We’re hitting a dreaded wall with progress, so instead of re-evaluating, we dig in deeper. We work harder, maybe cut more calories, increase the distance of our runs, push our paces, and suddenly everything seems WORSE. Overtraining symptoms are pretty easy to recognize, but not always easy to respond to wisely.
There’s that satisfying feeling of dog-tiredness as you reach peak marathon training or after a good speed sesh at the track.
Then there’s the feeling of utter exhaustion all the time, no matter what stage of training or how easy the runs.
While it IS important to log miles, it becomes less so if it means you’re sacrificing in other areas.
Eating, sleeping, hydrating, and recovery are all part of the entire training plan. Not just running alone.
And we KNOW YOU ARE TERRIFIED of losing fitness. So please read this to put your mind at ease — >> how quickly do I lose fitness??
If you’re not sure whether what you’re feeling is normal marathon-training tiredness or signs you’ve taken things too far, check out these Overtraining Syndrome symptoms and make a change if needed!
What is Overtraining?
Overtraining is a condition characterized by fatigue, diminishing performance, and burnout among athletes. This is also referred to as Overtraining Syndrome (OTS).
It differs from overreaching, and it’s important to understand the distinction.
Overreaching is an accumulation of training load that leads to performance decrements and requires normal amounts of rest days and cutback weeks. It’s actually a part of training as the mileage or speed work increases in your training plan.
It generally occurs after several days of intensive training and leaves you feeling more tired or with more muscle aches than usual. Fortunately, the negative effects of functional overreaching can be easily reversed with adequate rest. At which point your body rebuilds stronger!
This process is known as supercompensation.
Overtraining, on the other hand, occurs when an athlete continues training even though they’re consistently experiencing symptoms of non-functional overreaching.
Many runners think that feeling weak or underperforming is a sign they need to train even harder, so they keep pushing themselves further. This just worsens all the existing symptoms you were feeling from overreaching and leads to overtraining.
Overtraining can cause your athletic performance to plateau and then decrease rather than improve.
Full recovery from overtraining might take weeks or months of rest, which can be especially difficult for runners who love running.
This article will help you not only understand what overtraining is, but also recognize the symptoms of OTS and prevent it.
9 Signs of Overtraining for Runners
If you aren’t taking rest days and are noticing these symptoms below, it’s time to rethink your training
1. You’re Having Trouble Sleeping
If you’ve lately been experiencing new sleeping issues, such as insomnia or restlessness when trying to fall asleep, then it may be a symptom of OTS.
Poor sleep quality or inability to fall asleep quickly is a sign that your nervous system is on overload. Without regular sleep, the body cannot function to its full potential
Regular, high-quality sleep stimulates muscle growth and repair and boosts the immune system.
Lack of sleep results in poor workout performance and inhibits the conversion of carbs to glycogen.
Endurance athletes tend to skimp on sleep in order to get the miles in, however, sacrificing sleeping more and better won’t produce the performance results you’re hoping for.
Plus, you’ll feel sore and will likely get sick more often – ahem, your body’s way of forcing you to rest.
2. You’re Super Thirsty All the Time
If you’re constantly thirsty or notice that your pee is dark yellow, that’s a sure sign of dehydration.
Under constant stress, the adrenal glands begin to release cortisol, the “stress hormone.” This is known as adrenal fatigue.
In this state, the exhausted adrenal glands can’t properly produce aldosterone, the hormone that regulates electrolyte and fluid levels, thus stimulating a demand for water.
Another reason for insatiable thirst could be that the body has reached a catabolic state. This occurs when the body begins to break down muscle tissue to use as fuel rather than fats or carbs.
An unfortunate consequence of fasted running, or simply underfueling workouts.
Without proper hydration and fueling during times of intense training, the body has no other choice.
Drinking electrolytes can help to improve hydration levels and helps the body maintain more water.
3. You Feel Slow and Weak During Workouts
A bad workout happens to us all every now and then. If it’s beginning to seem like every single workout is a slog, then it’s time to take a look at your training schedule.
