We’re well into the winter season, and by this time of year many of us will have already been trapped indoors nursing the sniffles at some point or other.
If your session is so important you simply cannot miss it, then go for it, but you must be satisfied that your choice won’t result in waking up worse the next day- Matthew Muscat Inglott
Despite humankind’s immense capacity for information and communication technology progress and the development of science and research, we are still no closer to wiping the common cold from our lives for good, confining it for ever more to the realms of history.
Of all the useless pills we are sold at every opportunity, if only just one of them could instantly cure the common cold the moment symptoms begin rearing their ugly heads. As I write this, I lay confined to my bed, hoping that rest will cure this ravaged throat and acute sense of fatigue.
But alas, the symptoms persist. Uppermost in my thoughts are those weights sitting around at the gym that must be lifted. They’re not going to lift themselves, so when am I next going to be able to do the honour? When is one really sick enough not to exercise?
Troubling questions for some, but if you are anything short of hooked on exercise or sport, the answer will be relatively straightforward; don’t train, take it easy.
Most people might be grateful for just the right excuse to succumb to the mystical magnetism of the sofa, to remain cuddled up with a furry four-legged companion, sipping tea and watching television.
These cold winter evenings have a tendency to dispell all motivation to get up and get moving. But what of the hooked? What of the rare breed of exercise addicts and gym rats who cannot bare the prospect of another night away from the smell of sweat, rubber gym mats and protein shakes?
For the hardcore fitness elite out there, one might expect some set of established guidelines on the matter to exist somewhere out there in cyberspace. How-ever, such credible advice is remarkably sparse.
So, based on the humble hive of fitness ideas buzzing about in my own repertoire of fitness advice, let us first attack the all-important question: “I’m not feeling well, should I train or not?” If you really want an honest answer that isn’t influenced by guilt on one end of the spectrum, or laziness on the other, there are some factors we must bear in mind.
You must first establish what is wrong with you and how bad it is. Is it a cold? A fever? Common colds are the most common forms of illness this time of year, but you could be feeling the fever or flu too.
If symptoms inlude severe lethargy and pain felt throughout or anywhere in the body at a point below your neck, then it’s definitely not a good idea to train. If you do, you might make matters a whole lot worse or even sustain serious lasting injury.
If the symptoms are confined to your head, or in other words, occur above the neck, then the answer isn’t so straightforward.
If you have a runny nose or a minor sore throat, or both, without accompanying generic symptoms, then a workout might be just the thing to stimulate endorphin production, sweat out toxins, stimulate appetite, boost energy levels and promote a general sense of well-being.
If your head cold is accompanied by general fatigue, then your choice is harder still, and yet more factors must come into play. The old phrase ‘live to fight another day’ springs to mind here.
If your session is so important you simply cannot miss it, then go for it, but you must be satisfied that your choice won’t result in waking up worse the next day, and delaying training even further in the long run. One day of rest might have been all you needed to beat the bug and leave you perfectly fit and healthy to resume normal training immediately.
If you decided to go for it, you should be able to justify your decision. Are you a competitive athlete with a competition or tournament coming up soon?
Is the session vital to agreeing or practising your strategy or tactics for the day? Is the session an opportunity to train with a visiting coach you won’t ever get the chance to meet again? Is your training partner banking on you being there on this particular day and you can’t let him or her down?
These might all be valid reasons for taking the sniffling plunge, but once you’ve made your decision to go, we’re not quite done yet. What about the sesison itself?
It stands to reason you will need to modify your session in some way to accommodate your undesirable state of health. If you are an athlete, this is the time to focus on skill or technique. Your performance will benefit, but you won’t be making a significant dent in your recovery.
This might actually be the perfect opportunity to work on some of the finer details of your game you previously neglected for lack of time. We tend to focus on the most prominent or obvious issues most of the time, but occasionally we need to dig a little deeper too or revisit the basics. I tend to neglect flexibility training, for example, so when I’m sick I find this to be the ideal period to indulge in some dedicated stretching work.
For those of you who are wrestling with these very questions right now, I wish you a speedy recovery.
info@noble-gym.com