SHOULD YOU TRAIN WHEN YOU’RE SICK?

Sometimes your body will decide for you—but sometimes you need a little guidance

There’s no doubt about it—getting sick in the middle of a training block sucks. You may need to skip training runs, or even your goal race. Only you can decide whether you’re too sick to run, but there are some useful guidelines.

Dr. Rose Zacharias is an emergency medicine physician based in Orillia, Ont. She says it’s OK to run if you are in good health overall and you’ve been running for a while (and you don’t feel like you’re going to collapse if you start running). An experienced runner who’s feeling a bit under the weather could try a shorter, slower run, just to get some miles in, but “if you feel more fatigued or develop more pain and you continue to feel unwell, then it is time to rest,” she advises.

Zacharias adds that “new shortness of breath and/or new chest pain, or anything gastrointestinal, is a sign that you should skip the run. And if activity makes you feel worse, then it’s best to stop and rest up, or get an expert opinion.”

She points out that different illnesses will affect your cardiovascular and metabolic systems differently, and affect your ability to run in different

It also depends how important those runs are to your training. The first few runs in base season aren’t that critical, and skipping them while you take time to recover from illness are unlikely to affect your training once you resume running. However, being forced to miss a key workout a few weeks out from a race might be more detrimental to your performance, and could result in your having to re-evaluate your goal, possibly switching to a target race that’s later in the season.

When you’re ready to resume physical activity, it’s best to try walking or some gentle yoga before diving back into run training, and when you’re ready to run, keep the pace easy and conversational for the first couple of outings. Don’t feel bad if you need to take walk breaks. Remember that nutrition is an important part of training; if being sick prevented you from eating normally for a few days, your energy stores will be depleted.

A good rule of thumb is to allow two to three days of easy running for every day you were sick. Pushing too hard too soon could end up setting you back even further. Avoid high-intensity workouts for a couple of weeks, since these could further compromise your immune system.

It can be tempting to push too hard to catch up after taking time off due to illness, but coming back gradually will pay dividends in the long run.

Lauren Charlton is a competitive distance runner and future sports dietitian who’s passionate about keeping runners in the sport for the long game.

posted Sunday December 15th