Feeling slow, weak, or missing time goals by a large margin indicates fatigue. You’re likely not allowing enough time for your muscles to recover, not getting enough sleep, and not fueling properly.
Perhaps you aren’t taking your recovery runs easy enough.
There’s a reason most training plans only call for one to two hard sessions per week. The majority of your training runs should be easy efforts, but if your easy runs are dragging you down, then take a step back and see what the root cause could be.
Using Perceived Effort Running Chart is a great way to keep your easy days easy, but this talk test guide can help as well.
4. You Have Nagging Aches and Pains
If you’ve lately been experiencing joint pain and other aches, it could be a sign that you’re overtraining. When your body is tired, you have sore muscles from running, and haven’t slept well in days, you’re more likely to fall out of good running form.
Running long-term with poor form is a recipe for developing an overuse injury from the repeated stress and strain.
If you weren’t taking enough rest before, you’re sure to find yourself forced into rest when you have a common running injury. The body is smarter than you think and if you don’t give it rest, it will ensure you rest.
Training stresses the muscles to create microscopic tears in the muscle tissue. With proper rest, the muscle then repairs to build back stronger. However, continuous, repetitive movements, like running without the right recovery, only cause more tears that lead to inflammation.
While muscle soreness is completely normal if you’re just starting out, trying a new technique, or lifting weights, feeling sore all the time is a sign of overtraining.
5. You’re Experiencing Mental Training Burnout
Of course, there are always days when we don’t feel like working out. Maybe we stayed out later than normal with friends, we’re in the middle of peak week training, or the wind is howling.
That’s NORMAL.
Days and days of needing to forcefully drag yourself from bed because both deep mental and physical fatigue are signs of burnout. A sudden loss of enthusiasm for running is a clear sign of it.
I’ve talked all about how to avoid that mental burnout during marathon training, so I won’t rehash it.
But want to ensure it’s highlighted here, and it’s a symptom that you may need a day or week off to recoup before it leads to overtraining.
6. Your Heart Rate is Abnormal
Both an elevated and a reduced heart rate can indicate exercise-related stress. If your heart rate exceeds five to 10 beats per minute in either direction, then it could be time to take a rest.
Knowing your regular resting and maximum heart rate helps with recovery, performance, and reduces the risk of overtraining. If your heart rate is above normal in the morning, then take that as a sign to resist a tough workout that day.
An elevated heart rate means your body is releasing more oxygen to the brain and muscles in response to stress hormones that trigger fight-or-flight mode.
The best way to get to know your regular resting heart rate is to take it first thing in the morning every day with a heart rate monitor. Checking heart rate variability is another indicator of whether you are overtraining.
This is different than those who run with a high heart rate all the time. That’s something to watch, but if it’s not abnormal is not a sign of overtraining.
7. You’re Experiencing Mood Swings and Irritability
As I mentioned above, your stress hormone levels can be affected by overtraining, which may result in moodiness, decreased motivation, agitation, and even depression.
This, in turn, can cause other health issues due to decreased immunity. If you’ve been experiencing increased occurrences of illness and other health issues, such as high blood pressure, it’s a sign that you’re overtraining.
It’s important to always address health issues right away, so if you’re experiencing any of these make sure to visit your doctor.
See how exercise impacts cortisol, it’s a good reminder that your body can’t differentiate the stress of life from the stress of training. So when both are high, it’s much easier to overtrain.
8. You’ve Noticed Changes in Weight or Appetite
Running and working out typically result in a healthy appetite. However, exercising too much can lead to a hormonal imbalance that affects hunger and satiety.
Your testosterone levels can fall as your cortisol levels rise, causing a multitude of issues with protein metabolism, insulin resistance, hunger, and more.
Feeling a loss of appetite, experiencing sudden, unplanned weight loss, along with gastrointestinal issues like runner’s diarrhea, may be a symptom that you’re overtraining.
Getting the right nutrition, including the necessary micronutrients, vitamins, and minerals, is essential for adequate recovery. Without this, you can further exacerbate your symptoms.
