Muscles

sandeegriffin

Is it safe to do weight machines 5 days a week? I've always heard you have to rest a day between so not to wear out your muscles.

SideSteel

Yes but very generally speaking, the more frequently you train a muscle the more careful you should be with regards to how much training you are doing on a day to day basis.

For example if I train my legs once per week I can do a lot of volume on that 1 day and I'll have 6 days to recover. If I train my legs every day (yes, some people do this) I would want to have a better idea how to manage recovery from session to session by understanding how to structure a program and how to manage fatigue.

canadianlbs

sandeegriffin wrote: »

Is it safe to do weight machines 5 days a week? I've always heard you have to rest a day between so not to wear out your muscles.

idk if muscles exactly 'wear out'. but they use something called glycogen which your liver can only generate more of at a certain speed. so you can spend your energy stores for doing the workouts, faster than your body can supply you with more energy to keep working out with.

if you're working hard enough to do 'damage' then that also benefits from building in time to repair. i think it depends on how hard you're pushing it. there's some stuff i can do every day because it's already within the range that my body is capable of. but 'progressive' challenge means you're always chasing your upper limits, so that's where rest does make good sense.

riffraff2112

I would't work the same muscle more than three times a week, and I don't think I have ever heard of a program that would recommend that. A full body workout, 3x a week is pretty common however, especially for beginners.

Some people work out with weights every day, but they ensure that they are putting the bulk of the stress on different muscles each workout and there are hundreds of such split programs available online.

SideSteel

riffraff2112 wrote: »

I would't work the same muscle more than three times a week, and I don't think I have ever heard of a program that would recommend that. A full body workout, 3x a week is pretty common however, especially for beginners.

Some people work out with weights every day, but they ensure that they are putting the bulk of the stress on different muscles each workout and there are hundreds of such split programs available online.

full body 3/week is a great way to do it and it's probably suitable for many people so in that regard I agree with you.

however, there are people (and reputable coaches) who train full body 5-7 days/week and carefully manage volume/intensity/exercise selection to manage day to day fatigue. It's incredibly effective but it also requires a good deal of care in setting up and monitoring and so it's usually not practical for most people and I'd never suggest it to a beginner.