I am shattered am I over training ?

[bad boy]

Hello All,

I am slightly embarrassed to say I am really shattered at the moment I don't think I'm doing enough training but I don't seem to have the energy and my legs are really fatigued.

I commute everyday by bike which is around 15 miles round trip I run 7.5k fast (for me) in 30 minutes 3 times a week at lunch with a long 12k run on Saturday. Sunday is either a 30 mile local cycle at TT pace or a booked TT on a sportive course E1/25b near stanstead mainly.

I do sometimes swap the bike and run in to work which amounts to 7.5 miles each way but if I do that I wont obviously run at lunch. My data seems good from the HR and bike comp but I'm struggling to pull it off and I am not improving.

I have only recently come back from holiday where I was doing some brick sessions swim and runs but I just don't feel up for it the last two weeks.

I am training ultimately for the London duathlon and also plan to upgrade to full tri now I have joined East London Triathletes as they can help with the open water swimming.

My training is not really that structured nothing is sort of set in stone do you think I should rest ?? and if so how long for ??.

I just always feel guilty if I'm not doing something and the thought of doing nothing makes me feel like I'm failing.

Any advice much appreciated

 

[Spinney]

 I'm not an expert, but I always understood that planning rest days into a training regime was a good idea. If I have read your post correctly you are doing something reasonably strenuous every day...

 

[ChrisBD]

What is your nutrition like?

Without knowing a lot more its hard to say "yes, you are overtraining".

But as was pointed out above; building in rest days will help, as will taking a more strategic look at planning your training, time and nutrition for your goal. What you describe above does rather sound like instinctive training gone haywire.

With what you describe there is no doubt you are fit; but develop and build structure and not only will you feel better but your results will improve too.

Good luck.

 

[bad boy]

What is your nutrition like?

Without knowing a lot more its hard to say "yes, you are overtraining".

But as was pointed out above; building in rest days will help, as will taking a more strategic look at planning your training, time and nutrition for your goal. What you describe above does rather sound like instinctive training gone haywire.

With what you describe there is no doubt you are fit; but develop and build structure and not only will you feel better but your results will improve too.

Good luck.

Hi ChrisBD

Yes in all honesty you are right it is haywire and it changes all the time.

I understand rest days are in order but its difficult when I use the bike everyday.

I will take a look at doing a training plan my nutrition is ok I think, you are right though if I want to improve I need to take a more structured approach. Its just I'm getting slightly disheartened at the moment and feeling tired all the time.

 

[Yellow Fang]

Those lunch time runs seem a bit fast, unless your race pace is under 5:30 minutes a mile. You seem to be putting in quite a few hard sessions a week, when you should only be doing one or two. A lot of your sessions should be at easy pace and you should have a rest day.

 

[ChrisBD]

"Its just I'm getting slightly disheartened at the moment and feeling tired all the time."

Classic; need for direction and structure in what you do.

There are some great links and info available to structure this, maybe your club could help? Or take a look on Amazon, loads of books on planning tri training.

Might also be worth you doing an online training blog, as extra motivation?

I'd be tempted to take a week off from runing, lepp going with the cycling as a comute; in that time do your homework on planning a training routine, and how you want to log it (and nutrition) with staged plans for dedicated goal setting along the way.

Hope it helps.

 

[Rob3rt]

You sound knackered, and your symptoms do sound reminiscent of overtraining, but this may also be a case of losing momentum and motiation. Take a week of, just commute and nothing else. Focus on your diet in this week off to control your weight rather than your training.

In the future (this is all my opinion)

You need at least 1 full day of rest per week. My advice would be, clear 1 day a week for rest. If you feel guilty, take your rest day on a saturday and then go volunteer at your local parkrun so you can involve yourself with your sport without actually training that day.

In addition running 7.5km 3 days a week at your pace sounds like a bad method of run training. Thats a fair pace your running, stop this.


For your training, you need to mix up this running, its not going to lead to great improvements. Its stale! Without knowing your planned race distance its hard to comment, but I'd suggest running 3 times a week

1) Base run 1.3333333 x race distance as a base run each week (So if race is 10km run 13km at base pace - cant tell you your predicted base pace without knowing one of your recent race or running TT results).
2) Speed session, i.e a fartlekk run say 3 miles at base pace, with 6x30 second bursts at 1 mile pace sprinkled in, or 1 mile warmup, then 3x400m intervals with 3 mins active recovery and then 1 mile cooldown.
3) Hill session, 1 mile warmup, sprint up the hill, jog back down x 4-6 times, one mile cooldown.

If you cant manage all this in any week because you feel overly fatigued, substitute either the speed day or the hill day for a 3 mile base run.


