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How
long do I have to rest between workouts?
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Christopher Warden: General
guidelines** recommend that trained muscles get at least 48 hours rest
before exposure to another bout of exercise.
In other words, if you perform a killer
leg workout on Monday, the earliest you’d want to expose your legs to
the iron again would be Wednesday. Train your upper body on a Tuesday,
and Thursday would be the earliest you’d want to re-work those upper
body muscles.
Of course, this doesn’t mean that you
can’t train yourself more frequently than once every 48 hours . . . as
long as you’re using smart program design.
An advanced individual looking to build
muscle may strength train 4 days in a week – Monday, Tuesday, Thursday,
Friday, for example – doing a 2-day split routine in this format:
He gives himself 72 hours rest between
each leg and upper body routine, respectively, while still getting the
benefit of 4 days of training volume.
(**Side Note – Always consider your
lifestyle habits when trying to determine the recovery time you need.
48 hours may be plenty of rest for you if you lead a relatively
sedentary life. But if you’re a regular on, say, the football field or
hockey rink – or if you’ve got a labor intensive job – you may need more
than 48 hours between training sessions to achieve optimal recovery.)
Okay, I understand that I’ve got to
give my muscles at least 48 hours rest. Why?
Getting adequate rest is important for the
following reasons:
• It allows your muscles to fully
replenish their glycogen stores, thus enabling you to actually have some
energy for your training bout. (There’s an idea. . . )
• It allows your muscles the opportunity
to rebuild. The stress of lifting breaks down your muscle tissue. How
are you supposed to get “bigger and better” if you don’t give those
muscles the time to fully reassemble themselves?
(Remember: Training is simply the
stimulus for change. Change and enhanced performance is the result
of rest and recovery from that stimulus.)
• It reduces your chances of overtraining
and overuse injury
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The dark Side of Dieting
 Christopher
“Doctor” Warden, CSCS traded in his lab coat, latex gloves and
microscope in the late 90's as part of a transformation from
pencil-necked geek to, well, freakishly strong not-so-pencil necked
geek.
His ability to understand and teach the
technical aspects of fitness, coupled with his passion and intuitive
sense -- hey, are we sure this guy's not Spiderman? -- have made him one
of the most coveted trainers in NYC.
When he’s not busy studying, writing or
transforming client physiques, Christopher loves traveling, snowboarding
and chillin’ with his family and friends. You can learn more about him
and his training insights by visiting his
fitness and
self-empowerment blog.
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