What is overtraining and when should I push my body?

What is overtraining and when should I push my body?

It is easy to confuse overtraining with being out of shape. If you are working out at more than 70% of your maximum heart rate or weight training more than 3 times per week, this may be something to consider. But if you are rarely getting to the gym, not really breaking a sweat or exercising intensely, this is not something you should think you are doing.

Overtraining is typically caused by doing too much too soon. There are multiple phases of overtraining: Overload stimulus---acute fatigue---overreaching---overtraining.

The overload stimulus is the increase in training intensity (ie. increased resistance, increased reps, decreased rest periods, increased training sessions, increased time training, increased power, etc.).
Acute fatigue is when you become tired from an intense workout (ie. the trainer kicked my butt, I am so tired). This is a good time to get a good night sleep and eat well (your body is telling you something).
Overreaching is easily achieved in a few days and is normally a planned phase of many training programs. It is important, after this phase, to do some form of recovery and back off your training intensity for a few days until your energy rebounds.
Overtraining can cause overuse injuries, sickness, loss of sleep, weakness, aches and soreness all over, decreased coordination, decreased performance, increased resting heart rate and blood pressure, and a decrease in sex drive.

Instead of overtraining, consider OVERLOADING. If you want to get stronger, faster, better endurance and/or change your body, overloading is necessary. It is important to listen to your body and get adequate rest (6-9 hours/day) and a healthy diet to recover from your more-intense workouts. It is a good idea to overload, but make sure to recover and feel fully recharged before training intensely again in order to prevent overtraining.

To prevent overtraining, a good rule of thumb is to allow your body to recover for one week every 3 months. During this one week you should still be moving, but at a lower intensity. Recreational activity, like walking, biking, hiking, or Frisbee can be a good way to allow your body to recover.

Adapted from Essentials of Strength Training and Conditioning 2ed, Baechle & Earle, 2000

Ergonomics at your desk

How to sit all day and prevent back pain


The diagram above is not too far from the reality of our own postures while we all sit at our desks. It is probably not detrimental to sit like this for a short amount of time, but when we sit in awkward and biomechanically disadvantaged positions like the ones above or even when we hold the phone between our ear and shoulder for extended times our bodies get cranky.

Studies show that primarily agricultural countries (where people are moving all day) have less back pain than countries that have sedentary desk jobs . The agricultural countries have nearly no back pain! But in America, nearly everyone experiences back pain in their lifetime (nih.gov).

The diagram below shows how the spine is most efficient when you sit upright and align each vertebrae on top of one another. The body does not have to work nearly as hard when the discs in your spine are stacked on top of one another. If you look at the skeleton on the right (highlighted in red), you will notice that the muscles on the back side of your neck(if you could imagine they are there) would have to work very hard to hold your head up. This can cause a chain reaction all the way down your spine to your lower back. It is best if the muscles can work evenly on either sides of your body to create balance and ease at muscle joints. So if you allow the muscles on the front side of your body to do some of the work by sitting upright there can be more balance in your body while sitting.



I believe, if you can keep your head back over your spine and your hips back as far as possible in your chair while working, you will have much less neck/back pain.

This is not easy. At first, you will have to train your 'postural muscles' to work a bit more. But when you begin to use your body more efficiently, you will find it is easier. You may feel stronger, you will concentrate and focus more and you will have much less incidence of headaches.

The main problem with chairs is most of our core musculature shuts off as soon as we sit down. To counteract this problem, at the beginning of each day wake up some of your core stabilizers by contracting them. Or try to suck all of your abdominal contents off of your pelvic floor. Yep, thats right, we want to use our diaphram, abdominals, obliques, quadratus lumborum and spinal erectors to help us work better and focus throughout the day;)

Please visit the following websites for some added information on workstation ergonomics.

http://www.merseyfire.gov.uk/aspx/pages/reports/display_screen_guide.htm
http://www.candgnews.com/Homepage-Articles/2007/9-05-07/XF-ERGONOMICS.asp
http://ergonomics.ucla.edu/Howto_Workstation.html
http://www.osha.gov/SLTC/etools/computerworkstations/index.html
http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/backpain/detail_backpain.htm