Recovery - What does that even mean?

There will be an entirely separate tirade on the pathological nature of self diagnosis that is present in our culture today, but one that we often hear is that people state they're overtrained. Others, who have little to no experience with training will often tell individuals not to overtrain. It isn't obvious to me that these individuals are actually overtrained, it seems more likely that they're under recovered.

The human body is capable of incredible feats. David Goggin's first 100 mile race, after that, he was overtrained, individuals training for an iron man, are likely at some point to be overtrained, your friend who competed in a bodybuilding show and was exhibiting 'signs' of being overtrained? Much more likely that they were under recovered.

Overtraining is actually a very difficult thing to accomplish, one because of the physical effort required to do so, but secondly because of the motivation. If you're unable to set the clock on your microwave do you really think you'll be dedicated enough to actually push your body into a state where its physiological functions are disrupted because you exercise too much? Let me propose an alternative.

 You exercise on average 60-90 minutes a day. Your day is filled with stressors, kids, work, emails, your attention is always stolen by your phone or another form of media. Because you're so busy, you haven't eaten a vegetable since September, and when you crawl into bed you scroll through top 10 videos on Youtube for an hour. All of these things are contributing to your bodies inability to recover, you could call it overtraining based on of your bodies ability to tolerate any kind of additional stress, but that seems to place the blame in the wrong direction.

 Recovery can look like a lot of things, and it likely looks different to some people. It could be corrective exercise after a session, it could be yoga, it could be going for a walk, but rest, good food, and low stress hormones are commonalities for all people.

 Here's a story for you. Back when my old man was teaching me to drive in my rural Alberta upbringing (I was probably about 10), I remember starting the truck and beginning to drive, which he got upset at me for, stating that I needed to let the oil run through the engine for a few seconds before I immediately took off. We went for our drive, I pulled back into the driveway, slipped the vehicle into park, and turned it off, for which I received a swift hand behind the head. "The hells the matter with you?! You gotta let it cooldown first!" We often treat others better than we do ourselves, my old man treated that old blue and white truck that emitted fumes likely to cause permanent brain damage with one solid inhale pretty good.

Written by our Athletic Therapist - Jeff Kubik.

~Find your passion, find what moves you, find your strength in movement~