What counts as a “rest day” (and how often do you need it)

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Rest days are an important part of any workout routine as they help you conserve energy for future workout days. But what exactly counts as rest is something you need to avoid all Exercise? I’ll break down the purpose of these days and answer your questions about what matters and what doesn’t.

What is the purpose of rest days?

People say a lot of things about rest days that aren’t actually true, so I want to take a minute to separate myths from facts.

Rest days Strictly speaking Proceed as follows:

• You balance your workload. Your body can handle three hard workouts per week if you give it four days of rest. Note that the number and type of rest days depends on this how hard the working days are. If you were to do six days of relatively light training sessions, one rest day per week would be sufficient.

• They help you incorporate exercise into your schedule. Most people can’t go to the gym every day just because they have other things going on in their lives. A three-day training program (with, yes, four days of rest) is much easier for most of us to stick to than a six-day one.

• They take the guesswork out of “easy” days. If your program requires you to alternate hard and easy days, you may find that you work too hard on the easy days. But if it’s a complete rest day, you just don’t show up to the gym and now you know for sure that you’re not doing too much.

Now let’s talk about some things that are often said to cause rest days, but are not true:

• They don’t prevent injuries. Balancing your overall workload can help prevent injuries, but as we’ve discussed, rest days are a tool that can help with this balance. There are ways to train safely without rest days.

• They are not necessary for building muscle. It is sometimes said that when you rest, your muscles “recover” or “grow.” However, keep in mind that a one-hour workout each day gives your muscles 23 hours to rest before the next one.

• They do not allow full recovery. It takes days to weeks for your body to fully recover from the results of your workout. We don’t wait for full recovery every time, otherwise we would never maintain a consistent schedule and never make progress in training. Your muscles (and other body systems) can work even when they are not fully recovered – within reason, of course.

When should I take rest days?

This depends on your training program. Any good training program, whether you get it from an experienced trainer or Download it from the Internetshould be designed with a good balance between work and rest.

As you design your own routine, here are some guidelines to help you know where to schedule rest days. These are not ironclad laws and many good programs will do things differently. But these are helpful rules of thumb to get you started:

• In a strength training programEach muscle group should get a day of rest after training for 1 to 2 days. This could be a full-body strength program where you train on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, or a split where you do upper-body workouts on Mondays and Thursdays, lower-body workouts on Tuesdays and Fridays, and rest breaks on Wednesdays and weekends.

• During a running or cardio programBeginners should take a rest day after 1 to 2 consecutive days of training. This allows for a Monday/Wednesday/Friday schedule, which is very popular with beginners.

• For people with more experiencea relaxing day can replace a rest day. For example, a runner might run five days a week, but only two of those are hard workouts and the other two are light jogging.

• It’s okay to do two workouts on consecutive daysas long as your overall work/rest ratio remains the same. For example, if you can’t complete your Wednesday workout and have to run on Monday, Thursday and Friday, that’s okay because you still have four rest days that week.

Especially if you write or modify a program for yourself, Listen to your body. It’s unwise to commit to a five-day-a-week plan if you don’t normally exercise at all. It’s much better to start with three days, see how that goes, and then think about adding more workouts and adjusting their intensity.

What should happen on a rest day?

Considering the purpose of rest days, you want to ensure that your rest day accomplishes what it is intended to accomplish.

In a strength training program, your rest days should give you a break from serious strength training. This doesn’t mean you have to sit on the couch all day, but it does mean you probably shouldn’t do squats again if you just did squats yesterday.

On a rest day, you can maintain your baseline activity level. If you normally do 8,000 steps, you can still do 8,000 steps. If you normally walk your dog, you can still walk him. If you have a job that requires you to be on your feet all day or move equipment, you can still go to work and do your job. You don’t have to literally rest, just keep your activity at your baseline level.

Can I do strength training when I’m recovering from cardio and vice versa?

Once you get used to it, yes. Strength training and cardio training are so different that they don’t put the same stress on your body. In fact, strength athletes who do cardio training may find that the cardio training helps their muscles recover. And runners who add some strength training may find that the benefits outweigh the lost rest time.

However, beginners should handle it carefully. If you do it Couch up to 5K And since you’ve just finished living a couch potato life, you should give yourself a few weeks to get used to the new schedule before adding beginner strength training.

However, remember to listen to your body. If you’re a relatively active person and have just started strength training, you might not get tired at all if you jog a little more. Just pay attention to how it goes and make adjustments as needed.

Consider keeping “hard days hard and easy days easy.”

Here’s another not unbreakable rule: some trainers advise that it is better to combine two training sessions on a “hard” day in order to have some rest time on another day. That might mean doing a run and some strength training on Tuesday so you can take a real rest day on Wednesday. If you’ve increased your training volume and are craving a rest day, try this approach and see if it feels better for you.

Can I run on my rest days?

Yes, because walking is an exercise that is easy enough and is unlikely to tire you too much, so you won’t tire yourself too much with the next workout. If you don’t normally walk much, start with a short walk and see how that goes. If you normally walk a lot, you can walk as much as you want on your rest days.

Can I do yoga on my rest days?

Yes, if you keep it relatively easy compared to your harder training days. A rest day is a good time for gentle flexibility training, light strength training, and just to keep your body moving a bit. If you feel like your yoga session does just that, that’s perfect.

I would only recommend it not Do yoga on a rest day if your idea of yoga is a really challenging power yoga class or if it involves an extreme level of stretching. In this case, you should classify it as a hard workout and ensure you get some rest out of even those hard training sessions.

Can I “actively recover” on my rest days?

Depends on what that means to you, but probably! Mobility exercises, foam rolling, light yoga, walking, and light swimming can all fall under the umbrella of “active recovery.” Remember that active recovery doesn’t depend on what you do, but on how taxing it is on your body. If you are a swimmer and find it relaxing to do a few easy laps, then this can definitely be a recreational activity. But if you’re new to swimming and struggling in the water gasping for air, this is it not a recreational activity. Use a little common sense and you will be able to figure it out.