How do you get back to training once the corona has got you?

I already have several friends who have complained that it has been more difficult than usual to return to sport after contracting the coronavirus. A former classmate, who is a tough sportsman, was one of the first to be diagnosed with coronavirus back in March 2020, when coronavirus diagnosis was much rarer in our country than the one that hospitalised the polkovnik's widow in the Smul play nihilissimus acutus.

When we went for a run with him to Otepää at the beginning of June last year, it turned out that his form had not recovered in a few months, and even at a running pace of around 6:00-6:30, which is not a special pace for him normally, he had to take several walking breaks during the 12 km run around Lake Pühajärve. I thought at the time that I didn't want to catch the virus myself. So far so good and I've been fine (ptui-ptui-ptui) I've heard quite a lot by now about how others are recovering and that it's harder to start training again than with other illnesses. Finally, gone are the days when someone somewhere in the swingers' circles would quip that corona is like a snowman - because you haven't seen it, it doesn't exist.

Lost power?

For the moment, let's leave aside Mart Seim, an Estonian lifting legend, who may have lost an Olympic medal as well as a Christmas medal thanks to koruna. It is the ordinary people among us who have lost strength and form. The "commission" for this story came from my aunt. She started to train diligently at home via video after we had started with FitQ. Her physical performance improved at a good pace and whereas before she scored 240 on the Defence General Physical Test, it improved rapidly to 280 from a maximum of 300. But suddenly, after a bout of coronation, he asked me that he would like to return to the sport, but he could not find a suitable workout for him, as it was difficult even to do yoga with an underprivileged dog.

When suffering from coronary artery disease, doctors recommend breathing exercises as exercise: breathing with pursed lips, blowing soap bubbles, blowing bubbles in a water bottle with a coarse straw or inflating a balloon. Read more GP advice here.

However, these exercises are too easy for a person who already feels healthy and feels it's time to get back to their daily routine. So how do you get started and what should you keep in mind? I asked for advice from people who have been more involved in corona and/or training.

Doctor's thoughts

Mari Arak is a doctor who works at the University of Tartu Hospital and has unfortunately had a lot of contact with coronary patients recently. He is also an athlete himself, playing volleyball for the University of Tartu Bigbank women's team and is also a doctor for the Estonian volleyball team. To start with, he says that he has seen more patients than he would like to, but he does not follow their recovery and return to training after they leave hospital, and so he is giving a personal opinion, not a scientific view.

Mari Arak: "The biggest experience is with adults who have been hospitalised due to COVID-19, most of whom are unvaccinated and have also required prolonged intensive care and therefore have multiple complications. For these patients, recovery takes several months, and for them, walking down the hospital corridor without supplementary oxygen is a big step. How long it will take for them to get back to a completely normal rhythm of life one day is hard to say, because we don't follow them for that long.

In the case of athletes, it is now clear that most sufferers of COVID-19 have mild to moderate symptoms. A study of Estonian athletes found that on average, COVID-19 causes them to be absent from training for 2 weeks. For mild cases, I think this is enough. Of course, you have to keep an eye on how you feel. If the symptoms persist during exercise or if new symptoms develop, you should definitely seek medical advice. Many athletes are accustomed to monitoring their heart rate during training - it is useful to continue to do this and adjust training loads according to heart rate and how you feel."

Trainer's view

Recognised coach and athlete Ott Kiivikas warns, just in case, that he is certainly not an expert on post-covid recovery and at what point someone can be declared healthy and start training, he cannot say. From personal experience as a trainer and as a sufferer of the disease, he says so:

"First of all, it certainly depends on how severe the lung damage has been and there is no one yardstick for everyone. With any kind of lung injury, it starts with movement, walking, because even a little exertion is tiring. I know this first-hand. As the training improves, the proportion of aerobic exercise also increases at first, but on a week-by-week basis. Obviously, weight training is not forbidden or excluded, but in this case the load is at least 50% less than it was at the beginning of the training break. Be sure to monitor your heart rate and how you feel, these two things will help you to find the right load."

More specific recommendations for returning to training

The topic of returning to training has also been researched in the wider world, and for those who want much more specific advice, we found some that focus on competitive athletes, so arguably for returning to a much higher than average physical effort:

We've heard that some people have a harder time and some have an easier time. My former colleague Evelin, who suffered a coronary in March 2021 and who is a big fan of crossfit training, which is known to be extremely physically challenging, had an easier time and summed up her coronary upheaval and return to training like this: "At the beginning I might have tired a bit quicker, but other than that it was okay and I quickly got my groove back."

Despite the simplicity or complexity of the condition, the Cleveland Clinic website suggests that even if you're athletic and used to higher workloads, and symptoms are mild or virtually non-existent, you should still avoid exercise for 10 days after diagnosis. The main reason is that the disease is insidious and increases the risk of developing heart muscle inflammation.

Recommendations

My aunt Diana also found her own solutions for training, and she talks about her chosen training loads like this: "I started by doing the first half of the Netfiti Verve 01 programme for breathing exercises. I started with the first part of the Verve 01 exercises for Verve 01. The taiji and yoga exercises from BodyBalance are also suitable, as well as the relaxed stretches at the end, like in Yin Yoga. For me, it made being human more dignified."

Among the workouts in the FitQ programme, we recommend you look for categories such as "body and mind" workouts when you feel ready to train. If you're not quite ready, but would like to be, you might want to start in the meditation and mobility category, and certainly not go over the uncomfortable limit at the beginning.

Good recovery everyone!

Read more:

A family doctor's guide to coronavirus

Cleveland Clinic guide on how to return to training

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