Active Recovery Ultimate Guide: What Should I Do on Rest Days?

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“Steve, what am I supposed to do on days when I’m not training?”

It’s a great question and one we receive quite frequently here at Nerd Fitness.

With our coaching clients, not only do we create workout schedules for them, we also help them utilize “off days” with active recovery. 

Today, we’ll share with you the exact same lessons (click to jump to that section): 

• Is it good to work out every day? (Why you need rest days)
• What should I do on gym rest days? (Active Recovery)
• Rest Day Workout 1: Mobility
• Rest Day Workout 2: Fun Activities
• Rest Day Workout 3: Intervals, Sprints, and Walking
• Rest Day Workout 4: Yoga
• Rest Day Workout 5: Foam Roller
• Making the most of your days off (3 Rest Day Best Practices)

Let’s do this.

Is It Good to Work out Every Day? (Why You Need Rest Days)

We advise our coaching clients to work out 3 days per week with full-body strength training routines.

This would include lots of compound movements like:

• Squats
• Push-ups
• Overhead presses
• Deadlifts

These exercises train multiple muscle groups at once, resulting in an efficient, functional, strategy for strength building and weight loss.

Here’s the important science for today’s lesson: your muscles are actually broken down during your workout.

When challenged enough, they tear during the exercise and only start to grow back during the 24-48 hours after training.^[1]

That’s why it doesn’t benefit us to train the same muscles every day; we don’t want to destroy them without giving them a chance to grow back stronger.

If you follow our advice and do full-body strength training workouts 2-3 times a week, the question “How many days a week should I rest?” can be answered with “around 4 or 5 days without heavy lifting.”

So, does this give you free rein to binge-watch your favorite show on “days off from the gym?”

While I’m not going to tell you to delete your Netflix account (the horror), I do want to talk about making the most of your time away from the gym.

What Should I Do on Gym Rest Days? (Active Recovery)

The biggest problem most people have with off days is that they become cheat days! 

Because they’re not training, they’re not thinking about being fit and it’s much easier to slack off, eat poorly, and lose momentum.

This is bad news bears.

Remember, exercise is only 10-20% of the weight-loss equation: how we eat and rest is the other 80-90%!

I’ve found I’m far less likely to eat poorly when I’m doing some active recovery than when I’m not doing anything deliberately.

So plan your off days!

Think of them not as “off days,” but they’re “recovery days.” They serve a vital role in building an antifragile kickass body capable of fighting crime (or roughhousing with your kids in the backyard).

Whether it’s scheduling one of the Rest Day Workouts below at the same time you normally train every day, or deliberately adding a morning mobility/stretching routine to your day, doing SOMETHING every day is a great way to remind ourselves “I am changing my life and I exercise daily.”

This leads us to the idea of “active recovery.”

Active recovery is any gentle movement designed to help your muscles heal after training. 

It’s a subject we discuss in our guide on DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness). 

When you exercise, you increase blood flow to your muscles. By moving your body, you’re actually speeding up your recovery.^[2]

The trick is to be active enough to increase blood flow, but gentle enough that you allow the muscles to heal. 

Our Rest Day Workouts below will walk that fine line.

You might also want to walk a tightrope on your rest days.

Personally, on days when I’m not training, I try to block off a similar amount of time to work on myself in some way to maintain momentum. I encourage you to do the same if you lose momentum when taking a day off.

It could be flexibility training, mobility training, meal prep, and more. I’ll cover these below!

Whatever it is, do SOMETHING every day, even if it’s for just five minutes, to remind yourself that you are making progress towards your new life.

Need help building a weekly workout schedule, including rest days? I have two options for you.

1. The first is to get your hands dirty and check out our guide “How To Build Your Own Workout Routine.” It’ll walk you through everything you need to design a day-to-day exercise plan.
2. Alternatively, we can do all of the heavy lifting for you (well, not ALL the heavy lifting) – we’ll create a specific routine so all you have to do is log into your NF Coaching App each morning and do the workout your coach prescribed!

Rest Day Workout 1: Mobility

We’ve all felt that soreness the day after (or two days after) strength training or from an intense run – our muscles have been broken down and are incredibly tight from all of the heavy lifting.

For that reason, one of the best things you can do on an off day is to work on your flexibility and mobility. After all, what good is strength if we can’t move our body properly to utilize it! Dynamic stretching and mobility work helps prepare our body for the rigors of strength training, keeping us injury free!

Regardless of whether or not you have a training day scheduled, try to start each morning with a mobility warm-up: a series of dynamic movements that gets your body activated and wakes up your muscles, joints, and tendons. If you live in an apartment or are just getting started, feel free to leave out the jumping jacks:

This gives us a chance every morning to check in with our bodies and reminds us mentally “I am leveling up physically, might as well eat right today too.”

