When and How to Spend a Rest Day

Think of rest days as a way to give back to your body at least once a week. Use this time to relax and rejuvenate your body and mind in whichever way works best for you.

Health Benefits of Rest Days

1. Alleviating muscle pain and soreness: During rest days, the body has a chance to remove excess lactate from the muscles and this helps alleviate discomfort.

2. Repairing and building muscles: Exercise creates microscopic tears in your muscle tissue. Therefore,during rest days, your cells perform fibroblast repairs and build up your muscle tissue.

3. Replenishing the body’s energy stores: Glycogen is a form of energy stored in muscles. Exercise depletes glycogen levels, which leads to muscle fatigue. Therefore, rest days allow your muscles to replenish their glycogen stores, thereby reducing muscle fatigue and preparing the muscles for their next workout.

4. Preventing injury: Over exercising puts repetitive stress and strain on your muscles which can increase your risk of injury.

5. Allowing the mind to rest: Over exercising can tire the mind, as well as the body and tiredness can lead to poor decision-making and increase the risk of injury. In addition, constant exercise can lead to the overproduction of hormones released during exercise – such as cortisol and adrenaline – which can lead to a decrease in your quality of sleep and exhaustion.

It is important that you rest on your rest day. You can do lighter activities and actively recover but these activities should not put a strain on your body. Actively rest by adding walking and foam rolling to your weekly routine.

Download our walking guide here!

Download our foam rolling guide here!