Fatigue can be quite debilitating in some people; in others, fatigue is simply something that they can quickly shrug off with some forward thinking and some movement to overcome it. Loads of external factors can contribute to fatigue, but as sports nutritionists, we will focus on how to fight fatigue and reclaim your day. The three main problem areas for fatigue and how we will focus on how to fight fatigue:

• Diet
• Exercise routine
• Lifestyle (sleep, etc)

Optimising Your Diet

Although humans can eat anything (we are omnivorous), we tend to go for food with the most nutritional value, or whatever tastes nice. Unfortunately, what tastes nice isn’t usually the best because it is packed with sugar, salt, and hydrogenated fats. Sugar is good for giving people a boost, but is by no means sustainable energy, because sugar tends to give you a spike of activity, rather than a supply of energy which can also cause fatigue.

Ever noticed that you sometimes feel groggy in the afternoon after a stocky lunch? Take a look at what you’re eating. Are you consuming a lot of carbs? Perhaps you guzzle fizzy drinks like it’s nobody’s business, inducing a blood sugar spike? All of these things can make you feel a little tired as you digest them, perhaps go for foods like Beans (soy, baked, black, green), watermelon, nuts, oatmeal and red peppers to combat your afternoon slump.

Exercise for Results

Your exercise routine can have an effect on your fatigue levels; too much equals fatigued, too little equals fatigued… But how? Surely doing nothing would make you rest up? Well, not necessarily. If you exercise too vigorously, you risk injury, working within the confines of an injury requires more energy to put yourself through your paces, which makes you too tired. Not exercising enough will make your daily routine lackluster, so you stay up late and get fatigued. Believe it or not, exercise makes you sleep a lot easier, and you’d be out for the count if you did a few more miles on the treadmill, surely.

Sustainable Lifestyle

Lastly in order to pinpoint the issue behind your fatigue, you should look into your basic lifestyle choices. Do you smoke? Drink? Take drugs? – Partaking in any of these will affect your respiratory health as well as your energy and serotonin levels. Do you drink too much caffeine? – This can burn out your thyroid and cause fatigue through Hypothyroidism. So, there we have it there are actually a number of interlocking layers and factors that cause fatigue, rather than just one root cause.

If you’re feeling fatigued lately when starting your workout and it really knocks your motivation why not try our range of Pre-Workouts to not only give you energy, but to also use them efficiently counteract general fatigue in your workouts.