Introduction
Training within different seasons can alter for everyone. Some may find that their highest training load occurs over the winter months, while others find that spring and the good weather is where their training really takes shape. Whatever your schedule is, it is super important to transition the body effectively to avoid the risk of injury.
Winter deload to spring reload
Go slow but steady
Try to get some exercise 3-4 times a week on alternate days. It is well known that the most common type of injury comes through going too hard too soon.
Monitor your Level of Exertion
Using a simple scale of 1-10 (1 feeling fine, 10 feeling maxed out and over worked) can help you rate how you are perceiving the exercise and whether you are training in and around the correct threshold (initially aiming for a score of 5-6).
Increasing your training slowly
Setting yourself a variable to monitor during spring training (mileage, time or amount of weight lifted) reduced the risk of injury through spike in loads. Increases of more than 10% per week automatically heightens the risk of injury occurring.
Don’t exercise in pain
As you get back to training you may have some minor muscle aches and soreness. However, if you have any sharp, unusual pain, or soreness that doesn’t go away, listen to your body and seek professional advice!
Cross train
Just because your chosen sport is back up and running in the spring it doesn’t mean that that has to be the only activity that you do. Varying the training can help improve performance and reduce the risk of repetitive or over-use injuries.
Avoid all-out efforts
Depending on how much inactivity has occurred over the winter, it could take as long as 6 weeks to re-establish a solid fitness base. Establishing a good aerobic foundation allows you to add intervals or all-out efforts with sufficient rest & recovery.
Winter reload to spring deload
Active recovery
Just because your sport has come to an end as we come out of the winter months and into spring it doesn’t mean we just stop all together. Maintaining a level of fitness while participating in other sporting disciplines reduces the risk of injury, boredom, and atrophy!
Seek advice
Utilising the deload to seek advice from coaches, professionals, sports therapists, and nutritionists would be hugely advantageous to better performance going forward.
Maintenance
Maintaining strength capacities & nutritional habits when exercise demand is less will allow for a smoother transition when exercise load increases.
I hope you all had a lovely long Easter weekend and apologies for the delay in releasing this blog. For the first time in years I didn’t do any work related tasks over Easter and it was lovely. Enjoy this week’s read & take care,
Liv
BSc Hons Sports Therapy MSST
MSc Strength and Conditioning
07761887778
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