Days off from working out are important, regardless of where you are in your training, whether gearing up for a long day at an Ironman 3 months out, or pushing up the intensity for a Sprint distance race coming up in 2 weeks. Remember those classic sayings: “Everything in moderation.” or my favorite from the Shining, “All work no play makes Jack a dull boy.” These are both SO true in this crazy sport we have all decided to participate in. Take it from an amateur; a day off each week is VERY important and should be considered a healthy part of your weekly exercise routine. It should be schedule, stuck to and taken very seriously. It should not be rationalized away, forgotten about nor ignored, something we are all guilty of doing at one point or another. And no, I’m not talking about a day off meaning that you swim and lift weights instead of bike, run or both. Nor am I talking about a day off every 11 days or even, “I’m just going to do an easy 6 miles.” I’m talking about the real deal. The big rest. A full day of doing nothing more taxing than walking up a flight of stairs or getting up off the couch to check what food in the fridge during a commercial.
It has been noted in this publication and in many other forums that a day off a week is necessary to avoid the dreaded experience of being over trained, as it allows muscles to recover so that subsequent workouts are productive, versus destructive. For those of you who have never experienced being over trained, or who have never experienced a decrease in fitness as a result of working out too much, I truly applaud you. You are probably the type of person that gets a speeding ticket once, then never goes over the speed limit again. Kudos to you. Seriously! You learn quickly and have avoided one of the most common pitfalls a triathlete can walk into.
I was once told by an old friend of mine and fellow triathlete that it’s better to under train by 20% than to over train by 5%. After personally experiencing the painful experience myself, I wish I had listened to her in the first place. But I was inexperienced and stubborn, thinking I could push through it, pull myself out of it, or that it wouldn’t happen to me. Not a chance. It struck me like a ton of bricks 3 years ago and again this season, but I’m here to tell you that it’s completely avoidable and should be avoided at all costs.
Overtraining sucks. I’ve been there twice in three years and it isn’t pretty. In the first instance, I was lethargic to the point where I didn’t even have the energy to kick a soccer ball around the yard with my son. The second time resulted in over use injuries to my quad muscle and my knees. I’m still healing from these and pray that the damage is not long term. My legs hurt every day and I still can’t bend down without supporting my left knee. Where the bike used to be my strongest leg, today it’s my weakest because of these injuries. No matter how much I train on the bike, the over training has limited my fitness. The more I train now on the bike, the worse I get. Rest is my only hope.
I do plan on taking a healthy amount of time off this winter to heal mentally and physically, but knowing me, I’ll probably just try to train through the pain again, like I always do, never quite learning from even my own personal experiences. My orthopedic surgeon is literally foaming at the mouth hoping I come in for a “2-fur” this October. That’s right; a “2-fur” is what I call two meniscus repairs for one hour on the operating table.
Overtraining makes every minute of the day taxing to an athlete. His work suffers, his personal life is affected, his morale, sex life, and especially his fitness. It burdens an athlete with lethargy never experienced before. It takes your energy away, your enthusiasm for life, and your desire to do that next workout. Most importantly however, it doesn’t allow you to recover properly to make that next workout beneficial. Actually, an over trained athlete, and I’m speaking here from personal experience, can decrease his/her fitness with each additional workout as the muscles are not close to full recovery before the next workout takes place, and the damage to the muscle tissue compounds with each additional step, turn of the crank, or stroke of the hand. An over-trained athlete doesn’t just plateau; he/she can go back to being out of race shape pretty easily and stay there throughout an entire season. It is a well known fact that a regular person starts losing fitness with around 10 days of inactivity. In the case of an over-trained athlete, I would wager to say that those 10 days shorten down to 2-3 days due to harmful effects of under-recovered workouts.
And that’s not to mention the significant increase in the possibility of injuring yourself given your lack of muscle recovery. Injury probability increase proportionally to the weakness of your body during the present workout, as well as to the decreased mental acuity, both of which are severely compromised in an over trained athlete. Also, injuries happen when one is not tuned into the actual workout but rather focusing on the state of the weakness one feels in one’s legs, back or arms. If the lower extremities are shaky, don’t feel strong, or one’s head isn’t in the game, the probably of a strained quad, torn meniscus, rolled ankle or hurt back literally quadruples.
