How Much Cardio Is Too Much? Running Coaches Weigh In
If you’ve been consistent with your strength training and want to show off your might in an athletic setting, cardio can condition you to dominate in any sport — yes, including powerlifting and weightlifting. Improving your cardio capacity can go a long way toward making you a better strongman athlete, too. And that’s not to mention the boosts to your overall health.
That’s all well and good, but when are you giving yourself too much of a good thing? Unfortunately, cardio is one of those good things that can quickly turn against you if you indulge in too much of it. In this case, your success hinges on identifying when your cardio crosses the line into doing your body more harm than good. Here’s how to know how much cardio is too much for you, straight from the mouths of the experts.
Editor’s Note: The content on BarBend is meant to be informative in nature, but it should not be taken as medical advice. When starting a new training regimen and/or diet, it is always a good idea to consult with a trusted medical professional. We are not a medical resource. The opinions and articles on this site are not intended for use as diagnosis, prevention, and/or treatment of health problems. They are not substitutes for consulting a qualified medical professional.
Introducing the Experts
Lee Whitaker is an elite ultra-distance runner who regularly finishes at the top of the leaderboard at running distances of 100 miles or more. Whitaker is also the head distance coach and cross country coach of Fort Mill High School and has coached both teams to multiple state championships across individual, relay, and team levels. Whitaker is certified as an Elite Coach by USA Track & Field.
Paul Duncan has coached every level of long-distance and endurance athlete all the way up to professional IRONMAN triathletes. He also has several top-five finishes in IRONMAN triathlons under his belt. Duncan is a Level 1 coach for Qt2 Systems, an Expert level coach with Outrival Racing, and is certified as an Elite Coach by USA Track & Field.
What Is Cardio?
The word “cardio” is an abbreviated way to refer to “cardiovascular exercise,” which is sustained exercise that raises your heart rate and keeps it elevated for an extended period. Cardio exercise often involves your largest muscle groups, since working them consistently can maintain your heart rate at an elevated level.
Cardio workouts are usually of low or moderate intensity, but they can include sprinting, high-intensity interval training (HIIT), and other workout styles that build muscle mass and require all-out effort.
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Popular types of cardio include walking, running, swimming, rowing, cycling, and using elliptical machines. Cardio can also serve as a warm-up before weight training, a standalone workout routine, or a post-exercise cooldown.
How Much Cardio Is Too Much?
The definition of excessive cardio varies sharply from one person to the next. This is because several factors contribute to your cardiovascular endurance. This includes the amount of aerobic exercise you are accustomed to, the amount of resilient lean muscle tissue you have, and the ability of your joints to withstand the rigors of training.
As an example, well-conditioned marathoners may train by running as many as 140 miles per week. (1) Conversely, even running five miles per week can prove to be challenging to you even if you are a trained athlete. Even if your heart is otherwise healthy, the rest of your body may need time to physically adapt to new challenges posed to your joints and muscle tissue.
Signs You’re Doing Too Much Cardio
If “too much cardio” is so wildly relative, then how do you know when your body’s had enough?
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If you’re wondering whether or not you may be doing too much cardio, fear not. There are a few consistent, telltale signs that you may be putting your body through too much cardiovascular training. For the most part, it comes down to your ability to properly assess your own discomfort.
Excessive Pain
Discomfort is a natural feature of exercise that causes your body to make positive adaptations to physical challenges. The form of cardio you select to engage in will determine the degree of discomfort you feel, and also the location of that discomfort. With that being said, there are types of pain that fall well outside of the boundary of being a positive response to training.
“Watch out for signs like fatigue that makes you feel like you’ve aged a century overnight, or aches and pains that linger longer than a bad breakup.” — Paul Duncan.
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“If the pain is excessive and hinders your workout, you should definitely take it down a notch, rest, and maybe have a doctor take a look at you,” Duncan advises.
Mental Burnout
It’s one thing for your body to feel fatigued after an intense round of cardio, but what if your exercise is punctuated by feelings of mental exhaustion that never go away? When you’re dreading each and every session, it might be in your best interest to scale back the volume or intensity of your cardio training for the sake of your mental and psychological health.
