There Is Such Thing As Overtraining

By Phil Sims

Many people want to get into shape. The sad fact is that you can over train. It can cause your muscles to not grow as much as they can. This is usually caused from people getting bad advice or no advice at all about the precautions you should take when training. It is also caused by anxiety and the impatience to see results very quickly. All of this put together can cause a total body over load or over training.

Many men think of building muscle, or just getting “beefy” as their main goal. The main goal should be to be healthy. You try to squish a whole bunch of training into a small period of time which does not allow the body to rest properly. The saying “you like someone so much that you make a fool of yourself” can apply to your body as well. If you are looking to get that perfect body right away you may do stupid things to achieve that, the same way you would if you, for example, really liked someone of the opposite sex. Only because you thought it would be the best way.

People can become so anxious when you have your mind set on looking a certain way that you feel if you miss one day it will severely diminish your work. You feel that you can not afford to miss a single day in order to keep your good status. But be warned, overtraining can cause various health issues and can actually cause you to lose muscle.

A lot of these so called over trainers do not even feel their body screaming for rest in the way of sore and stiff muscles. You should know that giving yourself a break will better help you in the long run. A proper regime is better at getting you to grow faster and get bigger. Sounds like that statement is backwards, but the truth is that the body needs rest no matter what. It takes working out plus rest PLUS a proper diet to grow your muscles properly. They do need the time to recuperate. Do not “just” rest your muscles, but give them equal amounts of work and then rest.

The facts state that a man, currently training and not on steroids, takes about five to seven days to rest enough after a big training session. During these following days, the muscle feeds, grows and recuperates. That does not mean to only exercise once a week. You should exercise at least three times a week, but only one of them should be a heavy training session.

These sessions consist of doing one body section per week. Usually starting with the chest and triceps the first day. Rest the second and then move on to back and biceps after that. You get the idea. Training one body part per week will allow that body part to rest for an entire week before you come back to train it again.

Here are some examples of effective body building/muscle building “Training Splits”.

1. One muscle group once each week
Monday: Chest and Triceps (pushing)
Tuesday: Rest
Wednesday: Back and biceps (pulling).
Thursday: Rest
Friday or Saturday: Legs
Sunday: Rest

The above is a good way to train. You’re effectively training your whole body and at the same time giving each muscle group a full 7 day rest. Give it a go. To put a slight twist on things, you could shorten it a little (if you really can’t stand rest days!).

2. One muscle group twice each week
Monday; Chest and Triceps
Tuesday: Back and Biceps
Wednesday: Legs
Thursday: Rest
Friday: Same as Monday – and so on

You have to see which one works best for you. Routine 1 or routine 2. Really it depends on your job, your diet, how long you have been training and even the dietary supplements you use. Bodybuilding/sports supplements like whey protein & creatine allow you to train harder and recover faster so you could probably stick with routine 2.

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