Five Days, Zero Rest: What My Own Training Load Looks Like, and Why I Am Stopping
Ladakh field log · Day 5
Yesterday I published a post saying that a coach looking at my training file would prescribe a rest day. Today I did a strength session in the morning and a two hour thirteen minute run in the evening.
That is not a confession dressed up as content. It is the most useful thing I can show you this week, because the gap between what a coach knows and what a coach does is the single most common reason training goes wrong, and it does not spare the person writing the plan.
Here is the full five day load table, the one measurement that genuinely improved, and what I am doing about it.
Five days in Ladakh, five days of training, zero rest days. One of those numbers above suggests my body is adapting well. The other suggests I am spending the adaptation faster than I am earning it.
The Five Day Load Table
I arrived in Leh on the evening of 25 July. This is every session since.
| Day | Session | Duration | Avg HR | Load |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Day 1, 25 Jul | Arrival, no training | — | — | 0 |
| Day 2, 26 Jul | Easy run, 5.59 km | 1:00:00 | 129 | 58 |
| Day 3, 27 Jul | Zone 2 run, 6.81 km | 1:00:00 | 138 | 81 |
| Day 4, 28 Jul AM | Easy ride, 13.65 km | 1:01:36 | 135 | 32 |
| Day 4, 28 Jul PM | Easy run, 3.01 km | 28:17 | 148 | 53 |
| Day 5, 29 Jul AM | Strength, 29 sets | 42:29 | 109 | 17 |
| Day 5, 29 Jul PM | Run, 13.01 km | 2:13:24 | 136 | 163 |
Seven sessions in four days. Daily load of 58, then 81, then 85, then 180.
That last figure is more than double the day before it, and it landed on the fifth consecutive training day at 3,500 metres, in the first week at altitude, with no rest day anywhere in the sequence.
What I Actually Did Today
Morning: upper body strength, 8:43 AM
| Metric | Reading |
|---|---|
| Duration | 42:29 |
| Sets | 29 |
| Total reps | 284 |
| Average heart rate | 109 bpm |
| Training load | 17, low |
An average of 109 beats per minute across 29 sets is low. That tells you the session was genuinely controlled rather than a metabolic workout dressed up as strength training, which at altitude in week one is the right call.
Evening: 13.01 km run, 6:18 PM
| Metric | Reading |
|---|---|
| Distance | 13.01 km |
| Duration | 2:13:24 |
| Average pace | 10'15" per km |
| Average heart rate | 136 bpm |
| Running efficiency | 91% |
| Elevation gain | 53 m |
| Training load | 163, medium |
| Conditions | 15°C, 57% humidity, 11 km/h wind |
The heart rate was well controlled at 136, comfortably inside my aerobic band. The pace was slow. The duration was the problem: two hours and thirteen minutes is the longest session of the week by a very wide margin, and it was the second session of the day.
The Number That Genuinely Improved
One measurement in today's file is the most encouraging thing I have recorded since arriving.
| 28 July run | 29 July run | |
|---|---|---|
| Average heart rate | 148 bpm | 136 bpm |
| Running efficiency | 84% | 91% |
| Distance | 3.01 km | 13.01 km |
Better running mechanics, at a lower heart rate, over four times the distance. That is the first thing in five days that looks like adaptation rather than accumulated cost.
I want to be careful not to oversell it. Running efficiency is a device-calculated metric, the two sessions were on different routes at different distances, and one comparison is not a trend. But it points in the right direction, and it is worth naming alongside the load problem rather than letting the load problem swallow the whole post.
The Gap Between Knowing and Doing
Yesterday I wrote, in a published post that anyone can still read, that the sensible response to my day four file was a rest day. I wrote that a coach seeing those numbers would say take tomorrow off.
Then I trained twice.
Here is what I think actually happened, and I suspect it will be familiar to anyone who trains seriously.
Each individual session was defensible
The strength work was light, 109 bpm average. The run was well inside my aerobic zone at 136 bpm. Neither session, judged alone, was a mistake. It is only the sequence that is the problem, and sequences are much harder to feel than sessions.
Feeling good is not the same as being recovered
I felt fine this morning. That is the trap. Accumulated fatigue at altitude does not announce itself as tiredness, it shows up as a heart rate that will not come down, a pace that will not return, and eventually a session you cannot complete. By the time you feel it, you are already several days late.
I have nineteen days before nine people arrive
Our residential group lands on 16 August. Nothing I gain from training through this week is worth anything if I arrive at that date tired or injured. This is the argument that should have won, and today it did not.
- Tomorrow is a full rest day. Not a light day, not a walk with a watch on. Off.
- No double sessions for the rest of week one.
- The fixed test route starts the day after. One flat road, one time of day, one heart rate ceiling, repeated weekly. I have promised this in two previous posts and not yet delivered it.
- I will publish whether I kept to this. If tomorrow's log shows a training session, you will know I did not.
Why Rest Days Matter More at Altitude
Three reasons the maths is different up here.
Recovery is slower because oxygen is scarcer. The processes that repair tissue and restore energy stores are aerobic, and they are working with less oxygen than they would at sea level. The same session takes longer to absorb.
Altitude is itself a stressor, before you train at all. Simply being at 3,500 metres raises your resting heart rate, disturbs your sleep and increases your energy expenditure. Your training load sits on top of a baseline load you did not choose.
