Getting Sidelined with Overtraining

by Michael Sahno, MS APK, TSAC-F

So, I’ve been sick. That, by itself, would have been bad enough if, just beforehand, I hadn’t also been recently injured. It all started when I bent down to light a candle for my Wife and I suddenly experienced what felt like a stabbing sensation in my lower back. It was excruciating. I could barely lift my shoulders up to stand up straight. How could I be taken out by such a mundane and simple movement? Well, I’ll tell you how.

I train Muay Thai. It is a passion of mine. I LIVE for it. Because of this, I train in the backyard at my barn for about two to three hours, three to four days a week. This includes my sessions at the Muay Thai gym. I do everything from knee raises, internal and external rotations, punches, kicks, you name it. Hundreds of reps. Tons of sets. By the end, I am covered in sweat.

Someone at some point in human history said something along the lines of, “all things in moderation”. It is now blatantly obvious that I DID NOT heed that message. I over did it. WAY over did it. I injured my Psoas muscle. For those of you who do not know or have never even heard of this muscle, it is deeply set inside the structure of your hips and connects just about everything that you would use to bend over at your waist. When you hurt it, you are HURT.

I was sidelined for about a month with a pain that ranged from excruciating to mildly inconvenient and no matter how hard I tried, I could not stretch the muscle in such a way that it would loosen up. I was horrible, but eventually it subsided. Luckily I was only out of Muay Thai class for one week and after speaking to the instructor I was able to modify my training and remove the kicks and lower body-intensive movements in class for the next few weeks. Slowly, but surely, I was healing. Good to go, right?

This was when I got sick. It started with my wife (I’m starting to see a pattern here). She came home from work one day and started coughing. A cough that got harder and deeper as whatever she had ran its course. The course of this illness ran for about three weeks, and miraculously, I, nor anyone else in the house, got sick. That is, until my Psoas muscle had fully healed. Then I got sick. Perfect timing.

It didn’t hit me with the intensity that it had hit my wife, but it did knock me out of training. Again, I had to miss my weekly Muay Thai class. And, training outside by the barn? Out of the question. I could barely muster up the energy to do normal daily activities, let alone train or work out.

Why am I sharing this story of misery? Why am I telling you this tale of woe? Because I am finally feeling better. I am not sick and I am not injured. I am ready to start training again, but I also think that I might know how I got myself into this mess in the first place. This whole thing is MY fault. I think that I became a victim of my own devices. I am pretty sure that I took myself out by Overtraining.

What is Overtraining? According to book Exercise Physiology: Theory and Application to Fitness and Importance, by Scott K. Powers, Edward T. Howley, and John Quindry, “Overtraining is often defined as an imbalance between training and recovery. In short, overtraining results from a high volume and intensity of exercise without sufficient rest and recovery.” This is EXACTLY what was doing. Some of my workouts were what I call Two-a-Days, because the Muay Thai training wasn’t the only thing that I did during the week. I would also do weighted vest ruck marches for two miles, two to three times a week, and I was also swimming a half-mile breast stroke one to two days a week. Definitely Overtraining.

What is most interesting about all of this and this story is that this is, most likely, why I wound up getting sick. One of the effects of Overtraining is the potential for a weakening of your Immune System. In a UCLA Health Article posted on their website by medical journalist Chayil Champion, Ed.D, titled, No Pain, No Gain? Training Too Hard Can Have Serious Health Consequences, his research found that, “Overtraining can result in imbalances in hormones such as cortisol, testosterone and growth hormone. These imbalances can adversely affect metabolism and muscle growth. In addition, the strain on the body due to overtraining can suppress the immune system, making individuals more susceptible to infections, illnesses and prolonged recovery periods.”

This is why I am sharing this story. Often we push ourselves and our training, and that is great and we should commend ourselves for all of the hard work that we have done. But, we also have to remember to allow ourselves to heal and to recover. If we don’t, then we run the risk of running ourselves into the ground. I’m definitely going to take a lesson from this, one that I’ve already put into my training program. I’m adding more rest days. I’m focusing more on recovery. Why? Because I LOVE Muay Thai!