Coach's Comments
Date: Jul 20 at 9:26pm | Posted in: Alan Pittman
It's winter, the days are shorter and a lot of triathletes are getting sick. There are a lot of worse things happening in the world, you only have to watch the SBS news of the world. Compared to the stuff on there a triathlete having to sit at home and play with his kids, or read a book, is not all that bad.
If you feel the first symptoms coming on, the dry throat, the first sniffle. Take action, have zinc lozengers in your cupboard ready to suck every three hours. If you don't already take fish oil caps every day, first you really should take them all the time, but take two of them every three hours. Rest more, reduce your training or stop altogether.
You won't gain anything by training while you're sick. You will gain in other areas of your life if you take the break which nature has given you, and spend it doing something which you would not normally have time for. I don't mean sitting around whinging to your wife. I say wife because if you're a woman and you get sick, you take it easy but you keep plugging on with your duties. Guys go down like a house of cards when they get a cold, but it well known that men suffer worse cold symptoms than women.
If you're training for something pretty serious and its getting close. The best strategy is to take measure to prevent getting sick before it happens rather than trying to cure it once it has hit you. I personally take collostrum powder each day to boost my immune system. I have also found that taking vitamin D3 has been helpful in boosting our immunity and reducing joint inflamation.
It the cold of flu does get you, stop training. When the symptoms have gone go back into your training cautiously, you have to taper back, rather than taking off at full speed. Nothing will prolong an illness like starting back into full work too soon.
Allan Pitman
Triathlon Coach