Fadi
...
Overtraining or under-recovering?
Some would have you believe that overtraining is a figment of your imagination, and that you better man up / harden up and stop being a sissy! I define overtraining as that which results from what you do in the gym, whilst under-recovering is that which you do outside of the gym. So straight away as you can see, one aspect plays a much bigger role in one’s progress or regress than the other.
In a nutshell and to the point; what you do in the gym is dependent on what you do outside of the gym. So recovery in the sense of having good nutrition, sleep, rest, and something that not too many pay close attention to, and blame for leading into overtraining, is the management (or lack thereof) of life stresses. Breaking up with your girlfriend or losing your job is part of those life stresses that can have a tremendous effect on your performance in the gym.
Overtraining is real, but many won’t experience it. Being tired is not overtraining. Not feeling like going to the gym today is not considered overtraining. Feeling weaker than usual for few days or a week is not overtraining. To say that all these markers are the result of overtraining is to overstate their effects and underestimate what it really is to be overtrained (which I’ll get to shortly). All these feelings fall under the category of over-reaching.
So what is over-reaching? Over-reaching is when you push the envelope of training on purpose, being aware of where you’re heading and why. A short term of taxing your system, say, your nervous system, through lifting heavy weights coupled with a larger than usual volume, followed by a recovery period. This way of taxing our system is what makes us get stronger, grow larger muscles, and ultimately (yet progressively) see us realising our potential and fulfilling our goals.
I find through my experience, that the aspect of under-recovery plays a bigger role than that of overtraining (or the stresses that one places upon one’s self in the confinement of a gym). Since we spend much more time outside of the gym, some of us if not most of us, bring what we have experienced outside the gym to in side the gym. So whether the baby kept you up for longer than you would have liked the night before your workout, or your partner or your boss at work gave you some hard time, …all these experiences can have a dramatic effect on the outcome of your gym workout.
Let me if I may; give you some proof of what I’m referring to here. I can give you a structured workout program that I gave to another person and compare the results of both of you. However some might say but I’m not that other person and hence the comparison would not give a true picture of how or whether the workout was too hard or not. Granted…
The best person to make a comparison with is your own self. If you were to perform a particular workout over a period of time, you would find that there would be some days or weeks where you’re just not feeling 100%. When you look for clues, you’d find that even though the program has not changed, your response to it has. You’re not making progress, the weights feel heavy, and even your motivation has slipped a bit. You may even find that your temper has changed for the worse, and before you know it, you begin to snap at people, even when the young kid had simply asked you: “I only asked if you wanted fries with your Big Mac Sir!!
”
Here, most would simply say ah huh, overtraining, better back off a bit! When in actual fact (and as I’ve said before), your training has not increased in its stress levels, but you have brought something from outside the gym environment, something you have not been able to manage well, into the gym environment, which led to a regression or stagnation in your workouts. That something? It could be a sudden break up in a relationship, which lead to lack of proper sleeping etc. etc. That is why I said earlier, the under-recovery has the greater potential to play the greater part in this whole scenario of overtraining or under-recovering.
So a state of prolonged under-recovering, leads to a state of overtraining. Great, so what is overtraining again? It's when you sustain a long period (try a month and over) of a lack of drive, the weights constantly feeling heavy, and you've simply stopped making progress. These are some of the symptoms of overtraining, which many if any would ever experience due to a few overly stressful workouts.
So what’s overreaching again please?
The case has always been, are you over training or under recovering? I’ve said enough on that subject above. However what is less known to the general trainer is the principle of overreaching. Having trained at the elite level in Olympic weightlifting, I can confidently say that I've been through periods during my periodisation cycles, where the principle of overreaching was applied (and boy don’t you know it when it hits you!).
Having said the above, I'd like to always look at the positive side in everything even when viewed as a negative by others. I see two forms of overreaching and these are as follows:
1. FOR: Functional Overreaching
2. NFOR: Non-Functional Overreaching
Some would view the 1st as being the positive whilst viewing the 2nd as being the negative. For me, both are positives in their own right. FOR is the controlled way of training, where one knows exactly where one is treading, with both intensity and volume of training taken into account.
