Give your body a break to lose weight

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  • Ezwoldo
    Ezwoldo Posts: 369 Member
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    Your body need rest every 8 to 12 weeks as your body will then just go in to fatigue and you then start to resent training and give up because you are tired. Having a good plan that you can stick to and schedule in periods of rest in to this is key to your being able to hit goals no matter what you are doing. I try to work on 8 to 10 week plans and have it all on a calendar as to when I will have a rest week, this works for me just fine for 2 reasons

    1) I can change things up a bit ad I give everything a go and can see what works and what don't

    2) You give your body the rest it needs to recover from the training as sometimes it can be pretty tough.



    Hope this helps
  • stenochick0417
    stenochick0417 Posts: 124 Member
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    I had wondered about a "rest week." And I like the planning it out on a calendar idea. . . this is a great post. :smile:
  • TinaDay1114
    TinaDay1114 Posts: 1,328 Member
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    Your body need rest every 8 to 12 weeks as your body will then just go in to fatigue and you then start to resent training and give up because you are tired. ...I try to work on 8 to 10 week plans and have it all on a calendar as to when I will have a rest week...

    I've been on that "up 3 lbs., down 2, up 4, down 1" roller coaster for a while now, and I really do think the rest advice is spot on, especially when you're adding heavier weights, or more intensity.

    Over the past few months I stopped training for a 1/2 marathon (due to injury) and took up an intense circuit training class. Now I'm back to adding in running WITH the circuit training stuff, and a spin class too -- and even though I only do 4-5 days a week every week, I feel like my body is hanging on to every calorie it can get to fuel me through all this intensity.

    I have a question for Ezwoldo and the Original Poster -- do you guys stop ALL workouts for your whole rest week (all 7 days)? Or just slow everything down and do just a little bit of something that week? And do you have any other advice for someone like me?
  • kent4j
    kent4j Posts: 391 Member
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    Good Post
  • RAFValentina
    RAFValentina Posts: 1,231 Member
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    Your body need rest every 8 to 12 weeks as your body will then just go in to fatigue and you then start to resent training and give up because you are tired. ...I try to work on 8 to 10 week plans and have it all on a calendar as to when I will have a rest week...

    I've been on that "up 3 lbs., down 2, up 4, down 1" roller coaster for a while now, and I really do think the rest advice is spot on, especially when you're adding heavier weights, or more intensity.

    Over the past few months I stopped training for a 1/2 marathon (due to injury) and took up an intense circuit training class. Now I'm back to adding in running WITH the circuit training stuff, and a spin class too -- and even though I only do 4-5 days a week every week, I feel like my body is hanging on to every calorie it can get to fuel me through all this intensity.

    I have a question for Ezwoldo and the Original Poster -- do you guys stop ALL workouts for your whole rest week (all 7 days)? Or just slow everything down and do just a little bit of something that week? And do you have any other advice for someone like me?

    For me when I lost my weight... I was doing a week of DIY so technically no... but it wasn't the same crazy cardio I had been doing and beastings in the gym but wasn't "sedentary" :)
  • alaliberte
    alaliberte Posts: 205
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    crux....gooooood post. You are correct! Now, just to get off my bike and onto the couch!
  • Beatrix0810
    Beatrix0810 Posts: 138
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    Question: Can a break be something like doing yoga all week, rather than nothing? Because I have yet to lose any weight I feel weird about taking a week completely off....

    Also, great thread! So glad we're friends! :-)
  • Sambo004
    Sambo004 Posts: 549 Member
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    Very interesting. A bit scary to consider ;) But interesting.
  • crux
    crux Posts: 454 Member
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    I have a question for Ezwoldo and the Original Poster -- do you guys stop ALL workouts for your whole rest week (all 7 days)? Or just slow everything down and do just a little bit of something that week? And do you have any other advice for someone like me?

    I take 3-4 consecutive days off structured exercise, I may hike, or golf etc, but nothing much like a workout. Then I just do dead easy recovery workouts the rest of the week to keep things ticking over.

