# "How should I train if I'm ill?"| Ep 484

An episode of [Oxygenaddict Triathlon Podcast](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/951501034), 10 Apr 2024, 13 min.

Audio: https://anchor.fm/s/ea99f7d8/podcast/play/85182431/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2024-3-9%2F373730620-44100-2-0cc6712d54105.mp3

If you've ever been tempted to train when you're feeling under the weather, because you're worried that you'll lose fitness if you don't, this video is a must-watch for you! This week I talk about common mistakes I see athletes make when they're ill or injured, and why more often than not their gut-instinct risks significant damage to their training progress. But good news - I also provide really simple, unambiguous protocols of how to navigate illness from a training perspective, such that you'll lose minimal fitness and be back to full strength as fast as possible * * * * * * * * SPONSORS * * * * * * * * Like what you heard in this show? Join hundreds of other age group triathletes making the most of their limited training time, training with Team OxygenAddict! http://team.oxygenaddict.com - The most comprehensive triathlon coaching program for busy age groupers. Join the Team Oxygenaddict waiting list and be the first to find out when a space becomes available: https://team.oxygenaddict.com/waiting-list * * * * * * * * * * * * precisionfuelandhydration.com Precision Fuel & Hydration help athletes personalise their hydration and fuelling strategies for training and racing. Use the free Fuel & Hydration Planner to get a personalised race nutrition plan for your next event. And then book a free 20-minute video consultation with a member of the PF&H Athlete Support Team to refine your strategy. Listeners get 15% off their first order of fuel and electrolytes with Precision Fuel & Hydration. Simply use this link and the discount will be auto-applied at the checkout. * * * * * * * * * * * * Watch on youtube Listen on Spotify Listen on Apple Podcasts

