Overreaching, Overtraining, and Burnout

By Tiffany Gust MS, USA Certified Triathlon Coach

Athletes spend many hours of dedicated practice in order to achieve their goals. They engage in intense training to produce overload that will result in increased performance, thus helping them chase those dreams of success. However, a combination of excessive overloading and inadequate recovery can result in the complete opposite: a feeling of fatigue, a decrease in performance, and an increase of injuries, all of which can be signs of overtraining.

In a recent study, Overtraining in Sports, Richard B. Kreider and co-workers first defined overreaching and overtraining as follows:

Overreaching (OR) is an accumulation of training and nontraining stress that results in a short term (several days to several weeks) diminish in performance with or without psychological and physiological symptoms and signs of maladaptation in which performance capacity is affected.

Overtraining (OT) is an accumulation of training and nontraining stress that results in a long term (several weeks to months) diminish in performance with or without psychological and physiological symptoms and signs of maladaptation in which performance capacity is affected.

Overtraining Syndrome (OTS): The results of overtraining, a long-term fall in performance capacity, and RPE (rating of perceived exertion) and fatigue increased and energy and mood decreased.

Essentially, the difference between overtraining and overreaching is the amount of time of recovery needed to restore performance and degree of impairment and stress, both physiologically and psychologically.

Typical symptoms of overreaching in trained endurance athletes included reduced performance and high perceived fatigue; decreased heart rate values at all intensities, including at exhaustion; higher prevalence of infections, usually upper respiratory; and disturbed sleep quality and mood. Early warning signs show that the brain knows before the body.

How prevalent are overreaching and overtraining? One study showed that the risk of OR/OT was reported for endurance athletes at approximately 10 percent. And because the risk of OR/OT becomes compounded over the life of an athlete’s career, the study demonstrated the risk of OR/OT for elite female runners at 60 percent and elite male athletes at 64 percent with one episode. The career rate of 33 percent was noted in non-adult runners. Identical rates for young athletes were reported at 34.6 percent among 231 athletes, ages thirteen to eighteen years of age, with OT/OR being reported among the faster performers.

If you are experiencing any of these symptoms or are feeling defeated in your pursuit to chase your dreams of endurance sports, we can offer some evidence-based methodologies. A Vo2 max would be a good place to start. Call the LiVe Well Center today to schedule an appointment at (435) 251-3793. If you are trying to overcome an injury or would like to enhance your performance, call Intermountain Sports Performance to learn more about our Performance Running Program and HighPerformance Aging Programs at (435) 251-2256.