Overtraining is a problem which affects a number of athletes at some time in their running career. Often an athlete is sufficiently lucky to pickup a minor injury or a touch of influenza that curtails their training.
Runners are often compulsive by nature, this can apply to most sports, however in running where the athlete partakes in a continual weight bearing exercise the chance of falling into the 'overtraining syndrome' is oft higher.
There are a number of indicators that the athlete often ignores as they continue to struggle their way through what they see as a bad patch. This is when a good coach is all important and can step in to stop the rot continuing.
What is Overtraining
Overtraining, or the ‘Unexplained Underperformance Syndrome’ (UUPS) as it has recently been renamed, has been known to affect up to 10% of endurance athletes during their careers.
There are a variety of symptoms, the most common being poor performances that have continued for six weeks or more.
There are often a number of factors leading to the UUP syndrome. As well as hard training, stresses in home, academic or work life.
Medically, there are unfortunately no clear diagnostic blood tests but it is important to exclude, often with blood tests, any other medical condition that may mimic fatigue in athletes.
There are a variety of symptoms, the most common being poor performances that have continued for six weeks or more.
As part of any assessment to establish if an athlete has UUPS, they should see a sports physician, nutritionist and, if necessary, a sports psychologist. source - Dr Rod Jaques, Sports Physician
See the various articles covering overtraining and how to deal with the problem: Articles to come
- Warning Signs of Overtraining
- How to recover from overtraining
more data to follow
