As everyone knows, exercise is an important part of a healthy lifestyle. The Center for Disease Control recommends 150 minutes of moderate intensity exercise per week for the average adult.
Most adults and even kids are not getting enough exercise, but yes there is such thing as working out too much!
Some of the signs that you are working out too much include:
- Recurrent injuries: This is usually occurs because you are not letting your body rest sufficiently to heal itself. *
- How do you avoid this? Don’t do 2 high intensity workouts of the same muscle groups in a row. Do strengthening one day, then cardio the next, alternating throughout the week.
- Excessive hunger or thirst: it is normal for your appetite to increase when you are working out more regularly but if you can’t satiate that hunger or thirst, your workouts have become too much.
- If women stop having menstrual cycles (amenorrhea): this usually means you don’t have enough body fat, or your body is expending too much energy. This is common with Olympic level athletes but not for the everyday woman.
- Not making any gains in strength or muscle mass: You are not allowing your body to recover following a workout… SO you are not able to workout at your max capacity leading to the strength gains.
- Lower mental acuity: you are so tired; your brain is just not working at the level it needs to.
- You are not sleeping well: exercise amps you up, if you are performing too much your body can’t rest and if you can’t rest or sleep, it leads to problems already listed and more.
If any of these things are occurring for you, give yourself an extra day of rest or two; or give yourself a rest day period!
I myself workout 5-6 days a week for 30-40 minutes a day. I usually can tell if I need an extra day off if I am overly tired. It is alright to give yourself that day off or do a lower intensity activity like going for a walk instead of a run or performing less repetitions of a strengthening exercise.
If you are following the CDC guidelines working out should be 30 minutes of exercise 5 days a week. Unless you are a higher-level athlete, stick to this guide and take care of yourself.
https://www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/basics/adults/index.htm
*DOMS or delayed onset muscle soreness.
This is the soreness that occurs 12-24 hours after a workout. DOMS is caused by microscopic tears in the muscles. If you don’t let your body recover enough these microscopic tears can lead to further injuries. This is another reason to not perform exercise utilizing the same muscle groups 2 days in a row.
Weekly Workout Routine
For an example on how to mix up your workouts, here is what I do each week:
- Monday: Lower body
- Tuesday: upper body and core
- Wednesday: cardio
- Thursday: Lower body
- Friday: Upper body and core
- Saturday: Cardio
- Sunday: rest