Overtraining vs Low Iron

Low iron is something that is easily checked.

Overtraining is very complex and probably pretty rare. In most cases backing off for a few days will get you right back on track.

Almost anything can be a symptom of overtraining: sleeping too much or too little are both signs.

I don't usually check my heart rate, but I checked it now and my resting heart rate is between 48-54bpm (doesn't seem that high). My motivation though is still the same as when I ran the 17min 5Ks, so I'm not really sure if I'm burned out. Apparently low iron can also interfere with sleep, so it is still possible that I have low Iron.

Can anyone else give input?

Need more info:

How did you feel during your last two races that didn't go well? What were your limiting factors or symptoms?

Describe your diet?

What was your mileage at the beginning of the summer? At the end?

How have you felt and how have you performed in practices over the last several weeks?

va coach wrote:

Need more info:

How did you feel during your last two races that didn't go well? What were your limiting factors or symptoms?

Describe your diet?

What was your mileage at the beginning of the summer? At the end?

How have you felt and how have you performed in practices over the last several weeks?

The first race was on a pretty hilly course while the second race was on a more flat, less hilly course.

During the first race my quads started to tighten up and that mostly limited me. During the second race, it was a mix of breathing and my quads tightening.

I eat mostly grains with lots of beans and bread, some meat (sometimes red meat) maybe twice a week at most.

I went from running 35-40mpw before to running around 60-65mpw over the summer.

2 Weeks ago I was perfectly fine, doing consistently well during practice and in the first two races. My legs felt strong and I felt like it was going to be a good season, especially after beating a lot of people that were way better than me last season in crosscountry. After that I started lagging behind a little bit on workouts. I ran through the next 2 races and now I can safely say that in practice I'm more tired and struggle to run paces that I could do on Tempo runs.

It just doesn't make sense to me why I would be able to go through the whole Summer feeling great, and then 2 weeks after the season starts start slowing down.

need_truth wrote:

This summer I increased my mileage by 25mpw and followed the summer of malmo

Started my first two races with 17:5X and 17:3X, but I haven't broken 19 in the next and last 2 races.

My coach says I'm over trained, but I didn't have any symptom of overtraining and felt good throughout the whole summer. There are maybe 2 times when I have gotten up in the middle of the night (which I heard is a symptom of overtraining), but I used the bathroom and went right back to sleep.

Is it really overtraining, or could it be low iron? (I don't eat that much meat and I sweat a lot)

Overtraining is usually the result of under-something: not enough sleep, poor nutrition, not enough food, etc. etc. OTS is a diagnosis of exclusion and the diagnosis algorithm requires ruling out disturbances in 15 broad areas.

Difficulty sleeping from overtraining is not the same as waking up in the middle of the night to pee.

When I was actually overtrained, I was having difficulty sleeping because I was having hot flashes or muscle spasms or my brain was just too awake. Or I'd wake up in the middle of the night starving and drink a glass of milk or water mixed with protein powder and go back to sleep.

Bump w/ more information

I never really felt overtrained or bad at all when I ran 65mpw. There were two weeks I had when I ran 60mpw and felt really tired because of spending extra time at work, but otherwise I felt great. The week after I felt good (especially with more rest and sleep), so I doubt that the week messed me up in the long term.

I then did 30mpw with the team when they started training (normal for most programs) and stopped running 65mpw. Then 4 weeks later after starting to run with the team that's when my initial drop in performance happened.

It makes no sense to me that I would mostly feel great at 65mpw but then only get signs of over-training 4 weeks AFTER I start running 30mpw as opposed to when I have the high volume. Furthermore, from what you guys are saying it seems like overtraining syndrome is a lot worse and more complex than what I have (unless I just have a mild version of it).

Would I be right?

What did the blood test say? Or have you not gotten one yet?

then get truth! wrote:

What did the blood test say? Or have you not gotten one yet?

Next week I'm getting a test

Will update

Forgot about this thread for a while, got results back Saturday.

My Iron, Hemoglobin, and Hematochrit values are absolutely fine. Furthermore, my heart rate is not elevated at all, and my sleep (at least now) is perfectly fine.

During races I'm putting in close to 100% and I still can't break 19mins despite hitting 17:3X before. It definitely would've been nice to have a breakout season after running those miles during the summer, but I guess not everything is guaranteed to go perfectly. My crosscountry season is pretty much screwed by now, but I'm really scared that all of this is going to carry over to track. Does anyone else have a possible explanation?

How many miles per week have you been running since the season started?

If I understand correctly you dropped from 60ish to 30 mpw? If so, try increasing your mileage closer to where it was over the summer.

Might also want to check your body weight and see if your eating habits from the summer carried over into the season. You might be heavier and slower from that.

volume is important wrote:

How many miles per week have you been running since the season started?

If I understand correctly you dropped from 60ish to 30 mpw? If so, try increasing your mileage closer to where it was over the summer.

Might also want to check your body weight and see if your eating habits from the summer carried over into the season. You might be heavier and slower from that.

Mostly 30-35mpw, and I weigh 1lb heavier (but that doesn't matter because of how water weight can make things fluctuate).

I don't think that the lower season mileage destroyed me just because of how fast the decline happened; It took 2 weeks for me to go from 17mins to 19-20mins.

Although it could be being peaked or having lower mileage, it doesn't make sense to me why my fitness would decline so rapidly (17min → 19min in 2 weeks) while doing something that should still for the most part maintain my fitness. Furthermore, there are many people that do lower mileage in-season and end up fine.

I will get back to doing more mileage in the offseason if I decide it's worth it at all.

I can't really give you a good explanation.

I agree 1 pound shouldn't matter.

My n=1 though, my best performances came from when I ran 60 min easy the day before the race and little to no tapering. I'm also a head case though and I need the runs to keep the anxiety at bay so I'm likely a bad data point.

I'd change something. What do you have to lose at this point?

volume is important wrote:

I'd change something. What do you have to lose at this point?

Good point.

I just measured my resting my heart rate at 60 bpm (4 hours after running, have been sitting doing homework for 1 hour), though earlier this morning it was 50bpm. Yesterday my heart rate right before running was 52bpm, so 60 definitely is high.

Did you get your serum ferritin measured with the blood test?

I don't know the answer re: overtraining (except that this probably isn't it), but let me emphasize that the benefits of that increased training load are not going to go away. Dose, response, supercompensation, etc. - everyone reacts to training stress differently. But you probably didn't irrevocably harm yourself by increasing training load, assuming you were smart about it, and you should see those benefits in some form eventually. Keep the faith.

Mono? Lyme Disease?

I guess I'll find out what happens once the offseason comes.

Akanthos wrote:

Did you get your serum ferritin measured with the blood test?

Yes; It was a lot higher than expected (especially given that I don't supplement or eat that much red meat); 60.