Here’s another favorite mobility routine from my friend (and coach) Anthony Mychal. It says it’s a warm-up for tricking, but it’s quite helpful for those of us mere mortals: 

If you spend all day at a desk, doing some basic mobility movements throughout the day can keep your hips loose and keep you thinking positively.

Here’s an article on how to dominate posture at your desk job.

Rest Day Workout 2: Fun Activities

We are genetically designed to move, not sit on our asses for 60+ hours a week. Not only that, but we are genetically designed to have fun doing so too!

This means we can spend time on our off days working on our happiness AND staying active at the same time.

Like with whatever is going on here:

This fun activity can mean something different for everybody:

• Go for a bike ride with your kids
• Go for a run around your neighborhood
• Play kickball in a city league (I play on Thursdays!)
• Play softball
• Swim
• Go for a walk with your significant other
• Go rock climbing
• Learn martial arts like Brazilian Jiu Jitsu or Capoeira or Kung Fu
• Take a dance class
• Try Live Action Role-Playing (LARP!)
• Play on a playground
• Roll down a hill and run back up it

Check out our guide “40 Fun Exercises! Exercise Without Realizing It” for even more ideas!

I honestly don’t care WHAT you do, as long as it’s something you truly enjoy doing – it should put a smile on your face and gets your heart pumping.

Exercise does not need to be exhausting or miserable. If you haven’t found an activity you enjoy yet, you haven’t tried enough new things.

The point is to get outside, remember it’s a damn good day to be alive, and that we are built to move.

Helping clients discover exercise they love is one of the key components of our Online Coaching Program. Whether it’s learning parkour, hiking in a nearby forest, or heading to the gym to grab a barbell, we help clients discover their passion so working out becomes enjoyable.

Rest Day Workout 3: Intervals, Sprints, and Walking

“But Steve, I have this big party coming up and I really am trying to lose as much weight as possible.”

Okay okay, I hear you – if that’s the case, then 90% of the battle is going to be with your diet. You should focus your energy on healthy eating in order to lose weight.

But there are SOME things you can do on your off days that can help you burn more calories:

1) Interval Training –  In interval training, you’ll be varying your running pace. This means you may switch between jogging and walking, or walking and sprinting (there are few different methods of interval training). This training style can help speed up your metabolism for the hours after you finish.

2) Sprinting – If you like the idea of burning extra calories and building explosive power and speed, check out our article on becoming the Flash. Find a hill, sprint up it, walk down, and repeat the process for 10-20 minutes. No need to overthink it!

3) Long walks – Walking is a low-impact activity that burns extra calories and doesn’t overly tax your body. What a “long walk” will be is different for everybody based on their level of fitness, but walking is one of the best things you can do for yourself!

If you want to take a more active recovery day, the most important thing is to listen to your body. Destroying ourselves for 6+ days a week can really wear us down, causing long term problems if we’re not careful.^[3]

Rest Day Workout 4: Yoga

You might not realize it, but yoga is the perfect complement to strength training:

Strength training makes us stronger, but it can tighten up our muscles and make us sore.

Yoga, on the other hand, lengthens our muscles and tendons,^[4] aids in their recovery,^[5] and helps our body develop better mobility and flexibility.^[6]

It’s the perfect way to create a strong AND mobile body, ready for anything and everything we throw at it.

It’s kind of like turning your body into a swiss-army knife: prepared to be strong, flexible enough to avoid injury, and truly antifragile.

Now, if you’ve never been to a yoga class before, it can certainly be intimidating, especially if you’re a ones-and-zeros programmer wary of the practice’s more spiritual aspects.

That was my concern years ago before I got started with it; I had to muster up 20 seconds of courage to attend my first yoga class, and I’m so glad I did.

Here’s how to get started with Yoga!

• Nearly any commercial gym you join will have yoga classes.
• Most yoga studios have classes throughout the day.
• Follow a plethora of videos online if you want to get started at home.

In fact, here’s a beginner routine you can follow right now:

Need help with any of the poses?

Check out 21 Yoga Poses for Beginners for guidance on all positions.

Rest Day Workout 5: Foam Roller

You’ll often hear using a foam roller as “self-myofascial release.”

You may be asking, “myofawhatnow?”

Don’t stress, because “fascia” is just the connective tissue covering muscle. 

Just know that “self-myofascial release” means giving yourself a tissue massage.

The important thing for today’s lesson: a rolling massage has been shown to help alleviate muscle soreness.^[7] Which means it’s a perfect inclusion for active recovery.

