Anyone who trains regularly knows the feeling: some days everything flows effortlessly, while on others, you feel sluggish, tired, or simply “not in the zone.” But why is that? This is where the Hooper Index comes in – a simple yet powerful tool from sports science that helps you better understand your body and avoid overtraining.
What is the Hooper Index?
The Hooper Index is a questionnaire-based method originally developed to assess the current fatigue level of athletes. The basic idea: those who regularly monitor their body and sensations can detect early signs of overload or exhaustion.
The Hooper Index is based on a daily subjective self-assessment. You rate four areas each on a scale from 1 to 7:
Sleep quality – Did you sleep well and feel rested?
General stress level – How stressed do you feel in daily life?
Muscle soreness or pain – Do you feel tension or soreness?
Feeling of fatigue – Do you feel energized or exhausted?
The sum of these ratings gives you your personal Hooper Index score.
Why is the Hooper Index useful?
A high Hooper Index may indicate that your body is overloaded and needs more recovery. A low index, on the other hand, signals that you’re well-recovered and ready for new training stimuli.
Especially in ambitious training plans, it’s easy to ignore warning signs from your body. The Hooper Index helps maintain a balance between training load and recovery – a crucial factor in preventing overtraining and injuries.
Studies show that this index correlates well with heart rate variability (Rabbani et al., 2019). In the future, it will also be possible to integrate health data from various wearables to compare subjective feedback with objective measurements.
How to use the check-in in everyday life
Take a few minutes each morning for your check-in.
Answer the four questions honestly – it’s about your personal perception, not perfect numbers.
The score is saved in the app so you can track trends over time.
Enduco responds to high values: based on your results, Enduco may suggest a lighter session or even delete the planned workout altogether.
Conclusion
The Hooper Index is not a complicated diagnostic tool, but a simple method that helps you listen to your body more effectively. It supports optimal alignment between training and recovery, helping you stay healthy and perform at your best in the long term.
Make your daily check-in a routine – your body will thank you!
Sources:
Rabbani, A., Clemente, F. M., Kargarfard, M., & Chamari, K. (2019). Match fatigue time-course assessment over four days: usefulness of the Hooper index and heart rate variability in professional soccer players. Frontiers in Physiology, 10, 109.