In Sickness and in Health

What to do about training when you fall ill is something we all wonder about. With so many of our friends and clients coming down with the latest cold that is making the rounds now seems like a good time to explore the subject.

So, if you feel yourself coming down with a cold should you continue training? It is not as simple a question to answer as it seems. It gets even harder if you are the one with the cold! 

One argument goes that if you are sick you should rest and let your body recover. There is certainly a lot of sense in this. If you are fighting off a bug you shouldn’t add extra stress into your system by exercising. Allow your body to recover and devote all your energy to getting better.

Another camp says that exercising increases your core temperature, this makes it more difficult for the cold viruses to multiply in your body. It is the same concept as you getting a fever to help your body fight off infection. There is certainly some truth to this also.

And, do you want to down tools every time you get the slightest hint of an illness?

In the end it is a decision every person needs to make for themselves. In my experience in the very early stages of a cold continuing training may help and the cold may pass by without every taking hold of you. But when you are really down with the cold you need to rest and let your body heal. Training won’t be enjoyable if you are having to cough at every stop sign and you won’t be able reach the intensity that you need, so it won’t give you the desired training benefit either.

One thing you do need to be aware of is how much you are masking the symptoms. The over the counter cold remedies treat the symptoms of the virus, not the cause. They make you feel better so you can get on with your day but they don’t change how sick you actually are underneath. These remedies are designed to allow you to do the essential things in life such as go to work and look after the kids, not to pretend you are not ill and go training anyway.

When you do get ill use the time to determine what this is telling you. If you were fully healthy and your immune system was working perfectly you shouldn’t have got ill in the first place. So the fact that you are sick means you were run down and your immune system was not functioning as well as it should have been. That can be due to stress, too much training, bad diet and a host of other things. It seems logical then to take the time whilst you are ill and relax, rest from training and eat food that is good for you!

One other thing that needs to be said when you have a cold or the flu: Do not get a massage! It may be tempting to let someone work on your aching body but massage will make you feel worse and get more ill. It is not a good thing to do, you would be much better off sleeping or you can get an acupuncture treatment to help.

Corina