NFOR (to me at least), is also viewed as a positive (even though it may verge on the edge of over training), for the reason that at the elite level, an athlete needs to be pushed to such a level (at times), where by delving unto the edge of overtraining, the body goes into forced adaptation, even though it may take that athlete 2-3 weeks to fully recover from such a "NFOR". A rabbit that is being chased by an eagle has two choices …
1) Surrender due to exhaustion, or
2) Keep on heading for the bushes whilst blasting through some excruciating and nauseating pain threshold, because the alternative is death with a certainty!
Okay, I left the most common problem (as I see it), yet the easiest to fix for last. Here goes…
Overthinking /overexcitement and adrenal fatigue.
This overlooked and most critical path that leads to not so much overtraining, as much as it leads to (let’s say) a less than a perfect workout, or to a workout that could have been better. For brevity’s sake, I’ll stick with the term of "overtraining” here if you don’t mind. So, overtraining that stems not so much from training too hard physically, but from neurological fatigue, that has the potential to lead to physical exhaustion is what we’re talking about here okay.
Most lifters get overly excited about their training sessions before they even get into the gym. "Don't talk to me mate, I'm thinking, I gotta smash it tonight!" At work, you’re consumed by, “am I eating enough today, I wonder if I’m shrinking, losing strength even…”. If this was a one off thing, your adrenal glands would be able to cope, but this scenario is played over and over, often during each week of training. Most lifters are experts in getting all fired up, but to me, it's a bit like coming all ripped to shreds with bulging muscles ready to own the bodybuilding contest...with only one problem; you're one week too early. In other words, there's no problem with being all fired up, but you'd do yourself a great favour if and when you work on getting your timing right. Let me be blunt: think of it as sex! You wouldn’t dream of screwing up your timing there, so why here!! Over-excitation (or constant excitation) overtime would take their toll on your body, draining it of energy that you could not afford to lose if performance in the gym as well as the bedroom were paramount to you. I believe my message has been clearly delivered!
I'm not speaking from thin air no, I've seen this scenario played out during my years of lifting in public. Even with some elite lifters, who are forever working to perfect their lifting technique, at times, fail at the last moment of contest preparation (or on the day of the contest) due to overthinking and /or over-excitement. Each (yes each) training session counts towards your final goal, so why not be at your ultimate sharp best mentally, before setting foot in your gym, (or garage as the case may be).
I'm not saying that we ought to put our neurotransmitters to sleep, be they of the excitatory or the inhibitory type. However what I'm saying is that just as we are always looking for a way to get our mind chemically excited and our body energised for a killer training session, we need to also look for a way to calm both our mind and body in order to achieve full restoration and preparedness for future "battles", because that's exactly how your mind and body view a training session, a battle that is full of stressful markers.
Yes there are supplements one can use, however I won't insist that they be used in each and every training session. Band-Aid solutions are not the answer for lack of energy and / or motivation. This is a vast topic and I do welcome your input if you are interested in such a discussion.
PS: Please be aware that I was not referring to that healthy talk we all need to feed our subconscious mind with through visualisation. I say that because that could also be understood by some to be some sort of mind chatter, even though that is not the way I would describe it.
Positive visualisation is the equivalent to installing some positive data in your back up hard drive on your computer. Your main hard drive is where the operating system lies, and the secondary (or back up) is where all other personal folders and files are stored. Stored does not mean deleted, it just means they are not at the foreground, but they are still very much there for whenever you call on them. And that's exactly how your subconscious mind works through the power of positive visualisation. It's a one-time daily or nightly event, you prepare yourself for it as soon as your head hits that soft pillow, or (if you prefer) on the train on your way home whilst gazing at the sky or clouds etc. It's you talking, feeding that subconscious mind (secondary hard drive) of yours, with all the killer ammunition for when you step into that gym.
This should be (or should become) a ritual just like brushing your teeth. What you feed your brain today/tonight, it would regurgitate back to you when much needed. So why not use this amazing and most powerful tool in your arsenal, of which many hardly ever pay attention to (on a regular basis). More power to each one of you reading this. Thank you.
