---
title: "3 Common Mistakes Athletes Make In Spring"
entity: "blog"
canonical_url: "https://www.andreaproulxnd.com/blog/3-common-mistakes-athletes-make-in-spring"
markdown_url: "https://www.andreaproulxnd.com/llms/blog/3-common-mistakes-athletes-make-in-spring"
lastmod: "2024-07-19T04:01:25.000Z"
---

Andrea Proulx 0:00

Hi. I'm so pumped to be here. I'm here to chat about three common mistakes that every athlete makes in spring. And this is an exciting topic, because the seasons are changing, obviously, and we're getting ready for our summer sports. So this is pretty thrilling, and or, I think it's pretty thrilling as someone who does a lot of summer sports, but a lot of fall or winter sports as well. So I figured I would invite my friend and colleague, Doctor Cristina, in here. So let me just find those buttons to add her in. Sure, you say, Sure, easy enough, easy enough to do. No problem.

Alright, yes, yes, yes, awesome. Alright, there you a second now, and I am so excited because spring is fun.

Cristina Leonardelli 1:11

Hi, awesome.

Speaker 1 1:57

I have some serious questions about his vitamin D levels, but that's that's a story for another day.

Cristina Leonardelli 2:05

But I just feel like spring, we're pumped, we're excited. The weather is awesome, right? And we all just want to go out there and and I think a lot of people are suffering the same mistakes, all related to going out, too hard, too fast, too much volume in training, too intense, too much all the things would you say? Like, would you agree? Oh, yeah, 100% I've, I mean, going through, I don't know, 27 years of soccer, having off seasons, preseasons, seeing some of my teammates who are maybe not prepared or a little too over ambitious, and seeing the, you know, results of that going into the season. Yeah, definitely over ambitious. I think that's a great term.

Speaker 1 3:53

I'm seeing a lot of my patients just feeling run down and and part of what I'm seeing is this nutritional piece we I feel like. So I remember when I was a teenager, and track and field season started in high school, and that was a big sport in my household, for my sister and I and my mom would chuckle, get this, she's like, I know you two are doing more sports because you're eating more and our grocery bill is more than $100 a week.

Speaker 1 4:50

Drives me a little. It's a little bit frustrating as a clinician, because under fueling just leads to, I mean, physical injury. But the mental, mental aspect as well of not having enough energy to do your sport, let alone unload the dishwasher and deal with various stresses. So I'm seeing the lack of proper nutrition and the lack of enough protein, specifically for women, as playing a huge role in, I would say, like, a mental and physical aspect of fatigue as part of this injury. We'll call it. What about you as your as, like, from your mental sports perspective, like, what do you say? Yeah, so I mean, a couple things from the mental side, I think you kind of touched on it a little bit is, like, when you're getting back into, let's say, from an off season into a preseason, kind of flow is,

Speaker 4 5:44

I mean, it can be really exciting to start, to start, especially when, you know, sports come back, and the sun is out and everyone's in a good mood because it's springtime, people get really ambitious, and then doing that, you know, too much too soon, kind of thing can, can sometimes lead to a little bit of burnout, so feeling really exhausted because you're just doing way more than what your body's trained to do at that moment in time, and maybe having lower energy levels because you're asking way more of your body.

Speaker 4 6:14

So that leads to more, you know, let or sorry, less motivation to do what you want to do, which seems kind of like, like an oxymoron, because you're really motivated and you're really ambitious to do the things, but then you lose that because you are doing too much, and then you start to lose motivation, and then maybe you get off track to from what your goals are for that, for that season,

Speaker 1 6:39

that's really, I mean, Not, I'd say cool, but not cool, right? Like, I guess I hadn't thought of that aspect of being over ambitious, excited, of the mental piece to that, because I look at it as well as from an adrenal gland perspective, and even our thyroid gland doesn't love huge amounts of certain types of exercise, particularly endurance exercise so that that moderating the the too hard, too fast, too much, too intense, sort of deal, yeah, because again, the again, the adrenal glands, again, that physical part, as well as playing into some of those neurotransmitters and the the neurological aspects of mood and Motivation. So neat, yeah, not neat.

Speaker 4 7:22

People are concerned with this um, but cool that you talk about that with your your clients as well. Yeah, yeah. And I think, from like a physical perspective, is really managing what we call in sports science and in the in the research, is acute to chronic workload ratio. So that's one of those things where, if we look at our workload in the past week, that's what we consider our acute workload. So it could be, you know, the number of hours you've trained, it could be the intensity level,

Speaker 4 8:29

So from from a physical injury perspective, and I of course, there's some, you know, nutritional, metabolic, mental pieces that go into that whole injury realm.

