One of the worst things that can possibly happen to you as a runner is getting injured. It sucks. Nobody wants it to happen to you. I don't want it to happen to me. I don't want it to happen to you. It's the worst. Nobody wants it to happen. So, you are here on this channel asking me, Jesse, how can I avoid overtraining and then becoming injured while I'm running? Well, I'm going to talk about just that here on today's episode of Runner's High.
In other episodes of Runner's High, if you've not seen them, hit that subscribe button right there in the bottom right-hand corner, I talked about something called periodization. And this is your number one key in avoiding overtraining when you're running periodizing your schedule. At the end of this video and down to the description. I'll have a link to that little series where I explain what periodization is, and the various phases of periodization.
The short version is you are setting up your schedule so that you have a certain amount of time where you're working hard, trying to go harder than you've gone before. And then a certain amount of time, when you rest, you're not working anywhere near capacity so your muscles have the ability to recover. Overtraining often comes almost entirely because you're working too hard for too long, too much outside of your capacity. See how those T-O-O, too’s in that sentence.
It's a matter of stretching yourself too far over and over and over again, and then your body is unable to recover. So, adding that recovery period in with a periodized schedule is the number one tool to avoiding overtraining.
Now, my second tip for avoiding overtraining when you're running is to not do speed work too early. This is going to be a matter of, again, following a periodized schedule. But that means taking the time to build up the steps properly, not going from I'm not running at all to let's do 400-meter repeats over and over and over. This is assuming that you're an endurance runner, not a sprinter, they're gonna have a whole different kind of training schedule. So, you have to take the time to build slow, build faster, build faster, and do that over a period of time.
Again, overtraining is excess strain on your body in too short a window without the ability to recover. So, when you go too hard, too fast, by doing speed work too early, then you're more likely going to end up in overtraining, over fatigue and set yourself back instead of being able to move forward. So, do you have any questions for me about running, anything that you are wondering? Leave them down in the comments below. I’d love to answer a question for you. To check out that series on periodization click on that link that should be up on the screen here shortly. I'll see you next time on the next episode of Runner's High.