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Have you ever trained and felt like your workout didn’t go as expected?

Maybe it was a day to rest or reduce training intensity, but how can you determine that? Heart Rate Variability (HRV) measures fluctuations in the time between each heartbeat, indicating the balance of the autonomic nervous system, as well as revealing stress levels (physical and mental) and recovery status.

Because HRV is highly sensitive to training load, it can indicate when it’s necessary to reduce (or rest) training intensity or, conversely, increase it. Ignoring these signals can lead to poorly adjusted training, excessive fatigue, performance decline, and even overtraining syndrome. On the other hand, monitoring HRV allows you to adjust your sessions as needed, training at the right time and at the ideal intensity, optimizing your results over time.

🏏In a study with cricket players, those who monitored HRV to avoid excessive fatigue showed a 17% better physical performance than athletes who didn’t track it. By identifying days when recovery was suboptimal, coaches adjusted training loads or prescribed rest, preventing injuries and keeping players at peak performance levels.

🏃‍♀️Lilian works in a high-pressure environment and trains running at night. She often felt exhausted midweek, without understanding why. After starting to monitor HRV, she discovered that her body wasn’t fully recovered on certain days, often due to work stress—rather than just training. By adjusting her rest periods and modifying running sessions, Marisa began to feel more energetic during workouts, reduced muscle soreness, and improved her road race times, all thanks to better stress and recovery management.

The force plate is not only used for isolated strength or power assessments; it can also serve as a strategic load management tool through the Countermovement Jump (CMJ) and the Reactive Strength Index (RSI).

This approach is widely used in high-performance centers and validated by multiple scientific studies, as vertical jump power is highly sensitive to neuromuscular fatigue.

When CMJ is included in a regular monitoring protocol (whether daily, multiple times a week, or just once a week), we can identify whether the athlete is entering a state of excessive fatigue or if there is room to intensify training. Additionally, this analysis helps prevent injuries, as training with high fatigue levels significantly increases the risk of muscle and joint problems.

Why Does CMJ Indicate Fatigue?

CMJ evaluates power (force × velocity), so any significant drops may indicate that the body is not fully recovered. Conversely, if values improve, it may be a positive sign to maintain or intensify training.

This daily or periodic assessment of neuromuscular condition provides a critical advantage for both professional athletes and amateur practitioners aiming for high performance with safety.

Common Monitoring Strategies

1. Every day (Daily Monitoring)
   • Recommended during tapering phases, when the goal is to reach peak performance before a competition.
   • Allows for real-time training load adjustments, preventing unwanted overloads.
2. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday
   • Useful in transition phases or when modifying a training program, requiring close tracking of how the body responds.
   • Provides sufficient data to identify fatigue trends or progress throughout the week.
3. Monday and Friday
   • Monday: Checks whether weekend recovery was sufficient to start the new week at optimal levels.
   • Friday: Assesses how the body responded to the training load throughout the week.
4. Only Monday
   • A simple check-in to determine whether recovery from the previous training block was adequate.
   • Typically used by those preferring a minimalist monitoring routine while still being effective.

Benefits of Load Control via CMJ

• Performance Optimization: By knowing whether the body is fatigued or not, training intensity and volume can be precisely adjusted, enhancing performance gains.
• Injury Prevention: Training under fatigue significantly increases the risk of muscle and joint injuries; CMJ monitoring helps prevent this.
• Tapering Adjustments: Before a competition, performance levels should peak. If CMJ values do not improve, it may indicate that training plans need to be revised.
• Data-Driven Decision-Making: With objective parameters, training load and recovery planning becomes more efficient and intelligent.

🏀 Imagine a basketball player entering a decisive phase of the season, with elimination games ahead. The coach decides to monitor the Countermovement Jump (CMJ) daily to check how the athlete is recovering from intense training sessions and consecutive matches. Every morning, the player performs a few jumps on the force plate, and if power values drop beyond the expected range, the coach adjusts the day’s load, reducing plyometric exercises or increasing active recovery time. This way, the player’s physical preparedness is maintained without exceeding the fatigue threshold that could lead to overexertion or injuries, ensuring that the athlete reaches key games with optimal energy and performance.