Speaker 1 9:59

Recovery rates change. So I'm currently in a phase, you know, after ovulation, where my estrogen and progesterone are overall higher, and that puts me in a phase of the month where I'm not going to recover quite as easily. So I'm going to recalometers,

Speaker 4 10:47

Yeah, exactly, different phases of the cycle. Women recover much faster. But that's also a cool piece when you're looking at, like you said, like the that acute, chronic workload ratio in the spring, as we shift to our summer sports, and then as women layering on that, yeah, that additional fun science around menstrual cycles. Yeah, yeah. I think it's been particularly challenging, too, with covid, like, because of all the closures and thing, people's routines changing. It's, like, especially important, like this year and last year, given, given that generally, overall, people's activity levels are down, I'm seeing that a lot in my practice. I mean, I think, yes, the like exercise, physical activity stuff, but also just the day to day, like people are going from their bedroom and walking five steps to their to their office, whereas before, they at least had to walk to the bus or walk to the, you know, to their car from the parking lot.

Speaker 1 11:47

And just that is has been a huge piece for for a lot of my athletes and and patients, getting back into exercise this spring. That's a very good point, too, I think, around adults versus maybe kids, because I I'm seeing that even more so in adults like you said, who were working from home, at least the kids maybe were in and out of school or they played, they can still had more time to play. Whereas adults, our play is often very timed. You know, I go to the gym for this class at this time. Or I, you know, meet my friends for tennis practice at this time and during the pandemic, we removed those components, and adults just didn't supplement with something else. They just

Speaker 4 12:33

found other hobbies, but sitting on their bum, doing it yes, in their own four in the same four walls that they were sleeping in, meeting breakfast, going to work, etcetera, etcetera, yeah, yeah, yeah, wow. So much. So much is changing with this, this particular spring, um, thank you for chatting about some common mistakes that we sort of lumped all into this. Too ambitious, going out, too hard, too fast, too much volume, too much intensity, all the too much is, do you have one big takeaway you'd want to share with everyone about like, this is the thing? Yeah, I think the most important thing is to have a plan. Because I think leading up to whatever, whenever your competitive season starts, it's really important to look at that way ahead of time and and figure out how you're going to increase your workload every week so that you're staying within your capacity.

Speaker 4 13:30

One number that I like to throw out to patients, just as like a general thing is like a 10% increase each week might be a good kind of safe number to stay at so that you're not at additional risk for injury. So looking ahead and so you're not just, like, a week before your competitive season starts and you're like, oh my god, I like, gotta run all these sprints. I gotta get in shape. I gotta lose five pounds, you know, like, whatever it is you've planned for that several weeks ahead of time so you can do it smart planning. I lied.

Speaker 1 1:17

You and I were just chatting a few minutes ago about the kind of ridiculous and funny injuries that we've seen, both as athletes, but also as healthcare providers, in in clinic and change of season always brings about a few kind of more interesting things. I had a teammate a few years ago that was just really excited and getting into some like technical drills and doing those, like Crossover Moves, you know we do in in our sports, soccer and Ultimate Frisbee, and he tripped on a shoelace and broke leg. Oh, no, I have

Unknown Speaker 4:29

Four. That was like, Whoa, $100

Speaker 1 4:31

that's so much YouTube. Girls are eating so much more food during your competitive season. But I find at adult women, we don't always listen to that, right? We we're not the teenagers that are going back and reading the fridge where our brains are saying, I don't want to gain weight.

Speaker 1 8:45

That's really neat. I didn't know that there was, like, a quantifiable number in that realm. That's super cool, because I will say I've been playing more Ultimate Frisbee as mean, for pandemic reasons, we're entering more and more sport as well. And there's two domes that are within an easy run from my house. And, you know, Oh, yay. Like, yes, I run in the winter, but in the spring, it's easier to run that I'm talking two to four kilometers to get to my game. Like, I'm not going far, and I would have to sit down and calculate the the minutes of the kilometers to to see that ratio. Because I yeah, that's an interesting one. Um, this week I asked for a ride. It feels so silly to ask for a ride to a game that's like three kilometers from your house, but I was looking at it from a lens of female hormones, because at different phases in your menstrual cycle, provided you're having a natural cycle and you're not on birth control pill. So that's a side if you're not on birth control pill, and having a natural cycle when your different hormone levels fluctuate, your body doing the estrogen is more in tune with doing different types of exercise and  going to recalometers,

Speaker 3 10:24

because I won't be able to recover quick enough if I add in the extra volume.

Speaker 1 10:28

So I think that's really neat. And for my cycle, a very unfortunate timing that my menstrual cycle and this ball work acute to chronic workload, I think are the perfect storm for me, but that's okay, I can, I can get a ride. Yeah, just for this week, just for this week.

Unknown Speaker 14:06

That would be my biggest, my biggest take.

Speaker 3 14:09

That's awesome. And I know people want to find you. They can find you online at your clinic site, flow health, health and performance. I'm sorry. It's flow healthy performance as a new clinic, and it's a  new name for me. 

Transcribed by Otter.AI