Recently I have started a new workout routine unlike anything I have ever done before. I learned most of what I know about weight lifting, body building, and exercise from guys back in my home town's gym. One of which had competed internationally in power lifting including the Olympics. Another had competed in the Mr. Utah body building competition. What they taught me was good, but I'm learning now, was a lot like Aristotle's Earth claim. Sometimes people make guesses, and when they aren't disproved they start spreading them as facts.
So the new routine is encouraging me to be as inefficient as possible. Efficiency is the bane of muscle growth and fat loss. Our bodies learn to adapt quickly, and adaptation leads to efficiency. So the routines I'm on right now, are quite inefficient, encouraging a total body workout that let's every body part push hard. I'm doing high reps, and lower weight. And I have never had a workout like these, that has me walking away short of breath and feeling like a Mac truck hit me.
This week though I started a new phase of this routine. This phase encourages me to workout more frequently, and I found myself sitting at my computer uncomfortably sore (but not painfully so), and hesitant to workout. For years, the common gym rat will tell you that you should not work a muscle that is sore. You let it repair itself. Doing so can cause "horrible" damage to the muscle. So why would this routine, written by several fitness and health experts (who gathered information from subject test groups and scientific studies conducted across the nation over decades) encourage me to "horribly" damage myself.
The answer I found, is that the intuitive logic of letting your muscle soreness stop before resuming exercise, is wrong. The reality is counter intuitive.
Before I go on, I need to be very clear that I'm not talking about excessive hardline workouts with very heavy weights and very low reps. Heaven forbid you tear a tendon or ligament because you try to power lift your max.
But you really are encouraged to work a muscle that is sore. Ironically, you'll heal even faster if you do so.
Don't take my word for it. I'm a nobody gym rat that was as misinformed as the rest of you. But here are some excellent references.
"But if your muscles are a bit stiff or sore, go ahead and train them. Your body will ramp up your recovery processes in response."
"Sometimes trying to work through an injury makes it worse, and sometimes it makes it better."
Best plan I can come up with, based on this new finding, is that unless I am so horribly sore (like the first time you did Deadlifts in your whole life), and I haven't experienced a "bad" pain from a workout, go ahead and go lift. If I can maintain proper form, then go for it.
What's the difference between a bad pain and a good pain. For me, DOMS is a good pain. The wiki on DOMS (delayed-onset muscle soreness) also indicates repeated exercise actually helps in the healing process. When you twist an ankle, pull a muscle, or anything that involves sharp pain, probably lay off until those symptoms dissipate.
I could be wrong. Maybe I'm making an "Aristotle" mistake. Perhaps the findings about exercising when sore are all incorrect, and the findings of doctor's with injured patients are wrong, as is all the studies about DOMS. Maybe in 10-20 years a new study comes out that shows new evidence that suggests you completely wait until you are not sore anymore. When that happens, I'll adapt and learn. I won't just stick my chin out and ignore the facts when thrown at me.
We should never stop learning or improving. What we knew yesterday is not enough for today.
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