Impact non-lifting day exercise

pandorakick

About 4 weeks ago I started with the C25K running program on my non-lifting days. Before that I did stuff like hiit routines, Wii zumba and elliptical workouts. I must day that now I'm in week 4 of C25K where you get more serious with the running, I'm starting to notice the impact on my lifting. Especially squats.
Now are squats already my weakest lift and the one I like least. Guess it's good it is the first exercise on lifting days, just to get that one out of the way!

Anyway, next week (week 5) is my test day coming up again and I'm rescheduling my workout schedule. In the current setup I have my rest day on Thursday, then a free choice day (which is currently running) followed by my 100% day. I will be changing it to free choice on Thursday, rest on Friday and fresh and rested on Saturday for lifting 100%.

I was wondering: what do you do on your non-lifting days? Have you noticed any impact positive or negative on lifting the following day? Would love to hear about it! :happy:

cmeiron

I definitely plan my cardio to accommodate my lifting! A few weeks ago I moved my schedule around so that my one rest day fell before my 100% load day, and I generally try to do a lower-impact cardio workout the day before that - so, very much like you're proposing to do! I also used to do pushups on cardio days but my arms were too fatigued for lifts the next day so now I do pushups at the end of my lifting sessions on days 2 and 3 only. My cardio alternates between Turbo Fire videos (HIIT or occasionally sustained cardio depending on how my legs feel), Insanity videos, and running. A typical week for me would be:

Friday: 100% load
Saturday: 15-20 minute HIIT or 30-45 minute sustained cardio (with video) + core
Sun: 90% load
Mon: 50 minute Insanity circuit, 30 minute HIIT (video), 5k sprint intervals - my "hardest" cardio day - + core
Tues: 80% load
Wed: run (either a fast 5k or long slow 7-10k)
Thursday: REST

That's it generally - but I definitely play things by ear and focus on not wearing out my muscles too much to lift properly. I'm particularly keen on resting more leading up to my "test" day on the final week of the cycle!

pandorakick

Glad I'm not the only one