The Truth About Overtraining

Do you think that the secret to success with fitness training lies in always pushing yourself harder? If you do, you may be grossly mistaken. Training hard is of course a must if you have lofty fitness goals. But there is a limit to which you can exert yourself. Any effort you put in beyond such limit can be classified as overtraining. Till the point you can distinguish between training hard and overtraining, you are fine, but when you overstep the limits of your physical capacity, the problem arises.

In your eagerness to achieve your fitness goals as soon as possible, you might tend to overlook the fact that your body is not responding positively to exercise. When your give your body more stress than it can handle, the post-exercise recovery goes haywire. And when your body does not recuperate from one session of workouts going in for another can be really counterproductive.

This is particularly true when you are into weight training for muscle development. New tissue and muscles only grow when you rest after a training session. If the amount of wear and tear caused due to exercise is more than what should be, regeneration is not possible. So, it is really important to read the signs of overtraining before it becomes a major headache in your life and derails your fitness training regime.

For detecting overtraining you should remember that:

- There is no medical test which can tell you whether you are over-trained or not.
- Overtraining does not happen in one or two strenuous sessions of exercise. You can feel tired and sore, but that does not usually mean that you have over-trained.

The following physical symptoms have been identified as common indicators of overtraining.

Increased resting pulse and/or heart rate
Chronic muscle pain or inflammation after exercise, which is also an indicator that you are not recovering at the right pace.
Exhaustion and lethargy that refuses to go away even after you rest
Loss of interest or even aversion to exercise
Constantly diminishing exercise performance
Headaches and a burning sensation throughout your body
Lack or a complete loss of sleep.

In case you have one or two of these symptoms, there is no particular reason to worry. But if most of these symptoms can be used to describe your present condition, you have probably over-trained.

This is the reason why most people train under the tutelage of experts. A personal trainer can ensure that you never overtrain, if you follow his guidelines and fitness philosophy. But this is not to say that you can afford not to use your own judgment even if you train with an expert. Since you are the best judge of your limitations, using your own intelligence to draw the line is the right thing to do.

Remember that no matter how hard you train, you cannot achieve all your fitness goals within a few days. The key is thus, to train hard but train smart as well. Do not harm yourself in your bid to do something constructive with your body.

You don't want to overtrain, so to check and make sure you're not you should talk to one of our personal trainers in Algonquin.

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