## Transcript

[0:03] Hello and welcome to the Oxygenating podcast.
[0:05] We're brought to you every week by our sponsors Precision Fuel
[0:08] and hydration.com. You can personalise your
[0:11] fuelling and hydration strategy so you perform your best with
[0:14] 15% off your first order of electrolytes and carbohydrate
[0:18] fuel. Decode Oxygen 24 at Precision
[0:21] Fuel and hydration.com Welcome to the show everybody.
[0:24] I'm your host, coach Rob Wilby, and every week we bring you an
[0:28] episode of this podcast to help. Motivate and inspire you for
[0:31] your. Triathlon goals.
[0:32] For this season. Listen, a couple of quick things
[0:35] you could do for us before we jump into today's episode.
[0:38] If you do like this episode, please consider following us on
[0:41] Spotify or Apple Podcasts. And also if you're watching on
[0:45] YouTube, if you could like and subscribe, that would really
[0:48] help out the growth of the show. It helps the show get shown to
[0:51] more people by the. Algorithm on on the.
[0:54] Podcast players and on YouTube, so we'd really, really
[0:56] appreciate that. And secondly, if you're looking
[0:59] for help and advice with your. Triathlon training.
[1:01] Please consider getting in touch with us.
[1:03] You can read. All about.
[1:04] What we offer at Team Oxygen. Addict.com.
[1:07] And then you can e-mail us. At help@oxygenaddict.com.
[1:11] Or there's a link in the show notes to book a call with me or
[1:14] one of the coaching team. We can discuss how we can best
[1:17] help you out with your triathlon goals for this season.
[1:21] OK, on this video we're going to be talking about 3 mistakes to
[1:25] avoid to do with injury and illness.
[1:28] Now the first big mistake that I see people making here is
[1:31] ignoring the first signs of soreness and niggles before they
[1:36] develop into something bigger. So often this will occur when
[1:40] people have been out for a run and they'll have an area of
[1:43] soreness, maybe in the hamstring or in the lower calf and they'll
[1:46] convince themselves that it's OK and they'll continue to train
[1:50] through this and they won't seek advice about it.
[1:53] They'll just try and pretend to themselves everything is OK and
[1:56] and and it's gonna be alright and things will keep going.
[1:59] That is the biggest mistake you can make with these things.
[2:02] Honestly, getting early treatment and getting these
[2:06] things looked at and taking it seriously is the biggest way
[2:09] that you can avoid this becoming a potentially much bigger
[2:12] scenario further down the line. So we're really good example of
[2:16] this is when triathletes have gone out and they've done a run
[2:20] that's either much higher intensity, much harder or very
[2:24] hilly compared to what they've been doing recently.
[2:26] So the body's under a lot more stress the next day.
[2:29] They feel really sore. And the right thing to do is to
[2:33] listen to that soreness because it's telling you something.
[2:36] It's telling you that your body hasn't recovered from the
[2:38] session that you've done. And it's telling you there's a
[2:41] potential there. Not necessarily that there is a
[2:44] niggle that might develop into an injury, but it's telling you
[2:47] certain that your body hasn't recovered yet from the session
[2:50] that you've done. And so you should avoid
[2:52] certainly running on that injury or that feeling of soreness at
[2:58] that time. That I think is the biggest
[3:00] thing that people can do. And often as a coach, people are
[3:04] surprised when when I tell them what I do for a living, they
[3:07] think that my job is to motivate and inspire and to and to push
[3:11] people to do things, almost like an Army Sergeant major.
[3:15] And it can be that job sometimes to to inspire people to do
[3:18] things. But I spend the majority of my
[3:21] professional coaching career saying no to people, advising
[3:25] people to be just a bit more cautious because the
[3:28] personalities that are involved in triathlon and you might well
[3:32] recognise yourself in this. They tend to be the type
[3:35] personality they tend to be extremely driven, goal oriented,
[3:40] determined to to achieve something big and successful and
[3:44] that often comes at a cost. And the cost is not listening to
[3:49] your body when it's telling you that.
[3:51] The longer term play here might be to skip one workout today, to
[3:56] be able to do 3 workouts over the next seven days and often
[4:01] left to our own devices. The Taipei personality will want
[4:04] to do more and will want to do faster and will want to do it
[4:08] sooner. So that's the first sign or the
[4:11] first mistake that I think you can avoid as as an Ironman
[4:14] triathlete is avoid that mistake of not listening to your body
[4:18] when it's telling you it's sore and and to avoid that situation
[4:21] before it becomes something more serious.
[4:24] The second biggest mistake as he people make, and this carries on
[4:29] from mistake #1, is that they don't then seek professional
[4:33] advice with a physiotherapist and get treatment.
[4:36] So this is the absolute best thing that you can do if you're
[4:41] experiencing any kind of soreness that's gone beyond the
[4:44] normal level of soreness you'd expect after a given workout.
[4:49] Get yourself. Booked in to see a good sports
[4:52] physiotherapist as soon as you possibly can.
[4:55] There are a couple of things they're going to be able to do
[4:57] for you. The first thing is they're gonna
[4:59] be able to assess you now. These are professionals who have
[5:03] their hands on people's muscles all day long and can learn to
[5:06] feel the difference between soreness a perhaps a small
[5:11] muscle tear, a larger muscle tear, something that's really
[5:14] serious, something that's going on with a tendon or ligament.
[5:17] They're extremely well qualified and well experienced to make
[5:22] that assessment where the usual person, even a coach, wouldn't
[5:25] be able to feel that with their fingertips.
[5:28] So you'll get a good assessment and you'll get a really accurate
[5:31] diagnosis for what's going on. You'll then be able to get
[5:35] treatment from the physiotherapist.
[5:37] Now that might range from anything from some light massage
[5:41] through to ultrasound through to what might be quite vigorous and
[5:45] possibly painful sports massage. It might be dry needling.
[5:50] There are all manners of treatments that are available to
[5:53] you at a physiotherapist that you might not know about.
[5:56] And and I'd encourage you to go in there with an open mind.
[5:59] Just because you don't understand how a treatment works
[6:03] doesn't mean that it isn't going to be effective.
[6:05] And I've got literally dozens of examples of athletes who've gone
[6:09] to physiotherapists and who've had acupuncture or dry needling,
[6:12] whatever you want to call it. They've had one session of it
[6:15] and it's completely taken a problem away just in one session
[6:19] and honestly in some cases I've had physios say to me we don't
[6:23] really understand how this works.
[6:25] What we know is it works. Now, this isn't a big push for
[6:29] people to go and experience, you know, any kind of treatment.
[6:33] But some kind of treatment from the physiotherapist, the one
[6:37] that's correct for the the niggle or the soreness that
[6:40] you're suffering from at the moment is guaranteed to reduce
[6:44] the amount of time that it's going to take you to heal on
