The answer could be you’re not focussing enough attention to recovery. Fatigue from the workouts alone are not the whole picture. Perhaps you have been working overtime at work. Your dog is sick and you had to take it to the vet and recently you have not been sleeping well. All of this stress accumulates on top of your training to cause the symptoms outlined above. The answer to this is to make sure you are devoting the appropriate time to recovery and stress management. The following are evidence based recovery modalities, in order of importance you need to consider if you want to perform at your best.
- Sleep: Adequate sleep is essential for everyone, particularly hard training athletes as yourself. Sure people can survive on 4 hours a night but these people are the exception and it is likely they could perform better with more. Similarly you may not need 12 hours but aiming for that solid 8 hour mark is a great start. Keep the room cool, use block out curtains to keep the room as dark as possible. Avoid your phone and computer in the bed and keep any other sources of light such as an alarm clock to as low a setting as possible. Consistent adequate sleep is the best restorative source of recovery.
- Calories: Ensuring appropriate and good quality calories is crucial to recovery. In fact it’s been said “no such thing as overtraining, just under eating”. While a little simplistic the underlying message is an important one. Getting good quality calories from a wide variety of sources is great for recovery. Vegetables of every colour, lean meats, dairy and whole grain carbohydrate sources should be prioritised. Limit fried foods and highly processed foods as these are often high in calories but very low in fiber, vitamins and minerals.
- Self applied modalities: Hot and Cold showers, Ice baths, foam rolling and stretching are all examples of self applied recovery techniques. There is a reason all professional athletes around the world use these techniques consistently. They aid recovery and enable the athlete to continue to perform at their peak.
Start implementing these ideas into your daily routine consistently and monitor your performance. You will notice which of the above ideas adds the most value for your recovery and then you can prioritise those techniques into your everyday routine.
Ref.
Venter, R; Role of sleep In performance and recovery of Athletes: A Review Article, 2012
Beck, K; Role of nutrition in performance enhancement and postexercise recovery, 2015
Barnett A; Using recovery modalities between training sessions in elite Athletes, 2006