The resources of our bodies are not endless, and sometimes we need to slow down a little so that our muscles have time to recover. But not everyone can do it at the right time. Sometimes, they don’t want or just don’t know when to stop.
Overtraining is highly undesirable since recovery will take quite a long time. In addition, because of stress, your body will not learn new skills, and you will not become stronger or faster. By overtraining, you will only lose strength and eat and sleep poorly.
In this blog post, we selected 8 signs that it’s time to take a break from running.
1. Increased Resting Heart Rate
Take your pulse every morning before you get out of bed, and you will know when to slow down. Research shows a sign of overrunning is an increased resting heart rate. This means that your nervous system is gearing up to deal with stress and has already triggered an increased production of appropriate hormones speeding up your heart rate so that your muscles and brain get more oxygen. Your body, unfortunately, cannot recognize whether it will be physical or psychological stress, so you need a break from running for a couple of days.
2. Sleep Disturbance
Everything is straightforward here. Good sleep gives us the necessary growth hormones to help our muscles recover. According to research, if you don’t sleep well, your muscles don’t recover, and your athletic performance only worsens.
3. Feeling Constantly Tired
If you constantly feel tired, then something is definitely going wrong. In this case, honesty is key. Honesty with yourself. Some hardcore runners may ignore this sign and tell themselves they’ll get even stronger, but it doesn’t always work that way.
It is always necessary to analyze the causes of fatigue, such as burnout, overtraining, and lack of sleep, to evaluate the need for a good rest after a workout. Otherwise, a “snowball” situation will arise when, due to under-recovery, fatigue will increase, eventually leading to unpleasant consequences such as depression and injury.
4. You Get Moody
When your body is overloaded with exercise, it releases the hormone cortisol, which can cause irritability or anxiety. Stress also stops the production of dopamine, which is a neurotransmitter. Its deficiency has a “big bummer” effect, so if you’re getting cranky or irritable, it might be a sign you need to rest. You should approach mental health seriously because you can get burnt out or fall into depression.
5. You Start Getting Sick Often
A small amount of sports helps the body fight viruses and colds more effectively. But what happens if you run too much? It has the opposite effect: you start to get sick.
Fatigue and lack of performance are common in runners, and, as a result, you can get sick, according to research. And this is quite natural since the body will divert forces to restore muscles, and there will be much fewer resources left to fight diseases.
6. Your Muscles Hurt All the Time
Don’t confuse this with delayed onset muscle soreness after a long break from training! If you are constantly exercising, but your muscles continue to ache and minor injuries begin appearing, it’s definitely time to take a break. Your body needs much more time to “repair,” and you should stop running.
7. The Results of Workouts are not Encouraging
Performance is a subjective measure of the quality of a workout. If you felt great during yesterday’s workout, you rate it as good. If you felt bad, then consider it not very successful. If unsuccessful workouts are becoming more common, affecting your feelings, you need to allocate additional time for recovery.
8. Lowering the Level of Oxygen in the Blood
The amount of oxygen in the hemoglobin of red blood cells can be measured using a portable pulse oximeter (you just need to put your finger on it). The higher the percentage, the better. For example, above 95% is the level of an athlete who has adapted well to training. This is a new area in recovery science that needs more research, but there is definitely a link between low oxygen and overwork.
How to Know When to Take a Break from Running?
So, if you want to know if it’s time to slow down, count your number of overrunning signs. You should do this calculation once a week.
0-1 – you can safely continue at a chosen pace.
2-4 – you need to be careful and not overdo it. It might be better to make at least one of your training days lighter.
5-6 – Attention, you are entering the danger zone! If you unintentionally put yourself in this state (sometimes, such loads are part of the training plan), it’s time to slow down.
7-8- red zone! You definitely need at least one day a week without training. And possibly more – it all depends on how you felt in the last few weeks. You may even need to see a doctor.
Other signs of overrunning include increased injury, loss of concentration, constant feeling of thirst, and decreased self-esteem and motivation.
How to Avoid Overrunning?
- You need to do your best during intense training but not at full scale. After a workout, you should have a pleasant feeling that you did a good job, but you could do better. But in no case should you get critical and down on yourself. On the contrary, you should have a positive attitude and tell yourself that you can and will do better in the next workout.
- Learn to enjoy easy runs or workouts, and be sure to respect your rest days. They are crucial, even if it seems to you that you will lose shape! We remind you once again that your muscles recover and become even stronger during proper rest and good sleep.
- Use the rule of alternating workouts. Overrunning can result from repetitive exercise when all your workouts are the same and you do not alternate loads. There is a rule – to wait 48 hours before repeating the same load using the same muscles. For example, if you did abdominal exercises today, you need to wait two more days before exercising those muscles again. You can spend these two days strengthening other muscles. In running, you can alternate between easy and short recovery runs with intervals and long distances.
- Choose to cross-train. Switch from your main activity to something else like swimming, cycling, dancing, playing tennis, squash or badminton – there are many options. Cross-training helps you to become more resilient, faster, and stronger.
