Working the same muscles daily

KintsugiCurlyQueen

....Are there any exceptions to the 'allow muscles to recover' rule?

For example, squatting daily with weights. Would it do more harm than good?

Might help if I was a bit more specific. My gym routine (Mon, Weds, Fri) currently consists of a weight training circuit that focuses on a variety of muscles. I do cardio on non-gym days but want to replace it with the 30 Day Shred and just run a couple times a week. I know, however, that a lot of the exercises used in 30DS are similar to those in my current gym programme and I'm worried about doing damage as opposed to making the muscles stronger. Any ideas, or would it be okay?

matt2442

lify heavy 3 days a week. Give yourself a day in between.

tacguy

lify heavy 3 days a week. Give yourself a day in between.

Yeah, you need the rest. Your muscles will grow during the recovery time and you risk plateauing and injury by overtraining.

KintsugiCurlyQueen

Thanks, guys. Guess I'll stick to weights on gym days and running when I'm not (:

phjorg1

Depends. Are you training, or are you exercising?

If you're training, then you're training your body to adapt to stimulus, Where you constantly try and push yourself further and harder every time you work out. If lifting heavy, this usually means trying to lift heavier every time.

When you're doing this, you're stressing the muscles, past the point of failure. this stress takes time and food to recover from. So in this regard, yes you do need rest.

If you're just exercising however, where you're not trying to improve upon old workouts, then you can do it daily and it's fine. Think of heavy labourers. If over training was that big a deal, they should be burned into the ground. But because it's just same old routine, it's no big deal once they are used to it.

there are some exceptions. Like if you do heavy squats one day, then go jogging the next. Different muscle types and energy systems for both those activities so they shouldn't conflict. (unless you're an elite athlete who needs very specifically one of the other to perform with, but then this applies to almost noone here) However things like heavy squats one day, then sprinting the next should not be done. as sprinting and heavy lifting use the same muscles and energy systems. You get the idea.

edit: normally circuits are fine to do daily, as again, as it's usually an exercising thing and not training thing. Doing 15-20 reps of anything usually isn't enough to really push the muscles. Exhaust them sure, but it's not enough weight to actually train them or stress them.