Are YOu Ironman Overtraining?

Part of our Coaches Questions Series

Question:

I am 8 weeks into the 21 weeks full IM plan and feeling tired and a bit burned out. I think it’s because I overdid what I should be doing during weekends, and also moved the activity around during weekdays to fit in my schedule. Any advice? Should I take a break and start again or?

Answer:

It is very common for beginner athletes to try and over achieve. This is simply not possible. You can not short cut endurance and trying to do so will inevitably lead to overtraining, especially when training for a very long endurance event like Ironman.
Recovery is the most important part of training, period. And by overtraining you are removing recovery.

With such a short period leading to this fatigue, recovery will happen quickly if you allow it. So a day or two rest should see you right back on track.

Moving training around to suit your schedule is one downside of a generic plan. The key thoughts when moving workouts should be how do I recover, how do I avoid injury. Not placing harder or long runs on back to back days for example. Not having three strong bike / run workouts on consecutive days.

When trying to accommodate a heavy training schedule into a normal age grouper week with all it’s stresses, constraints, family, work issues; make no mistake. A little less training is infinitely better than a little too much training.

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