Now that we have discussed the importance of RESTING and how it can be beneficial to give your body an occasional break from diet and exercise, let’s further discuss overtraining. The people that don’t have a regular workout may find the term “overtraining” foreign. Exercising and healthy eating can have so many health benefits but it is a possibility that too much diet and exercise over a long period of time can create additional stress on the body. Stress, whether it is physical, mental, or emotional, is one of the leading causes of sickness and disease. It is impossible to go through life with zero stress. Everyone has a different level of stress in their life whether it comes from work, finances, family, poor diet, or over or under exercising. If too much stress is present, then the body’s adrenal glands will begin to secret addition cortisol. Cortisol is known as the “stress hormone”. Even though our bodies need some cortisol to function properly, higher and more prolonged levels of cortisol in the bloodstream are associated with chronic stress. Chronic stress has been shown to have many negative effects on the body. Taking a look at all the negative effects of cortisol will help you to learn to manage our stress better!
April 30, 2009 – 10:16 am
Your metabolism may have adapted to a constant deficit or low cal diet. You may be able to significantly speed things up if you increase your calories for a day or even a week. It is important to not always deprive your body of certain foods because different foods contain vitamins and minerals that are beneficial for your health. Often I hear people complain of food cravings, especially women. If you want to eat something that you have been craving, sometimes you should eat it. Your body might be telling you what it needs at that time. If you are craving highly processed foods, you may want to consider a cleanse to get rid of some of the toxins in your body. Everyone has toxins in their bodies. When you have too many toxins built up in your body, you may experience unnecessary food cravings(like for sugar) to supplement the body with artificial energy.
An example of some healthy cravings would be craving things like milk, steak, chocolate, or even salt. Milk is a great source of calcium and vitamin D which can help to reduce the risk of osteoporosis and hypertension. Red meat contains very high quantities of iron and is full of high quality protein and contains all the essential amino acids that the body requires. Dark chocolate is rich in antioxidants that protect the body from aging caused by free radicals, which can cause damage that leads to heart disease. Sea salt contains a variety of minerals that play a role in keeping the body’s electrolytes in a healthy balance. Your food cravings could be telling you that your body may be deficient in something so don’t always resist that craving. If you give your body a little bit of what it is craving and wants, you are most likely, to not over eat other things.
Your body will actually talk to you and tell you when it has had too much. Listen to what your body is telling you. A good sign of over training is constant sickness (colds, headaches), chronic fatigue, insomnia, stiff joints, muscle aches and constant soreness. It is good for everyone, once in a while, to take a week off from the gym or whatever your hardcore training routine maybe and catch up on your Z’s. Another reason to rest is that overtime our bodies naturally will adapt to any kind of training. After a good week of rest, not only will you give your body a good time to recover and feel rejuvenated, but it will shock your metabolism just enough to improve results. Adaptation is a natural occurrence so rest and keep your body constantly guessing.
Not only do our bodies adapt to exercise but they also adapt to diet. If you are a healthy eater that is always on a strict and clean diet, it is good to change it up once in awhile. If you have achieved you fitness goals 100%, it is good to sometimes eat whatever. This doesn’t mean you should gorge yourself on ice cream, cake, and pizza. Once a week, you can have a cheat meal that you have been craving. Or, if you have been very strict for a long duration of time, it may be good to take a whole week off from your diet. Just let yourself have some of the things you really enjoy and don’t worry about gaining weight or getting out of shape. Often times, too much deprivation can create obsession. You want to have balance in every aspect of your life. Your health would be a great place to start!
In order to give our bodies the proper amount of time to recover from exercise, we need to take time to rest. It may be time for you to take a week off from a long period of hard and consistent training. Remember to make sure that when you are in the weight room, you aren’t training the same muscle groups on consecutive days. Recovery time is the key element that goes into making proper gains and staying healthy. Even though exercising is beneficial for your health in many ways, overtraining WILL put too much stress on your body, weaken your immune system, and will prevent weight loss and muscle gains.
I admire all the people who are dedicated and spend day after day in the gym and train competitively; it takes a great amount of discipline and hard work. Whether training for a bodybuilder event, a marathon, a triathlon, or just working out hard too many consecutive days in the gym, it is important to give your body a break. Your muscles NEED time to recover if you are hammering them day after day with weights or cardio training. You must give them the proper recovery time. As we discussed before, Axis Labs BCAA and Whey Protein can aide with your duration of recovery time; but even so, we still need to take breaks. If we think of our muscles as a fresh cut that we apply a band aide to, then it may give us a visual to justify resting. You don’t want to rip a band aide off if there is a scab underneath that you would also remove. That would only make the healing process take longer. You want the cut to be completely healed. Rest each muscle group for a few days before hitting it again with the weights. Occasionally, it is ok to rest for at least a week, especially. If you just finished training for an event over a consecutive period of time.
There are so many factors that go into staying healthy, looking good, and feeling great! Often we discuss how beneficial it is to work out on a regular basis and to be consistent, to create a routine geared toward your individual goals, to eat properly and to take the appropriate supplements. Another extremely important factor that goes into achieving this overall great look and feeling is RESTING. Resting is essential! Give your body a break on occasion, especially, all you hardcore athletes. In order to recover appropriately and eliminate excessive physical and emotional stress, sometimes you need to give your body a rest!
Resting doesn’t mean a few days a week off from the gym because you are feeling a little too tired to push yourself that day. Resting means listening to what your body is really telling you and giving yourself a legitimate break from exercise, diet, and supplementation. Just like our body requires a certain amount of sleeping, it also needs a significant amount of resting. If you want to be able to give 100% when you are working out, then it is important to have balance in your life. If you are a go getter or a hardcore athlete, chances are you don’t give yourself that much down time. As humans we don’t function off batteries so in order to keep our energy up, we need to take time to recharge. Give your body the proper amount of rest and nutrients. In the upcoming Blogs we will discuss some very important things regarding how to rest, proper recovery, too much physical stress and its negative impact, and how to have balance.
One of the fastest and most effective way to safely and naturally increase your testosterone levels, without playing Russian Roulette with your health (and the law, for that matter), is to take a non-hormonal supplement which is proven safe and effective. Our own HyperTEST is a unique, cutting edge all natural supplement which works three different ways to synergistically increase your levels to maximize recovery, muscle gains, libido and achieve that lean ripped look we all strive for. HyperTEST can be taken during a mass gain cycle of training, a cutting or pre-contest phase or even just to get the extra results out of your time spent in the gym. The bottom line is that testosterone is the “magic bullet” for physique transformation, if there ever was one. And the name of the game is safely and naturally manipulating our own levels. If you follow the recommendations I’ve listed, you can count on making good on that New Year’s Resolution of yours. And ladies, don’t worry about winding up looking like Mr. Universe…a little testosterone boost is good for us, too. Finally, as we finish up the first quarter of 2009, now is a great time to go home and take a good look in the mirror. Be honest with yourself and reassess your goals. Have you been making the progress you want? Are you giving it your all? If so, great job and keep pushing forward. If not, there is plenty of time left in 2009 to make it happen. Keep in mind there are a million ways to lose a work day, but not even a single way to get one back. The best time is now… Good luck!
