Saturday, February 2, 2013

How To Train From Illnesses

By Tyron Thompson


Influenza can keep you away from your exercise routine for weeks. You are likely eager to get back into it, but there are some good reasons why you should not jump back into your routine full-force as soon as you are feeling better. While exercise is typically good for the immune mechanism, intense workouts essentially suppress it. Your post-sickness body is fighting to regain strength and immunological regularity , pushing yourself hard straight away can really prolong your recovery.

It is sensible to attend 3 or 4 days after you're feeling better to start to work out again , anything beyond a walk may be too much to handle during this time. Waiting a couple of days will give your immune system time to rest and recover.

Now you are feeling better and one or two buffer days have gone by. Whether you are returning to the gym or resuming a home exercise regimen, resistance training or cardio coaching, it's important to remember that you've been out of the game for a while. Even a week off from exercising may cause muscle loss and aerobic fitness decline. A paper titled "The Management of Low Back Stiffness : A Thorough Rehabilitation Program," by Joel Press, MD, and Susan and Brad Sorosky, MDs, reports that muscle strength decreases by 1-3% every day of bed rest and that aerobic fitness level declines by 25 percent over a 3-week period of bed rest. This paper can be discovered in PDF format on the web.

Your zeal to get back to where you were pre-sickness should be tempered by the acceptance that this goal will take longer to achieve if you push yourself too hard at first. You risk injury or serious delayed onset muscle tenderness if you overtax your weakened muscles the first day back, both of which would put you off your routine for days or possibly, in case of injury, weeks to come. Pushing to hard could also weaken your freshly-reconstituted immune system and increase your probability of becoming sick again ( remember, there are many hundreds of different viruses that cause colds and flues ).

How much is too much? A good guideline is to halve your standard routine in each way for the 1st week or two. Exercise half as frequently, half as intensely and half as long as common. You are reintroducing your body to the difficulties of exercise, and this is best done slowly. Increase the length, frequency and intensity of work-outs steadily. Take the following scenario as an example. Your regular routine involves 4 to 5 days every week of half-hour sessions.

You typically do fifteen minutes of moderate- to high-intensity cardiovascular ( like running or jogging ) and 15 minutes of strength building ( weight reps, core exercises for example. ). After being sick, try 2 15-minute sessions the 1st week back, doing 7.5 minutes of low- to moderate-intensity cardiovascular ( like brisk walking ) and 7.5 minutes of strength drilling with half your typical number of reps per exercise. If at any time you're feeling very exhausted, breathless or dizzy, stop and rest one or two more days.

You'll get back to where you were before getting sick if you approach your return to exercise cautiously. Give your body the rest it needs before exerting yourself after having the flu and reintroduce your body to exercise slowly.




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