Makes very good sense, as when powerlifting competitively, my last heavy deadlift day was two weeks before the meet. My last heavy squat day was one and a half weeks before the meet and my last heavy bench day was a week before the meet. The week of the meet all lifts were done with no more than 50% of my expected goal going into the meet. And nothing after Wednesday for a Saturday meet.
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Sometimes I deload, sometimes I take the week off.
I’ve never lost strength taking a week off.
I come back less inflamed, well rested and ready to bang plates around every time.
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I always come back stronger after taking a week off. That’s why I decided to make it a staple in my regimen.
Can you help me reconcile these two thoughts?
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I separate the ideas of training and exercise.
Training whoops my ass and always has. There’s really nothing fun about, say, a heavy squat set pushed for reps. It fuckin’ sucks. I don’t like to do them at all. I’ve grown to somewhat like how they make me feel in the days following, but I will never feel as good as I would have if I just didn’t do the heavy squats in the first place.
It sucks so much I need planned easy weeks every few weeks to even keep training up over time.
You can walk away from stuff like that for a lot longer than a week and be no worse for wear, assuming you are not a high-level competitor of some kind where the marginal gains and losses might impact your ability to make a living. I’m not an athlete or model, so that’s not me.
A week away from all rigorous exercise, including training, can be beneficial in the ways others have pointed out, but there’s no good reason to let many of these kind of weeks pile up.
If you have a training goal, you have to train for it, which means consistency over time. Don’t worry about one week off when life tosses you one, but you have to resume training.
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I mean from a session. I train the Big 4 exercises, and do each one day a week. So if I miss a session, I’m skipping a week for that exercise.
A lot of people never work out with any real intensity, so they don’t have to worry about taking time off.
Some people do better by reducing loads to 50% or whatever. But I often prefer just taking 5-7 days off to let whatever inflammation settle down, depending on other factors.
It happens I only manage/prioritize one workout a week. My whole basis for training is to plan your way around inconcistency and time constraints. So, as an outlier, I always train more when on holiday or having more free space. The negative thing is you can’t follow a program. The positive thing is it keeps you on your toes - What to do next available time for proper training? It’s late in the evening - What am I able to do? Yesterday I threw in a Darden HIT machine session after work, when time allowed.
Does it work? Yes it does. My powerlifts are still going up, and the thrown in accessory training is mostly fun. You have to be inventive! Read my thread on chest expander for ideas. I would never leave home without resistance bands.
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