48 hours to recover?

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erjones11
erjones11 Posts: 422 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hi-

Do you really need 48 hours between workouts? I have read and read and it just seems arbitrary. One site says it takes 14 days for you muscles to recover but it is ok to resume exercise after 48 hours.

What's wrong with 36, 24 or 12 hours? How about 72? What so magical about 48?

For awhile now my break has been from alternating between mornings and nights on my exercise and one day off a week or so.

For example on the weekends I work out in the mornings and during the week at night. I usually work in one day off a week, Fridays but not always. I also workout Sunday morning and my next workout is about 36 hours later Monday night.

All the reading I have done says I am not taking enough breaks but I have been doing this regiment for three months and feel great? I have slowly increased both weight and resistance.

I do light weight lifting, crunches, bridges and squats followed by about 50 minutes of cardio either the bike or the elliptical, then I repeat the lifting crunches etc...

How much time do we really need to recover before we hit it again?



Replies

  • pinggolfer96
    pinggolfer96 Posts: 2,248 Member
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    Depending on the program, yes. You said you were doing light weightlifting which shouldn’t stress the muscle much. If you’re on a program doing compound movements heavy and hitting individual muscle groups, then yes, 48 hours may be needed in order to recover and have an optimal training session the days following. I wouldn’t do 400lb deadlifts multiple days in a row cause I wouldn’t have the same quality workout due to lack of recovery. Listen to your body though, you’ll know when you need to rest.
  • erjones11
    erjones11 Posts: 422 Member
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    pinggolfer96 wrote: »
    I wouldn’t do 400lb deadlifts multiple days in a row cause I wouldn’t have the same quality workout due to lack of recovery.

    That much weight would break me!

  • pinggolfer96
    pinggolfer96 Posts: 2,248 Member
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    I was just giving you an example. When you lift weights and stress the muscle fibers, you create tears and trauma, you need to allow that to recover
  • Davidsdottir
    Davidsdottir Posts: 1,285 Member
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    pinggolfer96 wrote: »
    Depending on the program, yes. You said you were doing light weightlifting which shouldn’t stress the muscle much. If you’re on a program doing compound movements heavy and hitting individual muscle groups, then yes, 48 hours may be needed in order to recover and have an optimal training session the days following. I wouldn’t do 400lb deadlifts multiple days in a row cause I wouldn’t have the same quality workout due to lack of recovery. Listen to your body though, you’ll know when you need to rest.

    It's technically two sleep cycles rather than 48 hours (you could lift at night on Monday and again Wednesday morning), but otherwise I agree with this.

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