Chronic

       What if I told you that the reason that many endurance athletes go through more cycles of rehab than training is simply because of their personality? Would you believe me?

    There are two different categories of people: people with intrinsically high stress levels and those with more moderate to low stress levels, even in the absence of external loads. High stress individuals tend to worry about things they can't control, exaggerate situations (both those that have already happened and ones that have not yet occurred), and have an endless supply of things to be stressed about. These people can get stressed on a Hawaii cruise, lying in a hammock, or while sipping Mai-tai's on the beach. Okay, that's an exaggeration. My point is, however, that there are just certain personality characteristics that create a person who is chronically stressed, whether they realize it or not.
      Stress wreaks more havoc on the body than Big Macs, soda, or birthday cake. Being stressed all the time is equivalent (hormone-wise) to being injured chronically. Your body is constantly dumping those inflammatory hormones into the blood, even though there is no real "injury". During times of stress (life and training alike), Corticotropic releasing hormone (CRH) is secreted from the pituitary, causing the release of adrenocorticotropic horomone (ACTH). Levels of cortisol, epinephrine, and norepinephrine follow suit. Even if you've never taken physiology, you should gather that this can have some pretty negative effects on the body.
     The issue with having chronically high stress levels is that the body never recovers from the external stressor of training. Training is, after all, controlled injury of the body's musculoskeletal system (and the nervous system hates it that it has to clean up the mess of microtears, whacked thermoregulation, etc.). The way the nervous system copes with stress is typically by down-regulating during sleep--brain waves are slower and more rhythmic, the heart rate slows and parasympathetic tone increases system-wide. This is the reason that one of the hallmark signs of overtraining is an elevated heart rate upon waking. This down-regulation never occurred, because the nervous system is still sending sympathetic signals to the heart, despite the body's resting state. It's also the reason for irritability in athletes who have been working too hard; the nervous system is overloaded and fails to elicit the proper response to certain emotions.
         So, as athletes and overachievers, how do we deal with this? Although we may not be able to alter our intrinsic stress levels, we can manipulate our extrinsic stress levels. We all know the things that make us happy, and we have to use them as recovery tool. Just as we will spend 30 minutes on a foam roller, sit in an ice bath, or wear compression socks, we need to read a good book or magazine, watch a comedy, spend valuable time with friends and family, or go someplace beautiful. I know a lot of this is obvious, and many of us do these things already. But it's worth a reminder, especially when you're marathon or half-Ironman training and you think that your every move must be careful and measured. It's also important to remember that the timing of these modes of recovery is just as important as those that deal with the body itself. Be sure to get in that mental recovery shortly after a long training week, a 20 mile run, or those heavy deadlifts. Your body (and nervous system) will thank you.