Maybe buy the 'my first triathlon' or the 'triathlete's trianing bible' by joe friel. Or look to the writting by Matt Fitzgerald, he wrote a large book on triathlon, but has also written very good books on nutrition (racing weight) and running (brain training for runners).


Ultimatelly, your training is messy. Its not periodized nor structured, to me it sounds like it lacks a well defined aim. You are clearly overdo-ing it with these runs at lunch times which sound like tempo runs and at this rate you will end up injured, not even making it to the start line or getting a big fat dissapointing DNF in the race.

 

[RedBike]

Feeling tired, bad mood, lack of apitite, and feeling as though you must train as all signs of fatigue.
If in doubt take a day or twos rest and see if you feel any better. It certainly wont hurt.

I was useless at resting and i used to run myself into the ground and then take forever to recover.

 

[palinurus]

I understand rest days are in order but its difficult when I use the bike everyday.

Same here. You can still have recovery days and ride; leave early and ride easy. Really easy. Accept that you will be scalped. Gear right down for the hills.

 

[Globalti]

You need to take at least 3 days off and preferably 5. Take the bus to work, drive, and just eat well. I go away for 2 week overseas business trip stints of beer and rich hotel food and I'm always amazed at how strong I feel when I get home.

 

[Hont]

+1.

Rest.

 

[bad boy]

Ultimately, your training is messy. Its not periodized nor structured, to me it sounds like it lacks a well defined aim. You are clearly overdo-ing it with these runs at lunch times which sound like tempo runs and at this rate you will end up injured, not even making it to the start line or getting a big fat dissapointing DNF in the race.
[/quote]


Thank you everyone for all the replies there is some really good pointers there which I will take going forward. I am going to buy those books mentioned and have started doing a training plan already to provide more structure to what I do each week. I have already structured in some interval training on the weekend and will stick to the plan for now which includes a rest day during the week.

I'm going to try and not get to hung up on the numbers and data from the bike and runs and just go back to enjoying what I do in a more structured way.

Thanks

 

[ttcycle]

hey badboy- nice to catch a post of yours.

I got to say- you do sound like you're overtrained. Take a week off - if that doesn't help try taking a week off from commuting too. It's a lot of high volume training with no structure, rest is very important to make any gains. You sound like you have a fantastic base fitness which won't decline if you give yourself enough rest period.

Improvements are about periodisation- basically every time we exercise we put our body under stress - the only way the body will adapt from this stress and ultimately for you to see gradual improvements in your fitness is if you build in rest, good nutrition and also have a block of about four weeks- this is where you gradually (increases of about 10% intensity or 10% volume of exercise-never both each week) ramp up the exercise with the fourth week being quite high intensity exercise -the week following the fourth week should be a whole week of rest- with just easy and I mean very easy maintenance runs/cycles to keep things ticking over so no punishing regimes. Each week needs to also have rest built in ie rest days or days where it's just low level easy runs/cycles- you need to build this in.

Remember - you need to change the psychology - if you feel guilty about resting, don't fuel the negativeness by getting out and pushing yourself- ultimately you are going to underperform from running yourself and over pushing which is not what you want - resting is essential for the body to adapt -it's not slacking. As a previous poster has mentioned- Joe Friel books are excellent.

No pain no gain- only partially true, pain at the right times and rest at the right times then you'll eventually become a better athlete.

Take it easy BB.

 

[Rob3rt]

May I emphasize TTcycles tip of building in rest weeks, I like to have, in each period of my training programme, 3 weeks on, 1 week off!

Its not at literal as it sounds, the week off isnt actually a week off, its a rest week in the sense thast weeks 1-3 will be incremental, week 4 will be a little step backwards in volume but not intensity to allow your body to adapt to the stress you have been giving it for the past 3 weeks.

Training incrementally is a must, but if you increment every week you are tempting injury.


BTW if you buy the triathlete's training bible, dont bother with my 1st triathlon book, its basically a dummies guide to triathlon (its good........ if you cba to read the huge detail of the bible but otherwise its a bit of a money sink), the bible is much more in depth and will include all the info in the "your 1st.... " book. Just so you dont waste money.

The triathlon book by Matt Fitzgerald is this one:
http://www.amazon.co...1ZB2B28ZCF0KHB1

Dont know if its any good, but he is a good writter IMO so worth a punt if its not to expensive. Its certainly a big fat book containing a lot of info.

Since if you are going to be injured or over trained as a duathlete, its most likely the running that is goingt o send you over the edge, I'd also suggest paying attention to your form in the early days, some small changes can make a whole load of difference. Look up Pose or ChiRunning. For a couple of weeks preceeding a training programme focus on short low intensity runs in which you focus on how you run and try to adjust your stride to be more efficient.It will pay dividends once you start upping the intensity and workload. I wish I'd found out about this aspect earlier, would have saved me at least 2 flareups in my ITB and a case of shin splints.