02/09/2026
Exercise is good for us.
But more exercise isn’t always better.
And sometimes what looks like discipline from the outside can actually be a really unhealthy relationship with training.
Exercise addiction isn’t simply training a lot.
It’s when exercise starts to feel compulsive. When you feel like you have to train, even when you’re injured, exhausted or unwell.
When missing a session causes guilt, anxiety or irritability.
When you train to compensate for what you’ve eaten.
When rest days feel harder mentally than training days.
Or when training starts taking priority over your health, relationships, work or other parts of your life.
And this is where it can be difficult to recognise in endurance sport.
Because a lot of these behaviours are normalised.
Training through pain is called toughness.
Never missing a session is called commitment.
Doing more than the programme says is called motivation.
But being a committed athlete also means being able to rest.
It means being able to change a session when your body needs it.
And it means understanding that your worth, fitness and identity aren’t determined by whether you trained today.
The goal isn’t to exercise less.
It’s to have a relationship with exercise where you’re still the one making the decisions.