    That's a rest week, I also take pull back weeks every 3rd or 4th weeks, when I just trim the volume of the workouts a little each time. That helps to avoid overuse injury's.
  • crux
    crux Posts: 454 Member
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    Question: Can a break be something like doing yoga all week, rather than nothing? Because I have yet to lose any weight I feel weird about taking a week completely off....

    Also, great thread! So glad we're friends! :-)

    If you have been exercising non stop for a couple of months, I would say 4 days off would be an idea. Then do some yoga. But hey.. I'm just saying whats seams to work for me...
  • moylie
    moylie Posts: 195
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    I also had a very similar experience. Had trained quite hard (6 days/wk either bootcamp or running) for my first Half Marathon. After the race I decided to take an entire week off, which turned into almost two weeks, since I got sick, too. Dropped nearly 5 pounds in that time, which NEVER happens for me. Now, I'm still not back to "full" workout mode, and I'm still dropping weight A LOT easier than before, and I'm even closer to my goal. I'm going to aim for 3-4 days a week of working out, and see where this takes me. I don't necessarily "enjoy" working out, so if I can do less and still lose fat but not muscle, I'm a happy camper.
  • FlexAppeal79
    FlexAppeal79 Posts: 146 Member
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    Bump....Interesting :ohwell:
  • violon
    violon Posts: 74 Member
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    bump
  • rydn4h2o
    rydn4h2o Posts: 255
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    interesting!
  • ItsLessOfMe
    ItsLessOfMe Posts: 374 Member
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    I loose weight when I lay off the exercise. But I'm just afraid I'm loosing muscle and not fat. So what good does that do me?
  • moylie
    moylie Posts: 195
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    I loose weight when I lay off the exercise. But I'm just afraid I'm loosing muscle and not fat. So what good does that do me?

    I worry about the same thing, but I look at it this way: as long as I'm still fueling my body properly, and believe that "muscle memory" is a factor, your body will remember where it was/needs to be and it won't lose all your hard work. I've been reading more about taking rest periods, and am quite happy to give that a whirl :smile:
  • crux
    crux Posts: 454 Member
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    I think it's a question of the amount of time away from exercise, I never felt like I lost muscle during a weeks break, more than that then sure you can start to lose fitness gains.
  • RBXChas
    RBXChas Posts: 2,708 Member
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    You may be on to something. My sister and I run 6 days/week. We did C25K and were doing 30-minute runs, then on Sunday we decided to start Bridge to 10K. So Sunday and Monday we did 4, 10-minute runs with 1-minute walking breaks, then yesterday to break the monotony we did 2, 18-minute runs with a 4-minute walking break (since a 1-minute break is painfully short).

    I have had zero movement on the scale in a week, which, coincidentally, is the last time we took a day off. I know my eating is spot-on, and I'm surprised to not have had at least a slight dip, not even .2 pounds or .4 pounds. I'm not discouraged, just surprised.

    Today we are taking a day off because our legs are just TIRED. I am hoping tomorrow will show some progress on the scale. I will definitely report back tomorrow!

    Don't get discouraged if you don't see it in 1 day off, it takes me 3-4 days off to crystallize a loss.

    I said I would check back in, so here I am. My sister and I were going to take a day off yesterday but because her husband won't be able to stay home with her kids tonight, we decided to take tonight off instead and just do a "light" workout yesterday. Since we are doing Bridge to 10K, a "light" workout was a late C25K run (25 minutes). Today I was down .8 after a week of no change on the scale. Based on the scale's "settling," i.e., it looked like it wanted to show some lower numbers before settling where it did, I have a feeling that tomorrow it will be lower. However I don't think a lighter workout had anything to do with it; I think it was just time for the scale to show progress. As you said, one day isn't going to do it, especially if I still had a decent workout. Like I said, I am guessing tomorrow I will also show a loss, but today's break is just one day.

    My sister put it well - and she said this like it was a bad thing (I reminded her that it was not) - that we are addicted to running. Not to say it isn't hard and that when I'm in the middle of a long run I don't want to walk or stop, but when I don't run or do something equally/more difficult, I feel lazy! I guess since we've been running now for almost three months, it's become a habit :happy:

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