Do I need a "rest"?

lauragreenbaum wrote: »

I do Pilates every day, and a friend told me I need a "rest" day in between, so should only be doing every other day. Pilates works the entire body and I always feel great afterward and not fatigued. There are some days I push myself a lot harder and will be sore the next day but I still do it daily.

Should I listen to my friend or just keep doing what I'm doing?

I've never done pilates, so I can't speak specifically to that...but generally speaking recovery is where fitness gains are made. A lack of recovery can ultimately interfere with fitness improvements as well as lead to an increased risk of injury.

Not that "rest/recover" means just sitting on the couch. My recovery days are still active, but rest from more strenuous work. I would still go for walks...do yoga, etc. on recovery days. I'm pretty well active 7 days per week, but not everything is a "workout".

Also, recovery issues tend to be things that creep up over time...they aren't typically an immediate thing. It is pretty common for people who are new to fitness to think they feel fine...until they don't. I also don't think it's necessarily a matter of doing what you're doing every other day, but working in one or two recovery days into your fitness regimen. Recovery is as important to fitness as the actual work.

IME, Pilates can vary a lot in intensity, and in the specific exercises being done.

How long have you had the "Pilates every day" routine? Do you do the exact same exercises every day, or do they vary?

If you've been doing it for quite a while, and have felt good throughout, you're probably fine. If you've been doing other forms of moderately challenging exercise very regularly before the Pilates for quite some time, and felt good then and now, you're probably fine. Besides the conditioning - which is what I'm implying in the beginning of this paragraph - if you've been regularly active for a long time (many months to years), it's more likely that you can trust your own intuition about when you're overdoing.

If you're in the brand new honeymoon phase of working out (first few weeks), I'd say you're in "hmmm" territory. If the exercises are quite varied from one day to the next (in body parts hit, or intensity), still could be OK. If the same stuff every day, maybe more iffy. If limited history of exercise activity, then intuition may be limited, when it comes to recognizing the early signs of overdoing.

So, hard to answer, but that's some stuff to maybe think about.

lauragreenbaum wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

IME, Pilates can vary a lot in intensity, and in the specific exercises being done.

How long have you had the "Pilates every day" routine? Do you do the exact same exercises every day, or do they vary?

If you've been doing it for quite a while, and have felt good throughout, you're probably fine. If you've been doing other forms of moderately challenging exercise very regularly before the Pilates for quite some time, and felt good then and now, you're probably fine. Besides the conditioning - which is what I'm implying in the beginning of this paragraph - if you've been regularly active for a long time (many months to years), it's more likely that you can trust your own intuition about when you're overdoing.

If you're in the brand new honeymoon phase of working out (first few weeks), I'd say you're in "hmmm" territory. If the exercises are quite varied from one day to the next (in body parts hit, or intensity), still could be OK. If the same stuff every day, maybe more iffy. If limited history of exercise activity, then intuition may be limited, when it comes to recognizing the early signs of overdoing.

So, hard to answer, but that's some stuff to maybe think about.

Thanks, such a great response. I've been doing Pilates for 1 1/2 years. Got slowed down a bit during Covid, but bought a reformer and kept working out. I think I like it too much to take a break, and yes, I can trust when I'm overdoing it.

In that case, don't let some random friend rattle your confidence (unless they have some super-good, super-relevant professional expertise). People have opinions. They're not always good ones. 😉