In the last 5-6 weeks I’ve been training hard to gear up for my fight in July. If you check my training log you can see that my average week is 6 days on and 1 day off. There have been days I’ve been totally mentally and physically ruined during the week. I was convinced by a lot of articles and twitter friends to take a rest week. I absolutely hated the idea of not being able to train for a week but after doing research, a rest week is pivotal to training.
The Challenge
The warrior inside any athlete, fitness fanatic, and mixed martial artist does not want to rest. If our bodies allowed us, we’d workout intensely 7 days a week, or at least I would. Personally, I invest about 3-4 hours a day dedicated to training. So now I’m supposed to stop training and do what? You don’t want a person like me with a lot of free time, I’d cause a ruckus. The other challenge is many people believe that you’ll lose your gains or “throw away everything they’ve been working so hard for” but it’s not true.
The Need for Recovery Week
I read about the rest week from a lot of body building articles which make a lot of good points. Even though us mixed martial artists are not body builders but our bodies are under similar stress if not more. Just think about how bad our bodies are being beaten, between strength and conditioning workouts, getting pounded during long sparring sessions, and learning all kinds of new technique. After a 6 days of working out, I know my body is barely holding on and my central nervous system is all out of whack.
The point is when you’re resting is when your body is building muscle and getting stronger. You destroy your muscle in the gym or on the mat and it repairs itself when you’re sleeping or tweeting. There is a lot of different opinions it seems between when to do rest periods, some say every 8-10 weeks, some say every 3 weeks, but I’d say let your body decide. So don’t be surprised when you hit the gym your strength goes up, I’m hoping so.
Stay Occupied
“Important to mentally rest and occupy one’s self with other activities outside of the normal routine as well” – Grayson (@6thRound)
My buddy Gray is right, you just have to find something to do or else you’ll go crazy. Find something else that you enjoy besides being at the gym and kicking people in the head. Hell, you can plan your next 3 months of workouts with this excess free time.
Personally I’ve been working on this blog, getting all the bugs worked out after the migration, facelift and upgrade. Also I’ve been doing a lot of reading about various things I enjoy, including fitness. So the point is do something.
Great Things To Do During The Week
- Focus on Nutrition and dieting
- Learn something new
- Hang out with your friends for once?
- Tweet – I probably annoy my twitter friends because my tweets per day went up 35+
- Go to the zoo
- Stretch
- Give your gym bag a nice cleaning
- Work more? (I have a part time job)
- Become a blogger!
- Be a freelance Ninja
May 24th, 2009 at 6:52 pm
Hilarious, Jimmy! Excellent post. You seem to be channelling that energy very well! And the website looks fantastic!!
I can’t wait to hear your judgment on rest week, when you can look at it from the rear view. Sometimes it takes me a few days or maybe a bit longer to see tangible results from having taken a rest week, but they are always there.
When you do see your rewards, be smart and write them down (or blog about it!) Because I guarantee you, next time you need a rest week, you won’t want it (again!)
May 24th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
When I do the rest week, I usually get 2 to 3 hours extra a day.
I tend to watch exercise the one muscle that doesn’t get worked out at the gym.
I read more during a rest week then any other time. I’ll read novels, books for work, or anything else handy. I also try to write more, and improve my language skills. Learn new words, put them together better. Try and learn something more about math. Practice my shell scripting and perl.
Play with my pet more, and do something with my servers.
May 25th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Great article, and the site looks wonderful. The new format is clean and eye-catching. Elegant, even
A recovery week doesn’t need to be completely inactive if you don’t want it to be. Light steady-state cardio at the lower end of your training zone is okay, as is yoga and flexibility/balance work generally. As long as you keep the effort well below maximum you’re not going to be doing more damage to your muscles so you won’t be interfering with the recovery process. In fact arguably you’ll be facilitating recovery by increasing oxygen supply to the muscles.
The main thing is that you really listen to your body and do what seems appropriate, whether it’s going for a light jog or taking a yoga class, or sitting back on the couch with the remote control in one hand and a nice big glass of, um, iced green tea in the other.
May 25th, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Hey Jimmy! Great post!
Rest and recovery is critical (especially for older dudes like me!)
One thing: I think you may be biting off more than you can chew:
“give your gym bag a good cleaning”? Now THAT sounds like work! (LOL)
By the way, your friend “Gray” would happen to be Gray Maynard, would it? [He's an awesome fighter!]
Thanks for the post!
-Fred
May 25th, 2009 at 6:47 pm
@Sarah Thanks for the kind words. I can’t wait to get back into action.
@Chris Great stuff. I’ve been focusing on more geeky stuff like customizing my blog. Maybe I’ll update debian sometime before rest week is up.
@Laura Great info! I missed my weekly yoga class last Saturday because I slept in. I’m going to do some stretching today maybe a light jog tomorrow.
@Fred My buddy Gray isn’t Gray Maynard. He runs 6th-round.com.
2 days until I get back in action.
May 26th, 2009 at 2:44 pm
active rest is so important, often overlooked. listening to your body, giving yourself a break from the daily grind, keep yourself fresh. i do sled training, amazing for active recovery and conditioning.
May 26th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
Jimmy, I love the freelance ninja part! You are a trip, man! I need to get to your part of Jersey and just hang with you when neither of us have any school work to do. LOL.
But seriously, over all that was a VERY good read!
May 28th, 2009 at 9:13 pm
A listen lived is a lesson learned.
I myself have been a bit ‘quite’ on the training front. REST WEEK.
Its only when you ‘knacker’ your self out, as we english say, that you understand the importance of rest.
AND how you can utilize it to promote growth and improve your PB or reach that goal- what ever that be.
quik story:I trained for the RKC whilst quite rundown. Apart from being a bit nuts – the hard training and much adrenaline got me thru…only to repeatedly fall ill to find out I was suffering from adrenal exhaustion!!! . U kno how it is! I always used to say ‘i’ll sleep when I’m dead. Anyway that was then this is now.
Now I teach more krav/kbs I have to plan my workouts week to week. And if I miss one it is no biggy. Tell ya it still hurts to rest- especially as I insist on reading other blogs like yours…
But the gains are good!
Chin down guard up and elbows elbows knees (are u allowed groin strikes?)
Kravmascara RKC
May 29th, 2009 at 12:27 am
@Kravmascara (Sarah)
Thank for sharing your story. I’m feeling the gains already. Stronger, refreshed, new sense of drive from my recovery week.
September 1st, 2009 at 4:21 am
Great post Jimmy! As a mma strength and conditioning coach, I’ve been personally studying up a lot more on this subject right now. I also teach hardgainers (naturally skinny guys/gals with extremely fast metabolisms) how to gain weight, and one of THE most overlooked component for hardgainers is getting enough rest and recovery. Obviously the same applies for mma fighters as well.
Three more great things to do that’s worked wonders for me:
- hiking (obviously for recreation and not for a workout)
- reading a book of your interest
- getting a massage
Derek Manuel
MMA Strength and Conditioning Coach
MMA Workouts
September 1st, 2009 at 7:12 pm
Derek,
Great little additions to what you can do on rest week. Thanks for comment, always a pleasure when you stop by comment.