Are you struggling to see results in the gym, or your chosen sport? Are you constantly spinning your wheels training, dieting, training, eating, and repeating over and over, only to find yourself exhausted and knee-deep in Oreo’s wondering why you aren’t getting the results you dream so persistently of? If so, you may have signs of overtraining syndrome.

It is one of the biggest issues I address in women who apply for my coaching programs, and this has been the case since I began specialising in female coaching back in 2012. It is slightly less common now, but still a big issue; women tend to believe that results will come with harder work, less food, and by surpassing their physical limits as much as possible.

For me, I experienced it back in my powerlifting days, right about the time I found myself with chronic fatigue, which interrupted my training for over 5 years.

Working harder doesn’t always mean you’ll get better results. There are many dimensions to training that way surpass volume, when you’re educated and experienced in the world of female training.

1. ARE YOU FALLING SHORT WHEN IT COMES TO YOUR RESULTS?

There are many reasons why you may fall short when it comes to results, those of which I covered briefly in my last article; ‘Reasons why you aren’t getting results’ (insert post link). If you haven’t read it, that would read it now, or after reading this one, as it will give you a holistic picture of what you may be doing wrong, and what you can change moving forwards. In summary, those reasons included;

1. Not working hard enough
2. Poor programming or program balance
3. Inadequate nutrition
4. Improper technique
5. Overtraining

In a healthy person, results come from progressive overload, followed by recovery, and in most cases, good nutrition (yes there are always those few who don’t worry about their food intake yet surpass the rest of our capacity to perform well, and look great). For most people, nutrition is key as well, but let’s get back to the training;

2. WHAT IS OVERTRAINING SYNDROME?

Over-training syndrome is defined as pushing your body beyond its natural ability to recover. That means, you do too much, and you just don’t have the physical capacity to put the pieces back together, before you do it all over again.

Over-training is one of the biggest mistakes I find women make when training in the gym. It is generally accompanied by, or identified by all of some of the following;

• Results don’t come as they were, or aren’t coming at all
• You’re injured or have joint/muscle pain
• If you’re female, you’ve lost your menstrual cycle, or it has become irregular
• Persistent fatigue and/or exhaustion won’t go away, even after a good sleep
• You don’t recover from your weight-training sessions like you used to
• You have flu-like symptoms that you can’t seem to shake
• You feel stressed at the thought of training
• It can be hard to concentrate or stay mentally focussed
• You may struggle with sleepiness throughout the day, and/or have trouble sleeping at night
• Disordered eating may occur, such as binge-eating or a reduced appetite
• Gut symptoms, such as bloating, are prevalent after eating
• You may feel abnormally low, or anxious (assuming there is nothing else you can attribute it to)

Note that it is also common to overtrain and have symptoms of doing so, without actually meeting the criteria for overtraining syndrome. Either way, it’s important to pay attention to the signs.

3. HOW DOES OVERTRAINING SYNDROME OCCUR?

Assuming your nutrition is sound, you’re emotionally healthy, and otherwise not under too much stress, over-training occurs when you can’t recover from your training stimulus, and this is either due to poor programming, insufficient rest, or sessions that are just too extreme or beyond your capability.

An example of this would be someone who trains 5 times per week in the gym when they’re brand-new, someone who loads weight on equipment that they can’t lift well, someone who starts a fat-loss program with double sessions from the get-go, someone who does too much HIIT, or someone who doesn’t take rest days.

These are mistakes made by many of the women I train, hence why I have listed them here.

If you can relate to that, you’re probably one of my clients who has undergone the process of ‘peeling back’ your training (and you now feel better for it), or if you’re not one of my clients, you’re probably thinking ‘crap, I need to sort this out asap!’

So, how do you fix this?

Before you think it’s as simple as just peeling back those layers of over-training, there are other pieces of the puzzle you need to consider. In real life situations, we can’t just look at the training alone, as there are other stressors that will also challenge your body’s ability to recover from a session.

When relationships are strained, study or work deadlines are pressing, your body image is poor, you suffer depression or anxiety, and/or you don’t eat well (or don’t eat enough), then over-training can occur much sooner. These things also deplete your nervous system, and this is before you’ve even picked up a weight, or attended your training session.

So there is much more to over-training than simply training less. You need to identify how much you own body can handle, based on your individual circumstances, by monitoring a multitude of factors such as sleep, mood, energy levels, performance, and appetite.

4. WHAT IS A HEALTHY AMOUNT OF TRAINING?

Have a look at how much training you are doing. If your goal is purely wellbeing, or body re-composition, then 4-6, 45-60min training sessions per week is perfectly adequate. The only times I have prescribed more than that, is when I have clients trying to get that last 5% of body-fat off for a bodybuilding show. Most of my clients reach their body composition and performance goals without doing anything extreme.

Remember these key pointers;

• Whatever you are doing to achieve your desired outcome, is what you will have to do to maintain it. Can you maintain what you are currently doing?
• There is no amount of training that can out-work a poor diet
• Overtraining syndrome is a serious condition which should not be ignored
• Moderate exercise is key in stress management, but excess exercise can destabilise you further
• Where high-level training regimes are needed (for elite-level performance), you need to focus on lowering the overall stress-load, including maintaining positive relationships, good sleep, adequate nutrition with ample calories, and support any body systems that aren’t coping via external stimulus such as supplementation or herbal medicines.

Overtraining, and overtraining syndrome is a chronic issue in women and one that is quite easily addressed, often with immediate positive results as well! Don’t be afraid to dig a little deeper if any of this rings true to you

Hope this has been helpful!

To learn much, much more about Female Training and how to advance fast in any chosen sport or gym protein, check out my self-coaching program on the topic!

It is jam-packed with all things female training and movement, and you’ll be surprised how easy it is to optimise strength and performance when you have the correct tools.

Jen x