Should You Workout If You're Already Sore?

A question for the ages: “Should I still workout tomorrow? I’m still sore from my last workout.“.

It’s a question I get a lot, so I thought I would quickly cover this topic. Here’s a couple of protocols to follow when determining whether or not you should workout when you’re sore.

How Intense is the Soreness?

Below 6/10 – Go ahead

Above 6/10 – Try to reduce soreness via foam rolling, low intensity cardio, lighter exercise

Way above 6/10 – Try to reduce soreness and then take a day off, seriously. You probably went too H.A.M. last time and your body needs to recover.

This is also dependent on what level of lifting time you have under your belt (see what I did there?). For beginners, your bodies may take a little longer to recover than an experienced lifter who’s conditioned their bodies for a higher work capacity without getting insanely sore.

Are You Able to Reduce The Amount of Soreness Before Your Workout?

Yes – foam rolling can often help reduce muscle soreness, provided you don’t use something so rigid, it makes the soreness worse. Perhaps, grab one of the softer rollers and treat it like you’re going in for a gentle massage. Increasing the amount of blood flow can often help reduce soreness, try some dynamic stretches or light cardio – low impact and low intensity.

Can You Work on Something That Isn’t Sore?

If during your last workout, you worked on lower body and are still sore, work on upper body. If you are training full body most days, pick different exercises than you did during the last workout. Training the same muscle groups in a different way is also an option if you are wiling to push through a small amount of soreness.

Day 1 – Back Squats, Barbell Chest Press, Neutral Grip Chin Ups

Day 2 – Back Extensions, One Arm DB Row, DB Side Raises

Day 3 – Box Steps Ups, Bodyweight Glute Bridges, DB Incline Chest Press

Day 4 – Sled Push/Pull, DB Overhead Press, Battle Rope Slams

Day 5 – Barbell/Single Leg Deadlift, Cable Chest Fly, Band-Assisted Underhand Grip Chin Ups

Varying intensities will obviously be necessary if you don’t feel like crawling back to work each day. I’ll leave those choices to your discretion, but just try to keep it within reason.

Is It Necessary to Take Days Off To See Progress?

Absolutely. The body does a lot of it repairing/recovery during your sleep (which hopefully you’re getting at least 7 hours of). Recovery doesn’t stop there though, after creating micro-tearing in your muscles through exercise, the body is still repairing itself throughout the rest of your day.

Training isn’t really about how far you kick your own ass each time you’re in the gym. Training (or general exercise) is about adaptation. If there is no adaptation in your routine, it’s highly unlikely that you will see much progress in the gym.

Give your body the opportunity to become accustomed to a certain amount of stress, whether it be a new weight, amount of volume used, or exercise you’ve just tried and see how you feel the next day. Automatically jumping right back in an intense workout the day after an equally intense workout doesn’t make much sense as a beginner or an advanced trainee unless you’re training program specifically calls for it.

If I Really Want to Work Out Anyways, What Can I do?

Well, if that’s really what you want to do, go take a class. Yoga might be preferable (I know, right?) or some sort of light activity involving a more cardio based exercise routine.

E.g. Going for a bike ride, going swimming, taking your kids to the park and try to catch them after they run off chasing stray dogs. That’s a lot of exercise right there.

This should give you a rough idea of some of the ways to tell if you should or shouldn’t workout when you’re sore. If this information is not sufficient, let me know and I’ll expand it.

#sore #workout