So you have been working out 4, 5, 6 days in a row! You are on a roll. Now there is a “rest day” scheduled. What do you do? Can you skip the “rest day”? Should you skip the “rest day”?
Well, whether you are training with resistance or cardio, you are working your muscles. And if you are working your muscles every day without resting, you won’t grow, you won’t get strong and you may even get injured.
Resistance creates microtrauma in the muscles and these small tears get rebuilt with new muscle (which is the cause of growth and increase in strength). If you work these muscles constantly, the microtrauma cannot be repaired.
That is why in Beachbody programs you usually have a resistance day and then a cardio day. On cardio days, you are still working your muscles, however in a different manner. You still get that rebuilding of the muscles, however you still are working other parts of your body while getting blood to those areas that need it.
Your body only grows strong at rest. This is not a myth! That is also why a good night’s sleep of 6-8 hours is important!
In order to change your body composition you need to push your body hard, and how hard you push it determines how much rest you need. If you are training hard enough, you need rest days or you will overtrain and see your results go backwards. That is how Beachbody programs are designed and why the rest days are scheduled.
But the reality is that you don’t always train as hard as you can or should be training for a myriad of reasons. Perhaps you just weren’t into the workout or you ran out of time. Maybe you already missed a workout. Well, when this is the case, you can skip those rest days and make them a workout day! Over time you’ll learn to identify when you need to rest.