How Your Menstrual Cycle Affects Workouts | Science vs Myths with Dr Hazel Wallace | Be Well Moments

0:00Welcome to Live Well Be Well, a show to help high performers improve their health and well-being.

0:10I've seen you talk about it a lot on the show. We've had Dr Stacey Sims on here a lot, speaking about the importance of, you know, resistance exercise and training for women's health. But what do you think about training during your menstrual cycle? Because there's a lot of different conversations around this now on you know you should ramp it up for the two weeks when like pre-ovulation and then once you've ovulated you should be slowing it down what's your because you're also really into your training so what do you do and what does the research say in that in that kind of sector so the research is definitely growing in this space but there's not a huge amount of studies there on training around the menstrual cycle or recovery around the menstrual cycle or muscle building potential around the menstrual cycle.

0:57And of the ones that we have, there is a lot of conflicting evidence or inconclusive results. From the systematic reviews where we pool all the research together, it seems that there may be a small dip in performance during your period. And I think for a lot of people that is not really a surprise, but it's such a small dip, like very insignificant that some women won't experience it. The other caveat to that is there's other studies that found otherwise. And when I was writing this book, I really wanted to pull this apart because I find personally that my cycle really impacts my energy, my motivation to train and also how strong I feel.

1:42And I wanted to find out if that was a real perceived effect like from objective measures and there was an interesting study done on athletes I think they were female footballers and they perceived that they performed worse during the period but actually when they did objective measures of how they performed their reaction times and other measures were better so they actually performed better during that time. And I think what this tells us is it's not that it's all in your head that you're having a terrible day or having a hard period, but we can still perform well during our period and during different parts of our cycle.

2:23And I found that actually really empowering. At the time I was writing the book, I was doing Paris Marathon and it was day three of my cycle. And so having that knowledge of my brain yes it might practically be really annoying but I'm still going to do well I'm still going to perform well I think is is an important message to tell yourself so kind of what does the research say maybe a small dip around your period and maybe kind of in that late luteal phase potentially there's more muscle building potential around ovulation in that kind of like pre-ovulatory phase when estrogen is high because estrogen is known to really prime us for strength, motivation, endurance training.

3:06So you might feel stronger during that time if you do amazing. And there's been a handful of studies, I think five now, where they've compared basing most of your training in that follicular phase, so the first part of your cycle versus the luteal phase or versus spreading it out across the entire cycle. And they found that maybe there's a benefit of actually front loading your training in the follicular phase. There may be some benefits there. But I think for most women who are not athletes, who kind of are trying to go to the gym around their working schedule, maybe picking the kids up from school, it's not practical to swap and change their workouts around based on their cycle.

3:50And I don't think the benefits are great enough to make that big shift. So I think for most women, use your cycle as a guide, but it shouldn't dictate whether you rest or move. It can't like use it to influence how you train in a, in the sense of like, take each day as it comes. So if you wake up during your period and you feel really uncomfortable, then maybe today's not the day to put a barbell across your hips and do hip thrusts, but maybe doing a Matt Pilates class actually feels really good for you. So it's just about taking, I think what the conclusion I've come to is while we're waiting to gather more research, you are your best piece of evidence.

4:30So start tracking your cycles, start feeling how you feel across your training, your cycle and your training program and see how you need to change things. For me personally, as I said like I feel the effects of my cycle on my training but I don't follow a cookie cutter approach and say during my letheal phase I only do low intensity exercise like I'm still doing my long runs I'm still doing my higher intensity speed work and things like that but if I wake up on a day and I don't feel like I'm up for doing a long run because it's day one of my cycle and it's quite heavy I will just move it to the next day and it's just about kind of giving your body that grace when it needs it.

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5:53That's why I'm so incredibly proud to be partnering for this episode with Spartone, the number one iron-rich water supplement. Now, I've personally been using these for years. the reason why is because they are naturally sourced highly absorbable iron that means it's much more gentle on your stomach there's no harsh tablets it's just one naturally sourced ingredient that works very well you can pick it up in boots or buy online at amazon but please do not ignore this it is really critical to make sure your iron levels are in check i think it's about becoming it tuned to your body yeah you know I think we're so many and I don't I try to not become obsessed with wearables and talk about it as like the only inclusion point to have in your data but it is a great one to be able to see and I know HRV is kind of again a very invariable measure but allowing yourself to start actually connecting to where you are as opposed to the noise online telling you what you should be because then you're trying to fit into a cookie cutter that isn't you and your body might be in a completely different phase and I think about how many women are listening to this and hopefully men.

7:02It'd be great if men were listening to this episode. But at all different life phases. And if this was Hazel listening to this episode six years ago, you'd have had a completely different outlook to where you are today. And I think that's what's really important with women's health and the menstrual cycle. It's about like tracking and trusting yourself to know when is the rest and when you can push. And using that data is really important as opposed to trying to fit yourself into a puzzle that you think should be working. Yeah I completely agree with you and I think if I think back to when I first stepped into the space and the research space which was probably about six years ago my perception was everyone needs to understand how training around the menstrual cycle is going to benefit them and as I've gained more knowledge and more research has come out my opinions changed.

7:56I don't think that we need to have that cookie cutter approach and I think that's okay because things will evolve but I I'm not confident to sit here and say the menstrual cycle has no impact on how we train and perform because that is just not true for me and you know you mentioned wearables I find that with my heart rate data it starts to climb just as my luteal phase comes in and it climbs climb climbs once my period comes it drops and the same with my HRV it improves and it recovers and that is a real objective measure for me and of course that's going to impact how I train but also what the research doesn't always look at is how our symptoms and our psychology impact that so if you are I don't know a footballer and you're wearing white shorts and it's during your period of course your brain is going to be thinking about well I really hope I don't leak right now um or if you're running a marathon and you have to stop halfway because you need to change your period product all of those things impact us on some level so I think it's really important that we continue to have have these conversations and help women perform at their best regardless of what phase of their cycle they're in I agree in so many ways I think you know allowing ourselves to feel more supported in those moments especially you know if you're running a marathon and you're terrified about well when's the next loo stop all of those things play a massive mental load thanks so much for listening to hear the full episode there's a link in the description