Comment by bob1029
10 days ago
I think that supercompensation is not as strong an effect in amateurs and that this is the #1 driver of injury.
I've long suspected there is a range of exertion that is net negative with regard to injury risk. No exercise at all means no exercise related risk. However, I strongly disagree that an extreme amount of exercise is the riskiest. I think the most dangerous level of exertion sits right in the middle somewhere. That special zone where you are grinding down your bones a bit but your hormones and other compensation mechanisms don't react accordingly because you aren't going quite hard enough.
I think you’re missing a major point the article mentioned. High level athletes are genetic freaks that can tolerate much higher training loads. Recovery capacity is somewhat trainable within limits but there are limits and there’s a big genetic component to that. Hormonal environment matters too, but there’s a genetic component to that as well.
So there’s a huge selection bias in the population of people that can tolerate the training loads you’re talking about without having their bodies fail them and take them out of the population you’re thinking of.