Fadi.
Some would have you believe that overtraining is a figment of your imagination, and that you better man up / harden up and stop being a sissy! I define overtraining as that which results from what you do in the gym, whilst under-recovering is that which you do outside of the gym. So straight away as you can see, one aspect plays a much bigger role in one’s progress or regress than the other.
In a nutshell and to the point; what you do in the gym is dependent on what you do outside of the gym. So recovery in the sense of having good nutrition, sleep, rest, and something that not too many pay close attention to, and blame for leading into overtraining, is the management (or lack thereof) of life stresses. Breaking up with your girlfriend or losing your job is part of those life stresses that can have a tremendous effect on your performance in the gym.
Overtraining is real, but many won’t experience it. Being tired is not overtraining. Not feeling like going to the gym today is not considered overtraining. Feeling weaker than usual for few days or a week is not overtraining. To say that all these markers are the result of overtraining is to overstate their effects and underestimate what it really is to be overtrained (which I’ll get to shortly). All these feelings fall under the category of over-reaching.
So what is over-reaching? Over-reaching is when you push the envelope of training on purpose, being aware of where you’re heading and why. A short term of taxing your system, say, your nervous system, through lifting heavy weights coupled with a larger than usual volume, followed by a recovery period. This way of taxing our system is what makes us get stronger, grow larger muscles, and ultimately (yet progressively) see us realising our potential and fulfilling our goals.
I find through my experience, that the aspect of under-recovery plays a bigger role than that of overtraining (or the stresses that one places upon one’s self in the confinement of a gym). Since we spend much more time outside of the gym, some of us if not most of us, bring what we have experienced outside the gym to in side the gym. So whether the baby kept you up for longer than you would have liked the night before your workout, or your partner or your boss at work gave you some hard time, …all these experiences can have a dramatic effect on the outcome of your gym workout.
Let me if I may; give you some proof of what I’m referring to here. I can give you a structured workout program that I gave to another person and compare the results of both of you. However some might say but I’m not that other person and hence the comparison would not give a true picture of how or whether the workout was too hard or not. Granted…
The best person to make a comparison with is your own self. If you were to perform a particular workout over a period of time, you would find that there would be some days or weeks where you’re just not feeling 100%. When you look for clues, you’d find that even though the program has not changed, your response to it has. You’re not making progress, the weights feel heavy, and even your motivation has slipped a bit. You may even find that your temper has changed for the worse, and before you know it, you begin to snap at people, even when the young kid had simply asked you: “I only asked if you wanted fries with your Big Mac Sir!!
”Here, most would simply say ah huh, overtraining, better back off a bit! When in actual fact (and as I’ve said before), your training has not increased in its stress levels, but you have brought something from outside the gym environment, something you have not been able to manage well, into the gym environment, which led to a regression or stagnation in your workouts. That something? It could be a sudden break up in a relationship, which lead to lack of proper sleeping etc. etc. That is why I said earlier, the under-recovery has the greater potential to play the greater part in this whole scenario of overtraining or under-recovering.
So a state of prolonged under-recovering, leads to a state of overtraining. Great, so what is overtraining again? It's when you sustain a long period (try a month and over) of a lack of drive, the weights constantly feeling heavy, and you've simply stopped making progress. These are some of the symptoms of overtraining, which many if any would ever experience due to a few overly stressful workouts.
So what’s overreaching again please?
The case has always been, are you over training or under recovering? I’ve said enough on that subject above. However what is less known to the general trainer is the principle of overreaching. Having trained at the elite level in Olympic weightlifting, I can confidently say that I've been through periods during my periodisation cycles, where the principle of overreaching was applied (and boy don’t you know it when it hits you!).
Having said the above, I'd like to always look at the positive side in everything even when viewed as a negative by others. I see two forms of overreaching and these are as follows:
1. FOR: Functional Overreaching
2. NFOR: Non-Functional Overreaching
Some would view the 1st as being the positive whilst viewing the 2nd as being the negative. For me, both are positives in their own right. FOR is the controlled way of training, where one knows exactly where one is treading, with both intensity and volume of training taken into account.
