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I recall Scott mentioning that rest between workouts becomes more important when you are over 40 years old. He said that a 2-3 days rest between sessions is normal. However, he is also encouraging us to workout 3-4 days a week.
It seems a bit contradictory, or am I missing something here? That would mean only 2 workouts a week for someone over 40. I workout approximately every other day, meaning 3 times a week. Am I resting enough?
I wondered the same thing. I think (but I’m not sure) he was talking about weights and body parts. For example, you should allow 3 days between arm workouts, 3 days between leg workouts, etc. Don’t do arms every other day, etc.
I will try to go back to the podcast that mentioned it. I have a feeling it may have been in reference to weight lifting as well. I think Scott’s routine in lifting targets a different body area each day. That way he rotates among the different parts like back, chest, legs, arms, etc and gives each part a good two days rest to repair. My workouts right now are totally cardio and I will go 3 days in a row and then have a rest day. Or I will vary the intensity like one day I will go totally hard, then have a long slow burn, and then totally hard again. When I feel my body truly needing rest from cardio I will give it the rest that it needs. I will go back in the podcasts and see if I can find this reference for you. Hope this helps.
Scott is referring to resting the muscles you work in a weight training session. If you do shoulders and chest and push hard, then give those muscles 3 days to rest before doing another shoulders and chest workout, same with legs, or arms. That doesn’t mean that you wouldn’t be able to do an intense lower body or leg workout the day after your chest workout, then an arms workout the day after the legs workout. When you rotate through the body parts, you can do some resistance training almost every day.
You can do cardio every day, as long as you keep your level of effort at about the 75% of maximum. If you do intense intervals or sprints, I would also recommend a day off between. Your rest between cardio sessions depends on your intensity.
Sometimes I don’t skip the workout on my rest day, I just tone it down - for example, after a long paddling weekend I may only do a shorter (3 mile or so) walk on Monday.
