See whether this week's training load is a sensible step up or a spike.

DESCRIPTION

Spikes in training load are one of the few injury risk factors you can actually see coming, as long as you are tracking them. The acute to chronic workload ratio compares what an athlete has done this week against their rolling four-week average, and turns it into a single number that flags whether load is progressing sensibly or jumping too fast.

This free calculator does the maths for you. Enter the last four weeks of load, in whatever consistent measure you use (session-RPE, total distance or total minutes), and it returns the ratio, the acute and chronic figures, and a colour-coded read on where it sits: from undertraining, through the commonly cited 0.8 to 1.3 sweet spot, to the higher-risk zone above 1.5. It is a monitoring aid, not a crystal ball, and it works best read alongside how the athlete looks, feels and performs.

HOW TO USE

1.  Enter each of the last four weeks of load: week minus 3, minus 2, minus 1, and this week.

2.  Read the ratio, the acute and chronic values, and the zone it falls in on the gauge.

WHAT YOU GET

Acute load, chronic (four-week average) load, the workload ratio, and a colour-coded sweet-spot gauge with plain-English interpretation.

WHO IT IS FOR

Physios, S&C coaches, and anyone monitoring training load and managing injury risk.

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