The End of Overtraining
Overtraining happens. Adjust your training plan and try these nutritional strategies to prevent and conquer overtraining syndrome.
An old saying in the training world goes like this: "There's no such thing as overtraining, only under-eating." That's oversimplified, of course, and has caused a lot of hard-lifting guys to become hard-lifting fat guys.
This is more accurate: Overtraining syndrome does exist, and nutrition does play a big role. More accurately, however, overtraining occurs when your training load (intensity, volume, and frequency) surpasses your ability to recover and adapt. Add non-training life stress to training stress and suddenly you get overtrained from even moderately intense workouts.
You train harder, yet performance and gains decline. You're always sore, maybe even injured. Sleep is disturbed and heart rate variability (HRV) is reduced. Testosterone drops while cortisol rises. Mentally, you feel fatigued, foggy, even irritable or depressed. Soon, workout motivation tanks.
It's easy to slip down the overtraining slope. We love lifting, and when gains slow, we instinctively want to train more, not less. We also want to exercise more when we're trying to lose fat, a combination of more training stress and reduced nutrient intake. Not good.
So, here's a quick supplement guide for the overtraining-prone lifter. It's a little more advanced than "eat more."
Supplements That Prevent Overtraining
1. Workout Nutrition
The right workout nutrition consumed before, during, and after tough training allows you to train harder and recover faster. Training with nothing but Gatorade during and a banana after is a quick pathway to overtraining... unless you're just not training very hard. Hey, no need to worry about overtraining if you're not pushing yourself.
On the macro level, the lack of carbs (or the right kind) leads to insufficient glycogen replenishment. In turn, this leads to fatigue, poor performance, and decreased recovery. And if protein or amino acid intake is too low, muscle breakdown will exceed muscle repair, leading to slow recovery.
Ideally, focus on highly branched cyclic dextrin (HBCD) for carbs and L-Leucine for an amino acid. HBCD is a fast-digesting carb that provides a steady release of glucose without causing a blood sugar crash. It prevents energy depletion during long workouts, controls cortisol spikes (which contribute to overtraining), and replenishes glycogen stores for optimal recovery.
Leucine, the master amino acid, triggers muscle protein synthesis. It's responsible for activating mTOR, the pathway that drives muscle repair, recovery, and growth.
High amounts of both are found in the Surge Performance Fuel (Buy at Amazon) formula.
Along with these overtraining preventers, Surge contains:
- Citrulline Malate – Increases nitric oxide (NO) production, leading to better oxygen and nutrient delivery to muscles. Citrulline malate reduces muscle soreness by clearing ammonia and lactic acid and improves muscle recovery by increasing arginine and ATP production.
- Betaine Anhydrous – Reduces cortisol levels, helping to mitigate overtraining stress.
- Beta-Alanine – Prevents burnout by improving anaerobic and aerobic capacity, and helps sustain higher training volume without excessive fatigue.
- Malic Acid – Clears ammonia and lactic acid, reducing muscle soreness. It also improves oxygen utilization, reducing fatigue from overtraining.
- Electrolyte Blend – Overtraining causes electrolyte depletion, leading to fatigue, poor performance, and muscle breakdown.
2. Post-Workout Nutrition
A big protein shake after lifting certainly helps. The more muscle groups you train in a session, the more protein you need after training. (Info here.)
Take it up a level and use casein hydrolysate, a highly anabolic, special-use protein. Just 20 grams after training provides these benefits:
- Increased muscle gains by 70% over whey hydrolysate (Demling RH 2000).
- Faster delivery of amino acids to muscles for recovery and growth.
- Minimal muscle soreness after intense workouts.
Casein hydrolysate is found in the Mag-10 Elite Recovery (Buy at Amazon) formula, along with HBCD for additional enhanced recovery.
3. Magnesium and Zinc
Most Americans already have a deficiency or insufficiency in at least one of these minerals, and hard trainers lose additional zinc and magnesium by sweating.
Magnesium and zinc are the most critical minerals for preventing and recovering from overtraining syndrome. They impact muscle recovery, stress response, immune function, and hormone balance – all disrupted when you're overtrained. Low zinc can cause low testosterone levels, and the sleep problems associated with overtraining can usually be traced back to a lack of magnesium.
Take 400 mg of magnesium daily, ideally before bed, and 30 mg of zinc. Use the Albion-chelated form, which increases absorption. Elitepro Vital Minerals (Buy at Amazon) contains these amounts.
Along with these nutritional strategies, maybe take an extra day or two off from the gym. An EOD (every other day) training plan might be just what you need. Here's a plan to follow.
