Worry of Overtraining

Hey all,
Since I also workout at the gym 4 days per week, with aikido 1-2 times per week, what is the chance of overtraining?

It depends on the intensity and type of your gym workout.

Aikido isn't particularly physically demanding; it's doubtful it'll push your body - already used to freeweight training - over the limit. It may in fact be beneficial; giving your body some light limbering exercise between workouts.

That being said; I'd pay close attention to how you feel over time. If you start to feel overworked with nagging apins, pulls, etc. I'd recommend cutting back a little.

I would second what Dave has said.

I would also say that you should try to practice aikido at least twice a week. My experience has shown that those who train once a week have a hard time maintaining continuity between classes, and usually progress very slowly.

Paul Klembeck

It depends upon what kind of "overtraining" you are talking about. In strength training circles, it is often taken to mean working out with too much intensity, volume or frequency in even one movement or muscle group, such that one is not making progress.

To determine whether this is occurring is quite simple, as you can just look at your training log and see if your training performance is improving. If weights/reps/volume or whatever variable you are trying to improve doesn't go up at all for over a week or so, chances are that you need to throttle back one or more training variables, or alter some aspect of the routine, which has gone stale. If, on the other hand, you don't keep records, your training efforts are a bunch of guessing anyway, so what's the difference?

On the other hand, if you're talking about overtraining syndrome in the larger sense of your whole system, that's a trickier matter. The initial signs seem to be subtle and different for each person. By the time an athlete's performance is affected, it's often too late to recover in time for a competition, or part of the season is ruined. I fished around the web for a good basic writeup on it, and found one that's pretty well done:

http://www.grapplearts.com/OvertrainingArticle.htm

IMHO, training is very activity specific. So, you can probably go ahead and train at both the dojo and the gym without too much concern of over training. Monitor and pace yourself.

I train 3 x week, run, swim, and lift.

Hah... have you seen how some ppl train in Japan? 3 times a day 7 days a week!

on my third straight day, i couldn't seiza anymore. but i miss it all the same.

When I started I could only train for one or two days a week. Mainly because I was over 300lbs (about 135kg), so my body just couldn't take the demand. Now I train regularly 4 or 5 times a week for 2 to 3 hours each. (also weight train)

It's is a matter of building up your body to take that kind of punishment. It also knowing when to stop. If I feel like its too much I stop.

Ryan

Andy:

Consider taking your awakening pulse each morning BEFORE you get out of bed. If your pulse increases or decreases by ten percent, you probably need a little more rest and may want to scale back a training session or two. That's a technique that triathletes use and is highly recommended by some of the elite trifolks. Works for me anyway.

Michael