes remarkably early.
So the answer to your question (in my case) is that we, the fairer sex do tend to tread lightly. We underestimate our bodies, sadly.
I think the average person doesn't work out/train hard enough to worry about overdoing it. I believe that a lot of people don't give their bodies enough credit for what they're actually capable of and most people probably could really push themselves a lot harder. Having said that I do think that someone with an injury needs to be more careful about it.
Your Marine husband was a male in his teens or early 20s and was weight-height proportionate, Kira. How much of that is true for most of the folks who post here?
I think that most people can work a lot harder than they think they can, but I also believe the harder you work, the greater your risk for injury. Only you can decide how much of a risk you're willing to take, and gradually increasing strength and stamina is a legitimate choice.
I do think I'm a little overcautious about exercise (maybe more than a little), because I learned the hard way that pain needs to be respected. I herniated disks in my back on one occasion (that was a nightmare with months of recovery) and another time got a stress fractures in my foot (so thin at first that it didn't show up on xrays, so I thought it was just pain from being fat and ignored it for another year - before finding out the small bones in my foot were broken in several places). I've had other more minor, but painful injuries like plantar's fasciitis, muscle sprains, strains, and tears... that might have been prevented if I'd been a bit more cautious (in technique if not intensity).
A solution for me has been water exercise, because there's almost no risk of overexertion injuries. I can exercise at intensities and for much longer in the water than I can on land. I can get my heart rate up and keep it up (on land, I'm ready to pass out, wheezing, out of breath, with calf muscles and feet burning after a few minutes).
I think our bodies were designed to handle a LOT more physical activity than we give it. Our daily American life has just gotten so sedentary, we forget, and think that one hour a day of movement is a lot! We have gotten so out of touch with our capacity to do work that for many of us, the very feeling of physical exertion (sweating, breathing hard, muscles getting tired and a little sore) feels - wrong. It's sad, really.
However, I don't think we can or should just go from couch potato to ripped athlete without ramping up gradually. Muscles atrophy from disuse, and it takes time to reverse the process. It's worse if we are carrying around a lot of extra weight to start too -- tendons, ligaments and bones need to adjust to the extra demands. How quickly one can ramp up activity depends on genetics, age, general health, and so on. Otherwise we risk injury. So yes, I do think the average person has to take, if not rest days, at least days of lesser activity, to give their "system" a chance to adapt and rebuild from the new stresses. Overtraining syndrome is very real.
But I think any of us could be amazed at what we can physically do, given diligent training and time ....
Soreness isn't a sign of overtraining, its a sign of using muscles we haven't used before to a certain level. I like soreness and even if the soreness lasts for a few days, I am fine with it. I know I might've pushed myself a little far.
I also think we do have to take in account somewhat our own bodies. An example is my husband and I went hiking 8 miles the weekend before last. It was the longest hike we've ever done but we also haven't been hiking regularly this season. I'm not sure if I slept wrong because I was tired (we were sleeping on the ground) or if the mixture of hiking on a lot of uneven terrain and weak core muscles caused it, but I woke up the next day with an aching back. We can hike but a long hike and uneven terrain (I wasn't aware that it was a rocky hike before we started), caused a slight issue for me. I wouldn't call that overtraining but I would call it 'unprepared'.
As for overtraining, last year I decided I wanted to try to train for a triathalon. I was all gung-ho about it and went from exercising 30 minutes/day to 2 hours or more per day and quite strenuously. It wasn't very smart of me but I had never experienced overtraining syndrome but I basically crashed one day. My body screamed exhaustion. It wasn't muscle soreness, it wasn't an injury (which is a real possibility with overtraining), it was like my body screamed sleep/rest/sit/etc. After that point, I backed off a bit and it was much better.
Are we overcautious when it comes to exercise?
do tend to tread lightly. We underestimate our bodies, sadly.