The dead giveaway is that you should mentally feel better after running most of the time, not worse.
— Paul Duncan
“You can feel burnout coming, but it’s always different for everyone,” Duncan explains. “Your symptoms may not match someone else’s…If you were feeling down to begin with, and your workout leaves you feeling even worse, it’s time for a break.”
Lack of Sleep
At its best, sleep is a natural post-workout opportunity to recharge your batteries and prepare yourself for a fresh round of training. Ideally, you would be able to lie down and enjoy hours of sleep that are both stable and predictable. However, indulging in too many minutes of cardio and other exercise can have the surprising side effect of disrupting your sleep. (2)
One of the biggest red flags that I look for in the athletes I coach is their sleeping patterns.
— Lee Whitaker
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“People who are overtraining tend to not sleep well, and it’s usually one of the earliest signs,” Whitaker explains. “At least with the runners that I coach, if I start seeing sleeping patterns disturbed, then we back off.”
How Should You Respond to Overtraining?
If you suspect that your workout has wandered into overtraining territory, here are some sound strategies you can adopt to bring your workout back into healthy territory.
Recognize the Need For Recovery
It’s a natural tendency to want to stretch the boundaries of your physical capabilities during your training. Overcoming a performance plateau can be downright thrilling. All the same, your progress is largely determined by how efficiently you can recover from your all-out training efforts.
It’s not the work that we do per se that gets us the gains; it’s the recovery period.
— Lee Whitaker
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“We work, we break down, and then our body recovers in that period of super compensation and comes back stronger,” Whitaker explains. “Without that recovery period, we don’t get any gains…[I]f you’re continually breaking the body down and not giving it the recovery it needs, regardless of your volume and regardless of your mindset, you’re not going to get to your goals.”
Learn to Differentiate Between Types of Pain
The oft-repeated adage of “no pain; no gain” should come with a disclaimer. If the gradual wear and tear of cardio is harming your anatomy, you’ll want to quickly diagnose the problem, perhaps with the help of a health professional. Pressing onward through an injury might earn you praise for displaying mental toughness, but it can also do serious damage to your body.
Is there pain in the muscle, or does it feel like it’s more in a tendon or ligament or a bone?
— Lee Whitaker
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“If it’s in the muscle specifically, it’s probably just some soreness,” Whitaker says. “That’s a pretty regular occurrence when we’re training. See if it subsides in a day or two. If it doesn’t, then reassess things. If it feels like it’s in a joint or a ligament or a tendon, most of the time it’s probably some inflammation. If that sort of pain doesn’t subside you have to stop and rest for at least a day or two.” Seeing a doctor is often a good next step, too.
Change Up Your Training Volume
Sometimes less truly is more for aerobic exercise. Scaling back your cardio volume or doing lower-intensity cardio for a few days may allow you to feel more energized and motivated in the long run. Doing so may leave your body and mind more prepared for the moments that truly matter, like when it’s actually time to run, bike, or swim at your race pace.
Ease off the gas pedal and dial back the mileage.
— Paul Duncan
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“Throw in some rest days, and maybe even indulge in a Netflix binge or two,” Duncan advises. “Your body will thank you. You should also make sure you are incorporating some truly easy runs into your training and not going all out on every run. A run doesn’t have to leave you feeling like your legs are going to fall off or your heart is going to explode in order to help you achieve your goals.”
Benefits of Cardio
- Improved Heart Health: Your heart is the driving force of cardiovascular exercise, and engaging in cardio can dramatically improve the health and function of your heart. Relying on cardio as a regular form of exercise can protect your heart against heart disease, and lower both your blood pressure and resting heart rate. (3)
- Enhanced Physical Conditioning: Cardiovascular exercise can condition your body for the rigors of extended physical exertion. This is essential to maintaining your competitiveness in sports necessitating long periods of movement, like basketball, hockey, lacrosse, and football. It is also critical for racing sports built on sustained endurance, like running, swimming, cycling, and rowing. (4)
- Increased Insulin Sensitivity: If you are at risk for type 2 diabetes and experience insulin resistance, cardiovascular exercise has been shown to raise insulin sensitivity for up to 16 hours after exercise, even in individuals with type 2 diabetes. (5) Therefore, cardio can be a valuable tool for warding off blood sugar spikes that can be destructive to your body.