NFOR (to me at least), is also viewed as a positive (even though it may verge on the edge of over training), for the reason that at the elite level, an athlete needs to be pushed to such a level (at times), where by delving unto the edge of overtraining, the body goes into forced adaptation, even though it may take that athlete 2-3 weeks to fully recover from such a "NFOR". A rabbit that is being chased by an eagle has two choices …
1) Surrender due to exhaustion, or
2) Keep on heading for the bushes whilst blasting through some excruciating and nauseating pain threshold, because the alternative is death with a certainty!
Okay, I left the most common problem (as I see it), yet the easiest to fix for last. Here goes…
Overthinking /overexcitement and adrenal fatigue.
This overlooked and most critical path that leads to not so much overtraining, as much as it leads to (let’s say) a less than a perfect workout, or to a workout that could have been better. For brevity’s sake, I’ll stick with the term of "overtraining” here if you don’t mind. So, overtraining that stems not so much from training too hard physically, but from neurological fatigue, that has the potential to lead to physical exhaustion is what we’re talking about here okay.
Most lifters get overly excited about their training sessions before they even get into the gym. "Don't talk to me mate, I'm thinking, I gotta smash it tonight!" At work, you’re consumed by, “am I eating enough today, I wonder if I’m shrinking, losing strength even…”. If this was a one off thing, your adrenal glands would be able to cope, but this scenario is played over and over, often during each week of training. Most lifters are experts in getting all fired up, but to me, it's a bit like coming all ripped to shreds with bulging muscles ready to own the bodybuilding contest...with only one problem; you're one week too early. In other words, there's no problem with being all fired up, but you'd do yourself a great favour if and when you work on getting your timing right. Let me be blunt: think of it as sex! You wouldn’t dream of screwing up your timing there, so why here!! Over-excitation (or constant excitation) overtime would take their toll on your body, draining it of energy that you could not afford to lose if performance in the gym as well as the bedroom were paramount to you. I believe my message has been clearly delivered!
I'm not speaking from thin air no, I've seen this scenario played out during my years of lifting in public. Even with some elite lifters, who are forever working to perfect their lifting technique, at times, fail at the last moment of contest preparation (or on the day of the contest) due to overthinking and /or over-excitement. Each (yes each) training session counts towards your final goal, so why not be at your ultimate sharp best mentally, before setting foot in your gym, (or garage as the case may be).
I'm not saying that we ought to put our neurotransmitters to sleep, be they of the excitatory or the inhibitory type. However what I'm saying is that just as we are always looking for a way to get our mind chemically excited and our body energised for a killer training session, we need to also look for a way to calm both our mind and body in order to achieve full restoration and preparedness for future "battles", because that's exactly how your mind and body view a training session, a battle that is full of stressful markers.
Yes there are supplements one can use, however I won't insist that they be used in each and every training session. Band-Aid solutions are not the answer for lack of energy and / or motivation. This is a vast topic and I do welcome your input if you are interested in such a discussion.
PS: Please be aware that I was not referring to that healthy talk we all need to feed our subconscious mind with through visualisation. I say that because that could also be understood by some to be some sort of mind chatter, even though that is not the way I would describe it.
Positive visualisation is the equivalent to installing some positive data in your back up hard drive on your computer. Your main hard drive is where the operating system lies, and the secondary (or back up) is where all other personal folders and files are stored. Stored does not mean deleted, it just means they are not at the foreground, but they are still very much there for whenever you call on them. And that's exactly how your subconscious mind works through the power of positive visualisation. It's a one-time daily or nightly event, you prepare yourself for it as soon as your head hits that soft pillow, or (if you prefer) on the train on your way home whilst gazing at the sky or clouds etc. It's you talking, feeding that subconscious mind (secondary hard drive) of yours, with all the killer ammunition for when you step into that gym.
This should be (or should become) a ritual just like brushing your teeth. What you feed your brain today/tonight, it would regurgitate back to you when much needed. So why not use this amazing and most powerful tool in your arsenal, of which many hardly ever pay attention to (on a regular basis). More power to each one of you reading this. Thank you.
Fadi.
Last edited:
