Summertime is grindtime! Many of you, adults or youth, are increasing how much training you’re doing throughout the week. In many cases, especially with athletes playing on teams or training for multiple sports, you are going to 2-3, and at times 4, training sessions per day. Of varying intensities, focuses, and lengths.
Done well, this can really accelerate your improvement and build you into a better athlete. Done poorly, this can lead to burn out and injury.
Here are 4 ways to make sure you can handle training multiple times a day.
- Mix Up Your Training Focuses & Intensities
If you have 3 sessions in a day, they should not all be interval training! Or all strength training. You can handle 3 practices when you have - for example - a light technique session, a strength training session, and a hard strategy scrimmage.
You should view your training schedule and avoid matching 2 high intensity and/or high volume sessions on the same day. It’s best to match a high volume/intensity session with a low volume/intensity session.
Be mindful of how this matches up from day to day throughout the week as well. Try to avoid back to back high intensity/volume days.
- Eat A Lot of Quality Food
You are going to be burning a lot of calories and really stressing your body. It’s imperative that you eat a lot of food. You need a lot of calories to have enough energy to train 7-10x/week. It’s also wise to eat a lot of protein and vegetables to make sure your muscles and the rest of the body are able to function at their best.
Protein helps your muscles recover from training trauma. The micronutrients in vegetables keep the muscles and other tissue of your body operating at it’s best and most efficient.
- Sleep!
With all of the stressors of training 2-3x/day, your body needs to get good nights of sleep. It’s necessary so that you can make the physical and mental adaptations from your training that you’ve been working for. Not getting enough sleep doesn’t allow you to recover from training and puts you at risk of injury.
- Have Days for Full Rest and Active Recovery
It’s important to have at least 1 full day for your body to rest. This allows your body to better be prepared for the next set of training bouts.
It’s also important to have a full training session dedicated to recovery. This can be a light bike ride, yoga, a foam rolling session, a body weight workout, etc. A low intensity movement session that allows you to get some blood flow for your muscles to help it heal and soft tissue while not putting training stress on the body.
How do you handle training multiple times per day? Let me know.