Starting off the New Year Right

The warm months of 2015 are long gone leaving the students at Penn State University feeling all too familiar with the cold dreary days of midwinter. While many college students feel obligated to stay inside watching movies or re-watching their favorite shows, deep down they all know the consequences associated with their decision. In the beginning it may start harmlessly with a few crackers or a couple pieces of chocolate but before one knows it he/she is 3/4 of the way through the box and the second episode isn't even over yet. There are two options at this point, one can agonize over the fact that he/she just ate the average person's daily allotted calories in less than 30 minutes, or one can get out of bed and head to the gym. I mentioned heading to the gym instead of working out outside because no sane person wants run five miles in below freezing weather, and although the gym is a healthy alternative, it can have some unfortunate side effects.

The most important precaution that people tend to forget when going to the gym is stretching. In one of my posts last year I discussed the importance of stretching and its impact on both improving performance and preventing injury. Exercising on a treadmill or an elliptical may have less of an impact than running on asphalt, but it does not require less stretching. One's body is still going through the same motions and can be injured just as easily. Some vital stretches are listed and explored on Livestrong.

I, along with what I assume to be many other people, neglected to exercise for a large portion of the holiday break. To add insult to injury, I almost exclusively ate desserts and candy around this time. After a few mere days of this, the effect was clearly visible and I knew that I had to start exercising again. As experienced of a runner that I may think I am, I still made a huge mistake. I didn't feel too bad on my first run back so I kept on running and by the time I had finished I had ended up running 15 miles. The next day I did not feel too bad either so I once again ran too far, this time it being 10 miles. At the time I did not think that a few runs could seriously injure me but boy was I wrong. The pain slowly set in and soon I couldn't run more than once every 3 days, and as time went on the recovery period continued to increase. Currently it has been 2 weeks since I have last run and I just hope that I did not cause any permanent damage to my knee. My advice to anyone who is in the same position that I was in a few weeks ago would to be to make sure you take it slow and thoroughly stretch before any exercise.

The effect that foods have on your overall health is sometimes underestimated when it comes to eating to prepare for physical training. The number one most recommended food to avoid when exercising is white flour due to its adverse properties. It is one of the most commonly eaten foods in America but it causes huge amounts of inflammation.

According to Mother Nature Network, of the top 6 inflammatory foods to avoid, white flour baked goods are the worst. This news couldn't be much worse since the majority of food eaten over the holidays are white flour baked goods. Inflammation doesn't sound like a terrible side effect, but over a long period of time it can be. The effects of inflammation are stated on Active.com saying that "in athletes who train hard every day, inflammation may not be entirely resolved and muscle damage may not heal adequately between workouts. If you persist in training too hard and resting too little, you may enter a cycle of persistent tissue trauma and chronic inflammation." These athletes are not getting the necessary amount of recovery time which will inevitably lead them to injury which may take days or even weeks to heal. The worst aspect of this is that one may be doing everything correct physically, but it is his/her diet that will eventually hurt him/her. This news is both positive and negative depending on the specific person. One can prevent injury more easily by eating healthy, but if a person does not choose to eat the right way, he/she will be more prone to injury.

To anyone out there that was feeling lazy for the past couple of weeks and has suddenly been feeling motivated to start exercising, make sure you do so carefully. There are countless ways to injure yourself, but if you continue to stretch, eat the right foods, and go back into your workouts slowly you can greatly increase your chances of staying healthy.

#video