OFF Season Physiology - Why take a break?
By Sarah Willis PhD
What is the reasoning behind the ‘off season’?
Hopefully as you read this, especially if you are a skier, you are in a period of taking a break. There are many reasons why taking a break is important, even as we think of areas of our life besides sport. For this article, we will focus on why it is so good for us to take a break after the competition season.
Let’s begin in a quite common place for us, a need for rest and recovery. After a likely busy season with training, travel, possible stresses of injury/illness, and the compilation of life stressors, let’s start by incorporating more rest/sleep/easy going days. Allowing our body to catch up on sleep, visit family, spend time with friends, reflect on our health and this last season, etc. These are days to catch back up with your life and decompress. This time frame varies between each of us, as our lives are all different. We have differing demands, responsibilities, priorities, etc. that change the amount of time of this ‘off season’ period. It is important to allow yourself, with a focus on your body, a period of doing little to nothing to absorb what has all happened in these last months.
During this rest and recovery time, there will be some detraining that occurs. Unfortunately, that is part of the process. Despite this natural decline in performance, our bodies need this time for restoration and building back up. Allowing our bodies and minds to rejuvenate will develop a burning passion again and set the tone for building a stronger base for the season to come.
Why do our muscles need a break?
Let’s first think about the function of our skeletal muscles which is to generate force through contraction producing movement of our bodies which is coordinated with our nervous system for posture, stabilization, as well as heat production. We place a great amount of repetition in certain motions as we are endurance athletes, and we understand the importance of recovery from a session-to-session basis…but what about as we take a step out to look at the mesocycle (each period of the year; base/preparation, pre-competition, competition)? and even further out at the macrocycle (year to year progression)? Now we realize that it is critical to decrease training and ‘come down off the load’ to be able to fully benefit from the training ahead for the coming season.
Let’s zoom into the muscle for a moment to understand the need for repair and growth. With training, our muscles are continually under breakdown and repair. We are talking about microscopic tears in the muscle which trigger proinflammatory responses, a phase of restoration with anti-inflammatory and immune responses, followed by regeneration.
This is a continual process with stress/stimulus/breakdown/repair/adaptation, with emphasis on the adaptation and reparation process taking place during rest. With adequate recovery this leads to stronger muscles over time. Recovery is meant to prevent overuse injuries, replenish energy stores, and improve mental health. The figure below helps us visualize what is happening.
Above is an illustration of muscle repair. This image highlights the various immune responses including proinflammatory and then anti-inflammatory macrophages to help with restoration of the muscle (Loreti & Sacco, npj Regenerative Medicine, 2022).
The base of training during this off season should be to create a base or foundation with low-intensity, long-duration sessions, that prepare our bodies for the more intense sessions in the future as we build towards pre-season. Any training sessions or activities during this period should be centered around enjoyment. This is not about getting hours in, and it shouldn’t feel like ‘working’, rather the goal is to have fun and find JOY in several different activities.
So, why should we challenge our body and nervous system with new activities, skills, coordination, power, range of motion, fitness level, etc.? I’m glad you asked. If we think about which activities we have done on a daily/weekly basis over the last year, probably most of us will say a lot of skiing (classic, double poling, skating), running, and maybe cycling. To be honest, that is a lot of repetition and stress on the body in similar ways. It is now time to let the body move in other ways and maybe even find some new skills with climbing or a team sport or even a ‘relaxing…competitive’ game of pickleball. The reason for this is to recover (physically and mentally), prevent injury (overuse injuries), and bridge towards enhancing performance. Using different muscle groups brings more balance to our bodies, while also focusing on less intense activities. Participating in different activities also allows us to reduce stress and prevent burnout in the long run, while maintaining fitness and hopefully bringing fun into training. This is a time of year where we can do things that we might normally not choose, as it is not sport-specific, has a greater chance for injury, or is not logistically possible. Furthermore, exercise during this period will help against the ‘detraining’ effect during the off season and help the body prepare for successful adaptations to training in the future.
Some examples of training during the off season might include activities to lower impact such as yoga/swimming/cycling to give rest to our joints and muscles while also providing a mental break to reduce stress and improve mental wellbeing. Activities to help correct muscle imbalances and improve both strength and flexibility will also improve overall fitness and help to reduce injury as the year progresses towards the competition season. Training occurring during the off season may also be focused to improve muscle mass and aerobic capacity (strong body and wide base/foundation for endurance – both muscle and aerobic). In addition, there are often increases in running economy as we work to sustain longer endurance adventure days (often also taking place during this off season/start up period). This period is also known to allow increases in lean muscle mass while maintaining muscular endurance. Though there is a decline with decreased training during this period, off season training can help to maintain or even enhance strength levels to ‘boost’ into the next season.
It is important to have a gradual return to training to progressively get back to volume and intensity. It is extremely important to avoid any sudden surges in workload or duration which can lead to injury/overtraining. Incorporating fun and new activities is a wonderful way to practice being smart to not over-do it at this point. Listening to your body and paying close attention to fatigue and soreness is valuable, where taking rest days as needed is ok, as there is no reason to push here. This is an individual process which will be tailored to each athlete related to their needs and goals. With all of these activities, we can build a more resilient and successful athlete in the future. Let’s do it…rest, sleep, have fun/bring joy back, gradually increase, focus on strength and rebuilding your body to sustain you for the year ahead. Good luck!
