More is better is what most people think when they’re trying to get fit. When you have that mindset, you workout for hours every day and do all types of exercises, including strength-building ones in hopes of reaching their goal more quickly. There are signs that you may be taxing your body and working out too much. Overdoing your exercise goals not only can stress your body and slow your progress, but also cause you to lose ground.
Why does overtraining set you back?
When you workout, particularly if it’s strenuous, you’re taxing your body. That causes stress and stress is bad for you. While exercise burns off stress hormones, too much exercise creates it, since it doesn’t give the body an opportunity to heal. That can cause your immune system to be suppressed and reduce your resistance to disease for up to 72 hours. The muscle tissue in your body takes time to repair the micro tears that occur during exercise. When you over-exercise, it doesn’t allow the body to do that. You’ll find you’re more prone to illness when you over-train.
Other signs include poor performance.
The more you workout the better you should be, but what if you’re working out hard and getting worse. Instead of being able to do six sets of 10, you wear out at four or five sets, less than the previous week. That’s a sure sign. If you try to push past it or make your workout tougher or longer, it only makes it worse. Not only will your performance be worse, your enjoyment will diminish and you’ll start dreading the workout that you enjoyed just a few weeks previously.
Your mood can help you determine if you’re overdoing training.
Your body is telling you that it’s tired and trying to heal and sometimes that information comes via your mood. If you’re depressed, angry, irritable, anxious or even confused a lot, it might be signs of working out too much. It’s similar to someone who is getting sick, already ill or still recovering. Many times their mood isn’t stellar. Part of it comes from being fatigued. Imagine if that’s how you feel every day. It certainly can wear on your emotions.
- Do you have problems sleeping at night that you didn’t have previously? Insomnia can be a sign that you need to take a short break from exercise, reduce your workout time or alternate days of hard and easy exercise.
- Ironically, if you workout too much, it actually can cause lean muscle loss and may even increase gaining fat. That’s not normally a goal of any person exercising.
- Losing your appetite is another sign you may be working out too much. It’s normally one of the later stage signs. While it might sound like a benefit, it’s not. You need adequate nutrition to build muscle tissue.
- If you track your heart rate, you’ll notice a marked difference. If your heart rate is normally 50 beats per minute and it jumps to 70, your body is feeling stress and it could be from over-exercising.
For more information, contact us today at Reggie C Fitness