The adaptation you came for is a repair process. Building red blood cells is something your body does while recovering, not while working. Training every day at altitude interferes with the exact mechanism you travelled there to trigger. That is worth reading twice, because it is the part people find counterintuitive.
What Our Residential Group Does Instead
Our group arrives on 16 August. Their first week looks nothing like mine.
- Days 1 and 2. No training at all. Arrival, hydration, baseline measurements, rest.
- Day 3. First movement session. Short, heart rate capped.
- No double sessions in week one. Not for anyone, at any fitness level.
- At least one full rest day in the first seven.
- Daily monitoring before anything else. Resting heart rate, oxygen saturation, sleep quality, symptom check.
- Anyone showing fatigue signals does not train. That decision is ours, not theirs, and it is not negotiable on the day.
The reason we run it that way is not that our clients are less capable than I am. It is that a protocol enforced by someone else beats judgement made by the person who wants to train. Today is a reasonably good demonstration of why.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many rest days do you need at high altitude?
More than at sea level. Recovery processes are aerobic and there is less oxygen available to drive them, and altitude itself adds a physiological cost before you train at all. A sensible first week includes at least one full rest day, no double sessions, and no training at all in the first 48 hours after arrival.
Can you train every day at altitude?
You can, but you probably should not, particularly in the first weeks. I trained five consecutive days on arriving in Leh, with seven sessions in four days, and my load more than doubled from one day to the next. The adaptation you travel to altitude for happens during recovery, so training through it works against the reason you came.
What is training load and how should you use it?
Training load is a device estimate of the physiological cost of a session, calculated from heart rate, duration and intensity. It is an estimate rather than a measurement, and it varies between devices. Use it to watch the shape of a trend across days and weeks rather than to judge any single session. A sharp step up, like 85 to 180 overnight, is worth paying attention to.
Is strength training safe at high altitude?
Yes, with the intensity managed. My session today ran 29 sets and 284 reps at an average of 109 beats per minute, which is genuinely controlled. Strength work becomes a problem at altitude when it turns into a metabolic session with short rests and high heart rates, because that adds cardiovascular load on top of an already stressed system.
How do you know when to take a rest day?
Look for several signals pointing the same way rather than one dramatic reading. A rising resting heart rate, a falling heart rate recovery, a heart rate that runs high for a familiar pace, disturbed sleep, and appetite loss. And count your days: five consecutive training days in your first week at altitude is a reason to rest regardless of how you feel.
Does training every day speed up acclimatisation?
No. Acclimatisation is driven by exposure to altitude, not by training volume. Living at altitude produces the adaptation. Training hard on top of it adds fatigue without adding stimulus, and can interfere with the recovery processes that build red blood cells in the first place.
- All training figures are from the author's own device files recorded 26 to 29 July 2026 on a COROS watch with a chest heart rate monitor, and a bicycle power meter for the 28 July ride. Raw activity screenshots are published alongside these articles.
- Levine BD, Stray-Gundersen J. "Living high-training low": effect of moderate-altitude acclimatization with low-altitude training on performance. Journal of Applied Physiology. 1997;83(1):102-112. Randomised controlled trial, 39 competitive runners. The live high, train high group gained red cell mass and VO2max but showed no improvement in 5 km time, attributed to degraded training quality at altitude. PubMed
- Health advisory, District Administration Leh, Union Territory of Ladakh. All arriving tourists must complete at least 48 hours of acclimatisation before travelling to higher altitude areas. leh.nic.in
Niraj Kumar Borah
Founder and head coach of Fitness Bootcamp, a residential health transformation programme running in Rishikesh, Ladakh, Manali, and the north east. Since 2020 he has guided more than 4,600 guests through structured, fully supported transformations.
He has spent four to six months of each year in Ladakh for several years, and has raced the Ladakh Marathon in 2023 and 2024. He is here from July to September 2026, running the routes and testing the acclimatisation protocol our residential group will follow from 16 August, and racing the 11.2 km on 13 September. He publishes his own training data daily, including the days he gets it wrong.
- VDOT Certified Distance Running Coach · VDOT O2
- Certified Heart Rate Performance Specialist · NESTA
- Precision Nutrition Level 1 · Precision Nutrition
- Affiliated HYROX Performance Coach · verify on the HYROX register
- Mountaineering, Adventure Course · Jawahar Institute of Mountaineering, J&K
- Ladakh Marathon · 5 km 2023, 11.2 km 2024, racing the 11.2 km on 13 September 2026
- Full background and competition record · read here
The 4-week high altitude endurance programme
28 nights across Leh, Basgo and Nubra Valley. Structured heart rate training, enforced rest days, safe acclimatisation, cooked vegetarian meals, and daily monitoring. There is no payment to apply, and we speak with everyone before confirming a place.
See the programmeThis log is general educational information about the physiology of altitude and training, and is not medical advice. Ascent to high altitude carries real medical risk, including acute mountain sickness and, rarely, high altitude pulmonary or cerebral oedema, which are emergencies. If you have any cardiovascular, respiratory, or haematological condition, are pregnant, or have a history of altitude illness, please speak with your doctor before travelling to altitude. Individual responses vary considerably, and the readings published here are one person's and should not be used as a benchmark for your own. Training load and efficiency figures are device estimates, not laboratory measurements. Figures were recorded between 26 and 29 July 2026. If you believe any figure here is inaccurate, please contact us with the source and we will correct it.
