Sports on off days

dozenmonkeyz

Starting a new phase of fitness improvements and looking for some advice; here's my situation:

After about 10yrs of ignoring my health and fitness, I've spent the last couple years slowly working my way back to a reasonable level of fitness. Using diet improvement and various mixes of cardio and light strength training I dropped from 245lbs to 212lbs, started playing soccer and basketball 2-3 days a week again and over the last year really focused on strength using my own routine. For my modest goals (I'm not a PR or competitive lifting sort), this has worked fairly well. But, with limited equipment availability and time, I need to be more efficient with my efforts to keep improving. And, after spending the holidays eating about anything that was in front of me, my focus is now on losing excess fat and maintaining or even progressing strength (don't care about muscle mass as a priority).

So, I'm starting SL 5x5 this week with one modification; I know this goes against all recommendations but I don't have access to a squat rack or bench stand so my only option is the smith machine or dumbbells for now. I'm willing to deal with the inefficiencies for a little bit.

The part I'm not comfortable with and haven't found much info on is participating in sports on my off days. Lifting is M/W/F; basketball is T/Th; soccer is on Sat. Both are recreational level but played at a fairly high level (effort, not really quality LOL). Is this too much activity to provide proper rest between lifting sessions? Is there a better strength program I should consider? Anybody else intersperse sports with lifting and have other issues that I should be aware of?

Sorry for a long post but hopefully this can be a beneficial discussion and thanks for anyone that can offer input.

dozenmonkeyz

Not seeing any response so is there a better spot to have posted this?

musclegood_fatbad

Kind of is up to your body. For me personally, I always play sports on my off days. To me it is a good way to run and work out some of the soreness. If anything, the lifting may hurt your sports performance on days that you are very sore. My only suggestion is to make sure you eat right and fuel your body accordingly and I think it will react fine.

dozenmonkeyz

musclegood_fatbad wrote: »

Kind of is up to your body. For me personally, I always play sports on my off days. To me it is a good way to run and work out some of the soreness. If anything, the lifting may hurt your sports performance on days that you are very sore. My only suggestion is to make sure you eat right and fuel your body accordingly and I think it will react fine.

Thanks for the feedback. Sports is simply a fun way to be active so not being at the top of my 'game' won't bother me. Just don't want to blatantly put my self at injury risk.

musclegood_fatbad

dozenmonkeyz wrote: »

musclegood_fatbad wrote: »

Kind of is up to your body. For me personally, I always play sports on my off days. To me it is a good way to run and work out some of the soreness. If anything, the lifting may hurt your sports performance on days that you are very sore. My only suggestion is to make sure you eat right and fuel your body accordingly and I think it will react fine.

Thanks for the feedback. Sports is simply a fun way to be active so not being at the top of my 'game' won't bother me. Just don't want to blatantly put my self at injury risk.

I've been doing it for years and don't think you are much more at risk especially if you warm up properly.

version50

I've always felt that the purpose of lifting was to improve my sports performance and keep generally fit. I play the sport first, whether basketball, cycling, paddling, or mountain biking. If there's an opening and my body feels up to it, then I lift. So what's worked for me is sort of the opposite of what you're doing. Play sports when I can, then lift on my "off" days.

BrianKMcFalls

Obviously it's going to effect recovery. It's not going to hurt you, you just might have to adjust your expectations as far as gains go.

dfc4

There is nothing wrong with doing sports on your off days i train hard 4 times a week but do sports every day), it will actually be good for recovery if you do it right.
A few rules to follow.

Take it easy. Aktive regeneration is the key.
Dont lift on your off days.
Concentrate on koordination
Warm up good and use your off day sport to have a good stretch too.
If you feel too tired then use the off day to have a good warm up & stretch

psuLemon

My bigger concern is the recovery, as others mentioned, involved when comes to lifting heavy. Even if you are ok with it harming your sports day, you may also have to be ok with hindering your strength gains when it comes to lower body moves.

dozenmonkeyz

All good info, guys. Much appreciated. No hurry for me, I'm in it for the long haul. Consistency and avoiding injury are top priority.

Coming from doing my own thing to trying to find a fixed routine has been tough since most programs are full of specifics from a gains perspective. Hard to find solid info for people that have various goals. Places like this are a huge help in giving advice about the the gray areas.

AmandaHugginkiss

Anything that isn't strength training, or a tough cardio session, can be considered "active rest." Back when I was at my fittest, I did some form of fitness-related activity every day of the week. Now that I'm getting fit again after a break, I am back to some form of fitness-related activity every day of the week.

As for diminished gains, I didn't seem to have any trouble keeping my lifting stats up or stable even while running 10K five days a week (had to, didn't have a car and my kid's school was a little over 3 miles away; I'd run, she'd scooter). My lifting stats plummet when I over rest, but my goals aren't to constantly progressively overload. I have no aspirations to power lift competitively or anything like that.