Listen to your body

You may have heard of this phrase - "listen to your body".

Its about athletes noticing aches and pains and changing their training before those signs become serious injuries.

But there's a couple of things not mentioned:
  1. Your body whispers, so you have to listen really hard.
  2. Your ambition and enthusiasm will make you deaf.
Additionally, sporting culture can all be about going harder, ignoring pain and doing more.

The smallest pain can be a sign of impending disaster - your body gives you a small sign, and if you ignore that then it'll give you a really big sign.  

But by then it won't be a sign - instead it'll be the full on injury, and it will be too late.  Days or weeks may be needed to recover.

I'm always mystified about comments about motivation or enthusiasm.  I suffer from the alternative problem - too keen to train, always ready to do more.  This can be dangerous as it means I don't want to listen to the rather subtle signs my body gives me.

A recipe for over-training and exacerbating an injury.

The best thing to do is tone down the training plan - make it flexible rather than rigid, keep your ambition under control and really pay attention to what your body is saying.

Oh, and when you are feeling great capitalise on it!