Key Takeaways
To wrap things up, here are some key takeaways to help you know if you’ve been taking things too far in the pursuit of cardiovascular health — and how you can make some quick adjustments.
- If your body is experiencing excessive pain as a result of cardio training, it may be the result of an injury.
- Overdoing things during cardio training can result in mental fatigue and depressive symptoms that extend beyond the training itself.
- Overtraining with cardio can cause you to experience an increased number of sleep interruptions.
- Extending your recovery time may improve cardiovascular output in future training sessions.
- Reducing the volume and/or intensity of your cardio sessions may let you continue to reap the benefits of cardio while alleviating symptoms of overtraining.
Backing Down Can Be a Winning Strategy
So how much cardio is too much? However much your body and mind say is too much — listen to your body for signs of excessive physical and mental fatigue.
Increasing your cardio training output isn’t always a recipe for fitness success, so you should be prepared to tone it down when necessary. Always remember that the moments of rest in between your cardio workouts are every bit as important as the workouts themselves.
FAQs
If you still have questions about whether or not your cardio output is simply too high, we have some answers for you below.
If you have been doing too much cardio, you may experience one or more warning signs. These signs include indications of an impending physical injury, along with mental fatigue, and a disrupted sleep pattern.
Whether or not two hours of cardio per day is too much depends on your personal capabilities and tolerance for the training volume. Many athletes engage in physical activity that includes multiple daily cardio sessions to sustain their competitiveness in their sports. This includes pro distance runners, swimmers, cross-country skiers, and other endurance athletes.
On the other hand, if you’re a newer cardio devotee, you’ll likely have to train much less than two hours a day for your first few months, at least.
If your body can tolerate the repeated activity, it can be both safe and advisable to do cardio every day for the sake of heart health and physical conditioning. That can even include brisk walks to keep the impact down while upping your heart rate.
It is not appropriate to do cardio when the method of cardio in question causes or exacerbates a physical injury or health condition. Under these circumstances, it is best to give your body time to completely heal before engaging in any form of cardio that causes pain and extends the duration of an injury. Consider consulting a physician before engaging in a new workout program if you’re unsure of your ability to do so.
References
- Haugen T, Sandbakk Ø, Seiler S, Tønnessen E. The Training Characteristics of World-Class Distance Runners: An Integration of Scientific Literature and Results-Proven Practice. Sports Med Open. 2022 Apr 1;8(1):46.
- Dubinina E, Korostovtseva LS, Rotar O, Amelina V, Boyarinova M, Bochkarev M, Shashkova T, Baranova E, Libis R, Duplyakov D, Sviryaev Y, Konradi A, Shlyakhto E. Physical Activity Is Associated With Sleep Quality: Results of the ESSE-RF Epidemiological Study. Front Psychol. 2021 Aug 5;12:705212.
- Pinckard K, Baskin KK, Stanford KI. Effects of Exercise to Improve Cardiovascular Health. Front Cardiovasc Med. 2019 Jun 4;6:69.
- Franklin BA, Eijsvogels TMH, Pandey A, Quindry J, Toth PP. Physical activity, cardiorespiratory fitness, and cardiovascular health: A clinical practice statement of the ASPC Part I: Bioenergetics, contemporary physical activity recommendations, benefits, risks, extreme exercise regimens, potential maladaptations. Am J Prev Cardiol. 2022 Oct 13;12:100424.
- Venkatasamy VV, Pericherla S, Manthuruthil S, Mishra S, Hanno R. Effect of Physical activity on Insulin Resistance, Inflammation and Oxidative Stress in Diabetes Mellitus. J Clin Diagn Res. 2013 Aug;7(8):1764-6.
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