Should you exercise when your body is sore?

chiltanflats

Hello! I am on week 2 of INSANITY workout by Shaun T. I have been a regular at workouts doing 30 day shred then Ripped in 30 by Jillian Micheals. I started Insanity in December. But couldnt make the tempo work. I would skip workouts and never made a full week.

I started the program the third time and this time no skips in between. But I am on week 2 day 3 and my serratus anterior (the side muscles of the chest coveringth ribs) are sore. It’s the second day of soreness.

Should I exercise or skip workout because of the soreness. When do you know not to push your body? I don’t mind the soreness but I don’t want an injury!

Thank you for your input!

KrystinaMTL

In my experience, soreness is normal and temporary when switching up routines. I workout through it.
I'm no expert, I only have my personal experience

jjpptt2

If it's just standard soreness from a workout, then I look at it this way -

If it's bad enough that it will prevent me finishing a workout at the intensity I want to be working, then I'll hold off. Otherwise, I'll work through it, but I'll typically do a longer, more intentional warmup to make sure things are loose and feeling OK.

natruallycurious

Personally, I workout through it when it feels like soreness from a workout. If it feels funky or like a possible (potential) injury, I hold off. For me, I can kind of distinguish between the two after a warm up. Muscle soreness from workouts generally goes away or drastically decreases after a warm up and during my workout. If it is still causing quite a bit of pain, I will hold off on the workout.

LACLA221

Listen to your body. If you feel super sore and need to take it easy, maybe you could take a day off high intensity and run/other low impact cardio. I love yoga but even a deep stretching session could help. If you want to keep with the Insanity while sore, maybe go a little less hard, especially on exercise that really focus on the sore spots.

stanmann571

If it's DOMS, muscle burning/tenderness eases off with moderate activity, power through. If it's joint or tendon or sharp or gets worse with movement/load/stress then back off.

jeremywm1977

If it's muscular soreness, I power through. If it's joint pain/soreness, I tend to be a bit more cautious.
I've had 4 surgeries on my left knee, so if I have a day when I'm experiencing pain or soreness in my left knee, I will either do upper body/core, or I'll modify my lower body workouts.

apullum

Depends on the soreness. Is it DOMS, or is it injury-related? You can work through DOMS. You shouldn't work through a possible injury unless you have very good reason to think it's safe (i.e., you've consulted a doctor).

fitoverfortymom

I find with general soreness (on my own personal judgement scale), I'll work through it. Usually being active helps with the soreness.

If the soreness is injury, or more acute pain in a specific area, I'll rest.

Jthanmyfitnesspal

There's a reason it's call "Insanity." Why not take some break days for a couple of weeks as you get into it. Then your body will adapt. (It could work better keeping going.) You can still exercise on break days, just do somethig different, like jog or walk.

passenger79

I 've never managed to finish Insanity as I always seem to aggravate my sciatica,that's probably more to do with my form then workout itself but I kept pushing through it and then ended up on painkillers for a month because I could barely walk .Not fun.

Insanity is great workout but listen to your body ,if something doesn't feel right take a break. It's better slowing down then having to completely stop it .
And if it doesn't work for you there are loads of You tube workouts that are still effective but not as strenuous.

Roadie2000

I vaguely remember having to modify the schedule a little based on my level of soreness and personal schedule. Like sometimes instead of taking my rest day on Sunday I'd take it if I was too busy or too sore. Cardio Recovery is a good one to do if you are sore, it's actually designed to help you recover. The name is a little misleading though since there is really not much cardio involved, it's mostly stretching.