I am coaching a friend who is going to do her first marathon. She has very little running background and is anemic, low iron counts, and has to periodically go into the hospital to get an iron drip intravenously. Plus, she has a high iron diet as well. She is doing the marathon regardless of what the doctor says. My question is, is there any danger in training for a marathon and what precautions should she take?
Thanks,
So, she won’t listen to her doctor, but she will listen to you? to random people on a message board? as a ‘coach’, are YOU ok with this?
No, not that she would listen to me either. She’s going to do the marathon. I just want to know if there is any danger or precautions she should consider. I created a training plan for her before I knew about this problem she had, now I want to know more just in case there is a dangerous effect from training at this level.
Don’t shoot me because I want inquire.
She’s simply anemic. So her blood’s ability to transport oxygen is diminished. I don’t see the condition causing her to be in danger. If she’s doing any interval work or hill repeats and is being pushed, she could potentially reach the point of passing out if the anemia is bad enough but should be OK nonetheless.
The training itself could contribute to the anemia, and her recovery time will be longer than for an otherwise healthy runner in her condition…so you may need to tailor the training because of that.
Why is she chronically iron-deficient? Does she have Chrohn’s disease or Celiac disease?
Regardless; since she’s under medical care for the condition they’ve already certainly evaluated her for the more dangerous causes of iron deficiency (internal bleeding and such).
If she is undergoing a dramatic change in her running mileage under your tutelage you should at least encourage her to have her iron levels test/re-tested more often as the mileage goes up.
To get her to ‘listen’ to her Dr’s (if she doesn’t) you should let her know that getting the anemia under control will improve her performance in her training/racing which obviously is a motivation of hers.
BTW, has the Dr. told her NOT to run or to complete a marathon?