Ladies, why I recommend you track your menstrual cycle

 I work with a lot of women but I haven't yet started working with a woman who is actively tracking her menstrual cycle.

FitrWoman is a brilliant way to start to understand how your menstrual cycle affects how you exercise and eat.

Understanding what is happening to your body during the different phases of your cycle is critical if you want to get the best out of the exercise you do. It's also extremely important to understand if you are trying to lose body fat.

The early phases of your cycle are when you have the best energy, you have greater capacity for intense workouts and you can see a lot of improvement in this phase.

As your cycle progresses some women feel that they just can't perform the way they normally do and often put it down to not being good enough. 

Building a training plan that aligns with your menstrual cycle is vital. You know when you can really push hard in workouts and when to have easier sessions. There is always value to working on mobility, flexibility and balance and many other aspects of exercise whilst the super tough workouts take a back seat for a few days.

As far as nutrition goes you are going to have days where you need to eat more as you get closer to your period. Your basal metabolic rate increases slightly and generally we are less able to use carbohydrate. Ever thought it's just coincidence you crave all the carbohydrates when you get to a certain point in your cycle?! Nope, you need to eat a bit more.

I hope that helps you to start to understand that as a woman there are extra considerations.

This book Roar by Dr Stacy Sims is an excellent resource and I would highly recommend introducing some of the concepts for yourself and especially to any young women so they start to understand how to get the best out of their body at an early age.

If you have a regular healthy menstrual cycle it's a great sign but that doesn't mean it's not annoying at times x