Overtraining and Adrenal Fatigue

There’s no shortage of writing on overtraining as it relates to weight training, bodybuilding and even newer pursuits like CrossFit and kettlebells. Anyone who has spent time training hard in any form of athletics is going to be aware of overtraining and likely the symptoms of overtraining.

Currently, there’s a lot of talk about “Adrenal Fatigue” as well. A lot of the adrenal fatigue information is outside of the training world and it’s a pretty big deal in the “Alternative Health” industry. In fact, sometimes I think it’s just a catch-all diagnosis a lot of Naturopaths give when the don’t know what else to say.  But, there is also starting to be some good and real information and awareness of Adrenal Fatigue in the CrossFit community. This is mainly due to guys like Robb Wolf and OPT.

I’ve been thinking more and more about Adrenal Fatigue and find it interesting that 10 years ago no one had ever heard of it. At least I hadn’t and certainly the bodybuilding training community wasn’t talking about it. What’s interesting is I certainly HAD adrenal fatigue at a few other times in my life and guys like Stuart McRobert WERE talking about it. They just weren’t calling it Adrenal Fatigue – they were calling it overtraining. Once you change the term and understand the symptoms, you’ll find stuff about Adrenal Fatigue everywhere in good, complete and responsible training related writing.

Is Adrenal Fatigue really just another name for Overtraining?

I originally approached Robb Wolf about nutrition coaching. We’ve done a bunch of phone sessions at this point and the results have been great. What I didn’t expect is all the training advice he gave me. The basic deal is, I’m supposed to be doing powerlifter and strongman stuff at a relatively low intensity and my CrossFit Met Cons are no more than 1-2 a week and always less than 75% perceived effort. Somewhat of a difficult prescription to take, but definitely needed. In fact, when I do over do it with the training I can really feel the fatigue the day after. The point, according to Robb, is to train and stimulate the body – and have fun – without dipping too deeply into my reserves. No “seeing the White Buffalo in the sky” after a Met Con as Robb would say.

Intuitively, this makes a lot of sense. If you constantly crush yourself in your training you won’t really be able to progress. This brings in the concept of Periodization as it relates to training as well. Periodization of training and effort is a whole other topic – and an art and science – in and of itself…

Finding some classic and definitive work on Overtraining

I’ve recently been reading some of Stuart McRobert’s outstanding older stuff. Notably Beyond Brawn and Further Brawn. There is so much great stuff in there! Stuart is huge on avoiding overtraining. Rightly so. If you are overtrained you simply WILL NOT progress in your chosen endeavor – whether that’s powerlifting or weight training where the goal is more weight or reps or CrossFit where the goal is (usually) a faster time with the weight held constant. Overtraining will pretty much kill your progress in whatever you’re trying to excel in.

Here’s Stuart’s take on the relationship between training, gaining and resting from Beyond Brawn:

“As long as you’re truly training hard and seriously, and really are eating, resting and sleeping well, if you’re not gaining well, then you’re almost certainly overtraining. You need to find the amount and frequency of training that does the job of stimulating increases in strength and muscular size, but without exceeding your ability to recuperate. Some people need to abbreviate their training more than do others.”

Stuart makes a great point that is profound on a number of levels:

1.    His statement really makes you look at your program. If you actually ARE eating and resting as you should and training hard, then not gaining means only one thing – you’re overtraining. Could it be any simpler?
2.    Since most CrossFit types are probably training “hard and seriously,” Stuart’s statement pretty much leaves you with eating, resting and sleeping as the places where you’re messing up.
3.    There is some implied “individuality” in here when he says “Some people need to abbreviate their training more than do others.” As a side note, guys like Robb Wolf and James “OPT” Fitzgerald have elevated individualizing program and diet to an art form. This kind of stuff is what’s been missing from athletic training since day one.

For Stuart and in the “bodybuilding world” in general, the most common variable to work with is training frequency. I can remember in my peak bodybuilding days (Is bodybuilding even relevant anymore?) that taking an extra day off from training was enough to ensure a great workout when I went to the gym next. In fact, when I got into the Dorian Yates and Mike Mentzer “Heavy Duty” style training I made my best progress ever. And that was with a MANDATORY 1 day off completely between workouts and sometimes 2 days.