Here are some simple rolling exercises you can try today, courtesy of NF Coach Matt: 

Yes, that is in fact a T-Rex. Yes, it was 100% Matt’s idea.

If you want even more information, including recommendations on which type of roller to purchase, check out our guide “How to Use a Foam Roller.”

Making the Most of Your Days Off (3 Rest Day Best Practices)

No matter what you end up doing on your rest day, here are some best practices to keep in mind. 

Rest Day Best Practice #1: Meal Prep

As we know, a healthy body is made in the kitchen, not in the gym.

It’s important to stay diligent with healthy nutrition even on days when you’re not hitting the gym.

One of the best ways to do that is to use one of your non-training days to prepare your meals for the week! NF Coach Staci Ardison does all of her meal prep for the week on Sundays, and looks at it like an activity that is furthering her fitness journey.

Interested?

Staci walks you through everything you need to start cooking for the week in our Guide to Meal Planning and Prep.

Plus, here’s my exact recipe for batch cooking chicken:

Rest Day Best Practice #2: Engage Your Brain

I like to use one of my off days to break a mental sweat too!

On Tuesdays, I take fiddle lessons, which is a mental workout so taxing that I can’t wait to get back to deadlifts!

Learn a language, build a table out of wood, or go play chess with a friend. 

Anything that forces your mind beyond its comfort zone engages your brain. A great way to spend your time away from the gym.

Rest Day Best Practice #3: Have Fun!

Whether it’s playing a video game, getting caught up on a movie or TV show, or reading a book, it’s important for us to do the nerdy or fun things that make us who we are.

As the Rules of the Rebellion state: fitness can become part of what we do, but not at the expense of who we are!

I’m currently playing through The Last of Us: Part II, and it makes me happy our current apocalypse isn’t as bad as that one.

If you live for playing Dungeons and Dragons with friends, make room for it on your calendar. 

Just like it’s important to schedule health and fitness, it’s important to schedule fun.

This guide has provided you with all the tools you need to begin an active recovery practice and to make the most of your rest days.

If you’re looking to go a bit further, I have three options for you…

#1) If you want step-by-step guidance creating a workout schedule, getting stronger, and even eating better, check out our killer 1-on-1 coaching program:

#2) Exercising at home and need a plan to follow? Check out Nerd Fitness Journey!

Our fun habit-building app helps you exercise more frequently, eat healthier, and level up your life (literally). Plus, NF Journey will tell you exactly what days should be “off.”

Try your free trial right here:

#3) Join The Rebellion! We have a free email newsletter that we send out twice per week, full of tips and tricks to help you get healthy, get strong, and have fun doing so. 

I’ll also send you tons of free guides that you can use to start leveling up your life too:

Get your Nerd Fitness Starter Kit

• The 15 mistakes you don’t want to make.
• Full guide to the most effective diet and why it works.
• Complete and track your first workout today, no gym required.

Alright, your turn: How do you stay on target even on days when you’re not “training?”

I’d love to hear from you – do you take the day off completely? Do you challenge yourself in a different way?  Do you try to do something every day to keep the momentum up, or do you actually take days off?

Leave it in the comments!

-Steve 

PS: Another good rest day activity? Take a nap!

Your body does quite a lot of its healing during sleep. Get some proper shut-eye.

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Photo sources: Mikkel © 123RF.com, A good Sunday to you, resting cat, Rain doesn’t stop a photographer, juhajarvinen © 123RF.com , Run, foam roller, back to vacation,

Footnotes    ( returns to text)

1. A meta analysis found that 1 to 2 rest days between workout sessions was optimal for muscle repair, although they included a caveat that the intensity of the exercise would impact this: “A meta-analysis to determine the dose response for strength development.”(PubMed)
2. Check out this study on active recovery and DOMS: “An Evidence-Based Approach for Choosing Post-exercise Recovery Techniques to Reduce Markers of Muscle Damage, Soreness, Fatigue, and Inflammation” (PubMed)
3. Check out this sudy on the importance of resting for 48 hours after intense cardio: “The effects of exercise-induced muscle damage on cycling time-trial performance” (PudMed)
4. Check out this study on yoga and flexibility in the eldery: Flexibility of the elderly after one-year practice of yoga and calisthenics. (PubMed)
5. This study showed yoga helping to reduce DOMS: “The effects of yoga training and a single bout of yoga on delayed onset muscle soreness in the lower extremity.” (PubMed)
6. This study showed college athletes obtaining better balance and flexibility in only 10 weeks of yoga: “Impact of 10-weeks of yoga practice on flexibility and balance of college athletes”(PubMed)
7. The study on foam rolling and muscle soreness: “Pain pressure threshold of a muscle tender spot increases following local and non-local rolling massage: PubMed”

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