[6:46] your own. And that turns around into you
[6:48] being back into full training faster.
[6:51] So any kind of problems with typically we're going to be
[6:56] looking at Chili's tendon soreness, lower calf, soleus
[7:00] upper calf, gastrocnemius, hamstring problems, hip
[7:03] problems, neck problems, perhaps even in shoulder problems in
[7:07] swimmers. These are the sort of four or
[7:09] five most common niggles that we see in athletes, and they can
[7:13] get sorted out and helped massively by treatment from a
[7:17] qualified and experienced physiotherapist.
[7:20] And the additional thing that you're going to get from a
[7:22] physiotherapist is a rehab plan to take away with you.
[7:28] Oftentimes the fix for the problem isn't a session of
[7:32] treatment with the physiotherapist itself, although
[7:34] that will help. It's a series of specific
[7:37] strengthening exercises. That will.
[7:39] Help to correct perhaps as an imbalance going on that's
[7:42] causing those problems. But getting that correct rehab
[7:46] plan in place can make the difference between the Achilles
[7:51] problem going away in four to six weeks and the Achilles
[7:54] problem still being with you in 12 months to 18 months time.
[7:59] So the rehab plan will be really useful as long as you actually
[8:04] do the thing that you've been advised to do.
[8:06] O again, one trip to the physio might result in you being given
[8:11] rehab to do every single day for the next six weeks.
[8:14] And it's that rehab that's going to help.
[8:16] You heal rather. Than the one session with the
[8:19] physio per se. And the third mistake that I
[8:23] see, I'm an athletes making to do with injury and illness is
[8:28] simply this. It's training through the first
[8:30] signs of illness now. Oftentimes athletes, as we've
[8:34] said with the Taipei personality, very driven, very
[8:38] goal oriented, want to get to where they want to get to and
[8:41] they have a plan to get there and nothing is going to get in
[8:44] their way. And again, you might recognise
[8:46] yourself in this, but you can't train your way through illness.
[8:51] You can't, you can't speed up the healing from illness by
[8:54] training. And in fact training is going to
[8:57] very likely extend the amount of time it takes you to heal from
[9:00] the illness. So typically I'll get an athlete
[9:02] that will say to me, I've started with a bit of a sniffle.
[9:06] I think I've got a cold coming on but I'm going to go out and
[9:09] I'm going to do this session anyway and I think I'll be OK.
[9:12] Or even worse, sometimes what I get is two or three days ago,
[9:16] coach, I started with a sniffle and I thought I would be OK.
[9:19] So I moved the swim session and I did the run instead.
[9:22] And then I really didn't feel like the swim session because I
[9:25] could really feel the cold coming on.
[9:27] So I did a lower intensity bike session instead and now I've
[9:31] really got a cold. What should I do?
[9:34] And the answer is, well look, no one's going to like to hear
[9:37] this, but the quickest way to recover from the cold or the
[9:41] illness is to rest U completely from exercising while you're
[9:45] struggling with it and let your body heal and do all the things
[9:48] you can do to help promote healing, extra sleep, good
[9:51] nutrition being the two main ones.
[9:54] But training through this isn't going to make it heal any faster
[9:58] and it's almost certainly going to make that illness expand out
[10:02] to to take more time for you to recover from.
[10:04] And that's the best case. That's with the cold.
[10:07] If it's more serious, if it's something that goes on to an
[10:09] athlete's chest or it's a chest infection or it's the flu,
[10:13] you're not just extending the time it takes you to recover
[10:16] from this. You're also potentially putting
[10:18] yourself at risk of some potentially very serious
[10:22] complications as well. So my advice to the athletes is
[10:25] always this You're always going to bounce back faster than you
[10:29] think you're going to when you get back to training.
[10:31] So forget about the training for now, Rest up totally while
[10:35] you're under the weather, and then keep on resting for another
[10:39] day or two after you're sure that you're completely over the
[10:42] illness and you're ready to train then and then.
[10:45] That way, even if you have an extra day or two of rest and
[10:47] recovery, you can be sure that that illness isn't lurking.
[10:51] They're ready to come back and extending into a second week or
[10:54] a third week, so it can be difficult and I really do feel
[10:59] for athletes when they go through this.
[11:01] I know how hard it is when you really want to train and your
[11:03] body just isn't up to it, but the fastest way through it is to
[11:07] rest up when you're ill and then you'll get back to training as
[11:11] soon as you possibly can. Now the bad news is we can't put
[11:14] a time frame on this for people. We can't say how long it's
[11:17] likely to be. But what we can do is we can
[11:20] minimise the risk of the chances of you not having fully
[11:26] recovered from whatever illness you've got by making sure you've
[11:30] got that buffer of one or two days after you think you're
[11:34] fully recovered from it. And in a majority of cases, that
[11:37] really limits or completely does away with the situation where an
[11:41] athlete tries to come back too soon, the illness flares up
[11:44] again and the back into bed or the back feeling rubbish and off
[11:47] training and into another training week.
[11:50] OK then that brings us to the end of this week's episode.
[11:54] So here are some discount codes and deals for you.
[11:57] I've got Precision, Fuel and hydration.com.
[11:59] Use the code Oxygen 24 for 15% off your.
[12:02] First, electrolyte order. And over at
[12:05] teamoxygenaddict.com, I think we've got the most comprehensive
[12:08] triathlon coaching programme for.
[12:10] Busy age groupers. If you've enjoyed what you've
[12:12] heard today and the advice has helped you out, well, great
[12:15] stuff. I hope that's helped put some of
[12:17] your fears at rest, and I know from some of the calls we've had
[12:20] it's helping raise the right questions in the minds of people
[12:24] as to whether their current coaching relationship is working
[12:27] for them. If you're looking for a change,
[12:29] or if you're looking for high quality proven coaching for Iron
[12:32] Man or 70.3 Triathlon this year, you can just check out the
[12:36] details of our coaching packages on our website at
[12:39] teamoxygenaddict.com. And then if you're interested,
[12:42] there's a link in the show notes below.
[12:44] You can join our waiting list and you'll be notified if the
[12:47] slot becomes available and at that point you'll have a chance
[12:50] to book a. Call with us and see if you'd be
[12:52] a good fit for joining the team. So although we don't have slots
[12:55] available at the moment, we'll make those call appointments
[12:59] available to people as and when. We do have athletes who end
[13:03] their coaching packages during the season, if and when that
[13:05] happens. So remember, there's links in
[13:07] the show notes so you don't have to remember them till next week.
[13:10] Have a great safe training and racing week.
[13:13] I'm coach Rob Wilby and you've been listening to the.
[13:15] Oxygen addict. Podcast.
[13:17] See ya.

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