🏃 In the case of an office worker training for a 6-mile race, the monitoring routine may consist of just one CMJ measurement per week, on Mondays. If the test indicates a significant drop in jump power, it suggests that the body may not have recovered sufficiently from the previous training block or weekend race. In response, the coach adjusts the upcoming sessions, either by reducing intensity or increasing rest periods. With this single weekly test, the amateur runner can fine-tune their training plan, minimize injury risks from accumulated fatigue, and gradually improve performance in the 6-mile race.

📊Real case: A CrossFit athlete struggling with overtraining began monitoring HRV and adjusting training intensity. Result? His benchmark Fran time improved from 3:56 to 3:28.

Psychometric Assessments

Even if two people perform the same workout and display identical metrics, their physiological responses may differ. Factors such as lifestyle, stress levels, and sleep quality influence this reaction. Psychometric assessments help us better understand how each individual responds to stimuli.

Psychometric assessments have strong scientific backing, showing a high correlation with various physiological parameters. Here, we will mention some tools we use to measure how your body responds to training stimuli and recovery routines, but we are not limited to these. In addition to the ones listed below, we also work with DALDA, POMS, DRUMS, among others.

RPE is a way to measure the internal training load—in other words, the intensity perceived by your body during sessions. Controlling RPE facilitates decision-making on when and how much to increase or decrease training intensity, helping to optimize results and prevent overload.

The RPE scale ranges from 0 (minimal effort) to 10 (maximum effort) and reflects not only physical exertion but also factors that can interfere with training and recovery, such as sleep quality, hydration, and stress levels. Therefore, by recording RPE after each workout, you obtain an accurate representation of how your body is responding to training. However, it is important to note that even a score of “5” on the scale already represents a workout considered “difficult”.

How to Calculate Training Load

• Evaluate the training session based on your perceived exertion (RPE) on a scale of 0 to 10.
  
• Multiply this value by the duration in minutes of the session.
  
• The resulting value (e.g., RPE 8 × 60 min = 480 AU – Arbitrary Units) reflects the training load for that day.

Why evaluate internal load? Is this metric really important?

Based on the number of AUs, we can calculate:

• Strain (Accumulated Load): Quantifies total stress over a period.
• Monotony: Evaluates variation (or lack thereof) in training, indicating possible fatigue levels.
• Acute:Chronic Workload Ratio: Compares the weekly load (acute) to the average of the last six weeks (chronic). Increasing load by more than 30% compared to the previous average drastically raises injury risk.

PSR assesses how ready you feel for the next training stimulus, whether it’s a workout or a competition. This perception goes beyond muscle rest, as it includes factors such as stress, sleep quality, overall fatigue, and even emotional state. A low PSR indicates a greater need for recovery and load adjustment, while a high PSR signals that you are well-recovered and ready for more intense sessions.

The Well-Being metric considers aspects of overall well-being, such as mood, psychological stress, and daily energy levels. By monitoring these parameters, we can understand how external factors (work routine, personal issues, etc.) impact your performance and recovery. Maintaining a high level of well-being not only improves training quality but also reduces the risk of performance decline and injuries.

TQR is a psychometric assessment tool that is widely validated scientifically, used to measure the overall quality of recovery after periods of physical exertion. It considers not only physical condition but also psychological aspects and the effectiveness of recovery strategies employed, such as sleep quality, nutrition, hydration, and stress management.

A low TQR indicates that the body is still in the recovery process and may be vulnerable to fatigue or injuries, while a high TQR reflects efficient recovery and readiness for new efforts. This tool is especially useful in high-performance sports and during intense training periods, allowing for precise adjustments in training loads and recovery strategies. By integrating TQR with other psychometric metrics, such as RPE and PSR, it is possible to obtain a holistic view of how the body responds to stimuli, ensuring consistent and sustainable performance.

Through these psychometric assessments, we gain a more complete understanding of how your body is reacting, ensuring that each session is optimized according to your physical and mental condition. After all, evaluating only numbers (loads, times, and distances) is not enough; it is essential to understand how you feel and recover to achieve solid and sustainable results.