Knowing all this, then why is it so hard for us triathletes to take a day off a week.
For the past 15 years, I have not gone to bed without thinking of my next day’s workout. That’s just who I am. I often plan my days around the workout and rarely miss the workout entirely the following day. I would say however that there is a good chance my workout would take place differently than originally planned, as most of the time, I would ambitiously plan my workout in the morning, but then get a bad night sleep or just feel the covers were too warm to get out from under when the alarm went off. “Mind over mattress” another triathlete friend would say. In my case, the mattress always wins. I am not a morning person. Never have been, never will be. Period. I really don’t like sweating at 6:30am. I also find that my workouts at that time of day are less intense and therefore, less beneficial to me as I train for the season. I can count on one hand the number of good workouts I’ve had in these early morning hours. Since I’m 41 years young, have been addicted to working out for most of my adult life, 5 good morning workouts out of 6,000 days or so is not a terribly good ratio.
Why am I telling you all this. Because like you, I am obsessed with fitness and by reading this article, you probably are as well. However, I enjoy my sleep, I have a job and responsibility to my children, and absolutely love my chocolate chip cookies, so this is what keeps me an amateur athlete. We (obsessed athletes) have been convinced, wrongfully so, that taking a day off from working out is not healthy. We feel guilty about a day off a week as though we are going to lose some fitness in 36 hours of not working out. Insane. We feel taking a day off is akin to eating a dozen vanilla frosted donuts followed by a super-sized Big Mac meal at McDonalds. We are all nuts for doing this sport in the first place, and even crazier to think that a day off a week is somehow sinful. We should all go into therapy to figure out to why this phenomenon in our heads exists.
Days off make the next workout soooo much better, sooo much more productive and sooo much less painful. It decreases the probability of injury and frees your mind to focus on the intensity of the workout versus surviving the pain of lethargy or lactic acid buildup. Personally, I try to take Friday’s off when gearing up for an endurance event as I know Saturday will be the long bike ride of my week and Sunday will be the long run. Since I want to be strong on the bike and have the most effective workout, I take the day before it off. Mentally, I’m better off because I feel stronger and more able to keep up when riding in a group. Physically, I feel so much better as the lactic acidosis doesn’t set in for a long while versus right off the start line, and I can actually enjoy the time on the saddle versus curse the leader of the ride under my breath.
So, try to remember two things as you wind down this season and think of what’s coming up next year. 1) A day off a week should be considered a workout day. It should not be considered a day off or even a recovery day because it really needs to be part of your workout regiment. Treat it as a workout day itself and you’ll get through it without too much stress or guilt. 2) Remember a truth in this sports. It is not necessarily the workout that makes the difference, rather it is how quickly you recover from the previous workout that that matters the most. And over trained athletes do not recover quickly. It is as simple as that. Over trained athletes train on weak legs or with muscles that are still ripped apart, yet to heal, the muscles need time. Therefore, they continue to damage already damaged muscle tissue, causing further damage and possibly permanent damage to the muscles. At a minimum, overtraining exacerbates an already stressed situation in the body that can cause weakened immune systems and injury. One can do irreparable damage to the muscles by ignoring signs of over training.
So take a day off a week. Enjoy it. Consider it a workout and by all means, listen to your body. I’ve been dressed, out the door, and 20 yards down the road before I’ve convinced myself to turn around and quit the workout given that I listened to the signals my body was giving me. As I age, this 20 yard turn around seems to happen more and more, but that is life in the sport. Recovering when you are well trained takes 24-48 hours. Recovering from over training takes days or weeks, and that assumes no significant injuries.
Take care of your body, listen and learn from each workout experience. And by all means, have fun. Isn’t that what it’s all about? You’ll be a better athlete for it.
Jeff Dyment lives and works in Weston CT. He has been doing triathlons for the past 3 years, and just completed his first Ironman in Lake Placid in 13:29mins. Happy with his time and the fact he finished without having to visit the medical tent, he is thinking of retiring from the IM distance having just posted his personal best, and rather focusing on Olympics and Half’s, at least for a while. He is single with three children and still has all his toenails.
jdyment@earthlink.net