Acute Chronic Work Load Ratio
Acute chronic work load ratio
A lot of injuries that we see at NK Active are related to training errors and overtraining. In keeping with our motto of Get Active, Stay Active and Move Forward, there is a tool that you can use to try and prevent overtraining and hopefully reduce the risk of injuries.
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Typically people use the 10% rule, increasing their activity by 10% a week; however, there are issues with this rule when activity levels are both low and high.
Let’s introduce the acute chronic workload ratio.
The acute chronic workload ratio was developed by Dr Tim Gabbett, a human physiologist.
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The acute:chronic workload ratio (ACWR) is the ratio between how much workload has been done in the last 7 days (acute workload) versus the average weekly workload that has been performed over the previous 28 days (chronic workload). In other words, it is how much workload has been performed in the last week compared to the previous month.
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Should the ratio be greater than 1.2 there is an increased risk of injury and greater than 1.5 is significant increased risk of injury.
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This is a great tool to use on returning from injury and also future planning of activity levels. It doesn’t just have to be used for mileage, it can be used for time and intensity levels.
The Acute Chronic Workload ratio calculator
We have created the acute:chronic workload ratio for everyone to use. Just type your weekly data into the boxes, click calculate and it will instantly work out your acute:chronic workload ratio.
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For the Intensity calculation just times the length of the activity by the effort level (0-10 scale, 0 = no effort 10 = maximum effort)
For example 50min run at 7/10 would give an intensity level of 350
When filling in the ACWL ratio the 4th week is always the highest value, then work backwards.
For example if your biggest week mileage was 40 miles, this would go in week 4, then fill in the previous 3 weeks mileage in the other boxes.
We are have created the acute chronic workload ratio for everyone to use, just type in your weekly data into the boxes, click calculate and will instantly work out your cute chronic workload ratio.Â
