What do you do with your workout routine when you’re under the weather? Are you someone who ignores the symptoms to crank out your daily training sessions at all costs? Maybe you’re the type who ghosts your workout partner at the slightest hint of a stuffy nose? 

What if neither approach is optimal? 

Here's the scoop on how to approach exercise when you’re sick.

Exercise can and should be an extremely beneficial part of a healthy lifestyle. We know that a little exercise is better than none, moderate amounts are quite good, but a lot of exercise could turn out to be negative.

When we engage in any physical activity, our body to shifts out of homeostasis or baseline function, and we stimulate several physiological systems including our musculo-skeletal, cardiovascular, lymphatic, neuro-endocrine, and immune systems. 

Humans are designed for movement and when we’re active enough these systems work together to coordinate adaptations to our environment. We become adapted and resilient to a given “dose” of movement and when we move the "right" amount at the right times (not to little, not too much), we can strengthen our immune system.

It’s a balancing act.

When you're not feeling well or are fighting off an illness, it's important to approach your exercise a bit differently.

Being active and “exercising” are not the same though, so for the purposes of this article the term “exercise” refers to structured training modalities that are used to intentionally break a sweat, burn some calories, or break down muscles.  

“Activity” or “being active” refers to other non-sedentary parts of your lifestyle like walking, standing, doing laundry, or walking the dog – the times you're moving but not in ways that'll prepare you for that half marathon or adventure race. 

General health guidelines suggest we should exercise for a at least 150 minutes per week, in addition to being active frequently throughout the non-exercising hours each day. For optimal health and fitness we should include three to four bouts of resistance training as well as two to three bouts of cardiovascular training each week. 

These are generalities, of course – and they refer to the minimum effective dose for health so do not encompass the total training recommendations for competitive athletes. 

Listen to your body. 

Our bodies tend to respond best when they’re challenged physically, then allowed to properly rest, recover, and repair. We tend to respond negatively if we exercise to exhaustion each and every session, so it’s helpful to pay attention to how you balance the frequency, intensity, time, and type of exercise relative to your individual state of fitness and health.

If you listen, your body will give you plenty of clues on how to manage your training choices, or you can work with an experienced coach to bring better logic, objectivity, and art to your program. 

Exercise introduces two main forms of stress on our bodily systems – mechanical stress and/or metabolic stress. Mechanical stress refers to the physical damage to muscle tissue induced by resistance training or high-intensity/long-duration cardio. Metabolic stress refers to the short-term demand for higher-than-normal energy output that cardiovascular training places on our bodies. 

Both types of stress are necessary when we’re trying to change our fitness or physique, but depending on the total volume and intensity of the stress it may take up to 72 hours for your body to return to its baseline homeostasis. 

If you're sick,