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Will donating blood affect my training?
Gareth Callan: "I'm a fairly fit indoor rower, 30 years old, 15 stone, 2000m PB 6:25.5. I am a blood donor and I want to continue to donate blood at the recommended frequency - once every three months or so.
"Does this present any risk to my health or to my performance? Does a temporary loss in red cells reduce my capacity to get oxygen to and carbon dioxide/lactate from my muscles? When moving into more intense training phases, should blood donation be avoided?"
Terry O'Neill: For a normal healthy person donating blood is not a problem and your normal blood volume would be restored, certainly by the next day; red cell volume, however, could be down for around ten days.
So avoid doing any flat out tests until your red cell count is back to normal. The only other thing you need to watch is to make sure that the actual point where they take the blood from has healed as if you start rowing even at a low intensity you could cause the exit point to start bleeding again.
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