UPFRONT | Columnist BUSINESS TALK To the CN Tower and back T The importance of overtraining education BY DR. ANTHONY J. LOMBARDI, DC his past spring, Hamilton, On-tario native Ryan Polawski ap-proached me and said he was raising money and awareness for addiction and mental health. He was running from Hamilton city hall to the CN Tower and back – all within the same day. (That's over 160 km!) Naturally, I offered to help by providing pre-race treatment, and in addition, our team treated him during the race. Ryan did an exemplary job by completing the race in just 24 hours, raising almost $50,000, along with loads of awareness. What Ryan realized in the weeks to follow was that the effects of the run were problematic. His lack of rest and recovery during that time now contrib-uted to post-race injury, which manifested as knee dysfunction, hip pain, and other maladies that prevented him from leisurely running for general health and exercise. Education about overtraining ANTHONY LOMBARDI, DC, is a private consultant to athletes in the NFL, CFL and NHL, and founder of the Hamilton Back Clinic, a multidisciplinary clinic. He teaches his fundamental EXSTORE Assessment System and practice building workshops to various health professionals. For more information, visit www. exstore.ca. 10 Chiropractic and Naturopathic Doctor November/December 2021 www.Cndoctor.ca Photo: benedek/Getty images In our practices, we often see patients who achieve fantastic results using concepts like circuit training and running in general. They can improve their shape by losing weight and elevating muscle tone, but sometimes they forget to pace their regimen and fall into the trap of overtraining. Although it is part of our practice to run a business, it is foremost our duty and obligation to explain to patients why they just can’t keep coming back to get treated for us to “fix them up.” Many chiropractors treat recreational or amateur athletes. Often, they encounter patients that have injuries that stem from overuse or improper movement mechanics. This is very apparent in marathon and long-distance runners. For instance, the average serious marathon athlete takes 16 weeks to prepare for a race and averages about 50 kilo-metres per week. During the many months of preparation, they are seemingly able to power through any training-re-lated injuries, pain and dysfunction. But once the race is done, they take a rest – that’s when everything begins to fall apart mechanically. Heat, the natural lubricant I have inferred that there is a physiological reason why long-distance runners “fall apart” after weeks of training their musculoskeletal systems. The analogy of a steel mill is often used to describe this phenomenon. In a steel mill, there is a blast furnace that runs at temperatures above 800 degrees Celsius to cook the impurities from the steel during manu-facturing. These blast furnaces are primarily made of bricks and mortar and the furnace never completely shuts off, be-cause once it stops running the furnace would simply fall apart from the damage of the heat and the overuse over time. In a blast furnace, it’s the heat and the continuous use that keeps the furnace together and allows it to run. The same is true for endurance athletes and marathoners. Ath-letes who overtrain often have problems in the two weeks following the competition. This is because while they are in training, physiologically the body is releasing adrenalin, endorphins and neurotransmitters – which prime the nerv-ous system to ensure that the muscular system remains functional. In addition, athletes usually practise good nutrition and their continuous training stimulates the production of col-lateral blood vessels through angiogenesis. So, they can feed their tissues, allowing them to perform well daily. This eu-phoric high continues through the training period and
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