But bodybuilding doesn’t live here anymore

What I want to add to all of this is that there’s more to adjusting your training than just frequency – particularly within the context of CrossFit style training and training in multiple disciplines (CrossFit, Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebells and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in my case). When all you do is “weights and cardio” 3-4 times a week, regulating frequency makes sense and can be pretty easy to do. But what happens when you train more days than not. What about multiple sessions per day? I’m not talking about typical gym obsession or that weird reverse anorexia some would-be bodybuilders get. I’m talking about when you have several disciplines you’re training in, multiple training goals and need to keep regularity and consistency in your training schedule.

Today was a scheduled training day but I was very overtrained from the previous week. Rather than skipping training today (regulating frequency) I opted to leave frequency constant and train lighter and easier instead (regulating intensity). At first this might seem to be antithetical to most training doctrines. Power and weightlifters will tell me I’m wasting recovery on sub-maximal poundages when I could wait a day or two and hit a more intense workout. CrossFitters would say similar because, well, every second counts and why come in and train with the intention of taking it “easy?”

I think this method – regulating training load rather than frequency – has some distinct advantages:

• It keeps you in the groove. Particularly in martial arts, kettlebells and CrossFit, there is A LOT of stuff to learn and perfect. Too much time off can really get you out of your groove and feeling like you’re rusty and clunky on everything that requires any technique. Pavel calls lower intensity practice-style training “greasing the groove.” There’s so much technique to learn and perfect, these lower intensity “practice” sessions can keep technique progressing while your body gets a rest from higher intensity training. Robb Wolf talked about this very same concept in his Paleolithic Solution Episode #33 podcast and I’ve blogged about the topic of becoming more efficient in response.

• For me there is also a big mental and adrenal health component to all of this. Mentally I feel better if I train every day or close to it. I also feel energetically better throughout the day on training days. And therein lies the problem. You can’t train intensely every day and, if you tried to, any mood or energy benefits would quickly evaporate as you fatigued and fell into overtraining and adrenal fatigue. So, very often, the “technique” or efficiency work can have a place in getting the body some work without digging into reserves.

A non-weightlifting version of the “hard all the time” mistake would be something dumb I did last year. I love to run. I’m not particularly good at it, but I really enjoy running outside when the weather is nice. I don’t run more than a few miles at a time and I like to do hills and somewhat challenging routes. It’s a “brief and intense” version of running as far as I’m concerned. Anyway, last spring I was running about 4-5 times a week and was progressively going further and doing more difficult runs. I did one great run of about 40min with a bunch of hills – probably the hardest one I’ve done in a long time. The mistake I made what that I tried to make my new personal best my regular route. DUMB, DUMB, DUMB! I should have taken a day or two off from running and then done SHORTER and LESS CHALLENGING runs while I recovered and consolidated those gains.

Stuart McRobert also talks a lot about cycling of training intensity and a “gaining momentum” within weightlifting. I reread that chapter in BRAWN and had the realization that the “gaining momentum” period he’s talking about is very likely brought about by a period adrenal rest and recuperation from the lower training intensity as well as the adrenal stimulation from the lower intensity exercise. Most of the Adrenal Fatigue books I’ve read recommend “light to moderate” exercise to stimulate and heal the adrenals. If you look at the lower intensity “gaining momentum” part of a workout cycle you can pretty easily correlate that with a high degree of adrenal recovery and gentle, healthy stimulation from exercise. This sets up a healthy hormonal environment that supports the very hard work to come in the later stages of the cycle.

So now what?

I’m still working with this concept a lot and I’m not sure I can give any really firm recommendations. What I will say is to start looking at how you have your training intensity cycled – no matter what type of training you do – and begin thinking about how you can cycle your intensity, periodize your training and get some lighter skill-based work into your training.

It’s a hard thing – to back your training off – when you want to progress. But in many cases, the way foreward is a few steps back.

ttys

Adam

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