This Thanksgiving has given me the rare opportunity to stay out of the gym for a few days. Now it might sound rare that in a fitness blog I’m talking about NOT going to the gym. Well that’s because it allows me to focus on one of the most important and often overlooked training aspects. Because of my gym being closed for a couple days due to the holiday, I can rest at home and not feel? guilty about not going(well almost no guilt). Sometimes the hardest part of getting into shape is just getting yourself to go to the gym at all, but surprisingly for others the hardest part is leaving or staying away from it. I fall into the second category,? because I love to be in the gym training and its hard for me to leave once I’m there. However whats even harder is not going to the gym at all,with my current schedule I’m in the gym six out the seven days of the week and can’t imagine doing anything different.
The training aspect? I’m talking about is over training your body when your at the gym. Most people that fall into this category believe in the concept more is better, but in this case too much of a good thing can definitely be bad. Over training can keep you from making great gains almost as easily as not working out can. Why? Well lets break t hings down a bit, when your in the gym your working hard and building muscles right? Wrong! When you are training your actually damaging and breaking down muscle. When the muscle is being overloaded with weights little micro tears begin to occur throughout your muscle. This damage is whats necessary to cause the muscle to have to adapt to the stress loads that are being placed on them. When your performing an exercise in the gym your goal is to push the targeted muscle harder than its ever been pushed before. By doing this you cause? damage to occur to that muscle that the body must repair and rebuild. Rather than just replace only the damage muscle with more muscle exactly the same as it was before, your body adapts. It does this by rebuilding and adding more muscle fibers and making them stronger to ensure that the same amount of stress will not produce the same results again.
If you continue to damage the muscles over and over without giving the body the proper time to repair them you risk training them when they are in a weakened state. This can lead to injury or greater muscle damage that’s just too much for your body to fully repair. That’s why when your body is in a state of repair you must rest and recover for long enough to give your body the ability to fix the damaged muscle. Now this does not mean you can’t go to the gym the next day after a workout, but rather you need to avoid placing stress on the same weakened muscles. So if you trained chest one day you would not want to train it again for forty-eight to seventy-two hours. Now every once in a while it is also beneficial to take a few back to back days off from the gym all together and really give your body complete rest. That’s what these last few days have been for me although forced, they have been much needed and my body will definitely appreciate them.
If you find your self feeling overly fatigued, sore, and possibly even losing the desire to go to the gym , a few days off could be exactly what your body needs. Listen to it and you will be surprised with the results and progress? that can come from taking it easy for a few days. Do whatever it takes to just relax and rest. If your like me and really addicted to the gym this maybe harder than it sounds. You may even have to result to drastic measures such as handcuffing your self to the bed or flattening your tires(although neither are highly recommended)to keep from going into the gym. So remember you don’t grow while your in the gym training, the real growth takes place at home when your nowhere near the gym or any weight equipment.