So make sure you’re getting enough calories and nutrients. Your daily caloric intake should meet your body’s requirements for training and muscle recovery.
Get a ton more details in this Runner Nutrition Course >>
9. You’ve Stopped Getting Your Period
This is a serious sign of the Female Athlete Triad, a fairly common symptom among women that often goes ignored. The syndrome presents with three symptoms: low energy, amenorrhea (irregular periods), and low bone mineral density.
One of the first signs of the Female Athlete Triad (now known as RED-S) is loss of your period. This occurs because insufficient fuel is consumed to sustain the level of activity.
When the period disappears, it affects bone health. Low bone mineral density increases the risk of injury and can have long-lasting and irreversible consequences if not treated right away.
This is not a normal occurrence for women and should be managed immediately.
How to Prevent Overtraining
Now that you understand what overtraining is and its symptoms, we’re sure you want to know how to prevent it. Here are the top 4 ways to not only recover from overtraining but also prevent it in the first place.
Getting Adequate Rest
We’ve gone over the importance of rest days, and I’ve added it back here to emphasize just how important it is. It’s the first step not only to recovery but also to prevention.
Getting Enough Sleep
The National Sleep Foundation recommends 7 to 9 hours of sleep per night for most American adults. These requirements may be higher after a hard workout or training session, or when a runner is recovering from overtraining.
Developing healthy sleeping habits starts with deciding when you want to go to sleep and when you want to wake up and then keeping to those times on a consistent basis, including on the weekends.
Getting the Right Nutrition
Changes in hormone levels, such as increased cortisol, can lead to loss of appetite during overtraining. To be able to recover from it, it’s important to focus on nutrition and a proper runner’s diet.
Nutrition for runners is a complex topic, with so many opportunities for mistakes that I’ve compiled a complete guide to help you find the resources, tips, and tricks to fully recover from overtraining.
It’s also incredibly important for runners to understand to prevent overtraining in the first place.
Stop Skipping Rest Days
You hear that rest days are part of training, but we still think it often takes a swing of feeling BAD to let it sink in.
If the elite athletes know that rest days and easy running are important…why do we think we can skip it? Curious, isn’t it?
Elites spend 80% of their time running easy and optimize recovery time with naps, massages, lots of sleep, and high-quality food.
But not us. No, no, we’re busy. We don’t run 100 miles, so we probably don’t need as much rest…and that’s why we get injured.
It’s incredibly important to understand rest days, and we know you have many questions. Here are answers to some commonly asked rest-day questions to help you learn how to avoid overtraining in the first place.
How Often Do You Need a Rest Day?
That largely depends on the intensity of your training, your nutrition, your sleep, and your current lifestyle. We break this down more in rest vs active recovery days for running.
What Happens If You Don’t Take a Rest Day?
The list above highlights some common symptoms of overtraining. Many signs occur in combination with others. A body cannot perform at its best if it is under too much stress and your running will suffer if you keep at it.
What Happens To Your Body If You Overtrain?
As you read in the symptoms above, it throws everything out of whack. Your hormone levels are off, you may start to hold on to body fat due to increased cortisol, and the progress you were seeing starts to go backwards.
How Often Do I Need a Break from Running?
Elite runners often take a full month off training after a marathon.
Would that be wise for most of us? Probably. The toll that running all out for 26.2 takes on the body is tremendous, but we’re so afraid of losing fitness that we jump right back in and often end up injured.
- A great rule of thumb is at least 2 weeks after a marathon for experienced runners, of no running (you can be doing plenty of other easy activities), and possibly more for newer runners.
- At least a week minimum after a hard half marathon for experienced runners.
- A full month off if you’ve been training year-round and are starting to feel burned out – again, this could be a great time for walks with friends, core work, and less strenuous workouts.
We hope this was helpful and showed why listening to your body and taking rest days are so important to avoid overtraining.
What to read next?
- What’s the Difference Between Active Recovery and Rest Days?
- Running Maintenance Plan Guidance
- Could a Running Break Be What You Need? Ultra Runner Mirna Valerio Shares Her Thoughts
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