One of the biggest mistakes people make with exercise is thinking that more is always better.

It isn’t. At the Daily J, our week has structure: And those recovery days are there for a reason.In fact, if you’ve worked properly on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, you  should arrive on Thursday feeling like your body needs a break.

That’s the point.

WHAT IS TRAINING LOAD?

Training load is simply the total amount of stress you place on your body through exercise.

It’s influenced by how hard you train, how long you train, how often you train and the type of exercise you’re doing. Every workout adds load. Your body then needs time to absorb that load, repair and adapt.

Train → Recover → Adapt → Get stronger.

But if you constantly keep adding load without giving your body enough opportunity to recover, fatigue starts accumulating. And eventually something gives. Your performance drops. Your technique deteriorates. You feel permanently tired. Little niggles appear. Motivation disappears. And your risk of injury increases.

MORE IS NOT ALWAYS BETTER

There is very little value in doing another workout simply because you feel guilty about taking a day off. If your body is exhausted and you can only execute a session at 40% of your potential, ask yourself:

What are you actually trying to achieve?

Sometimes the better training decision is to recover today so that you can attack tomorrow at 90–100%. That is not being lazy.

That is load management.

Professional athletes have understood this forever. They don’t just manage how much they train. They manage how much training their bodies can actually absorb.

Everyday people need to understand the same principle.

You cannot keep going, going, going indefinitely and expect your body to keep responding positively.

EARN YOUR RECOVERY

But there’s another side to this. A recovery day means far more when you’ve actually done the work beforehand. Work hard Monday. Work hard Tuesday. Work hard Wednesday. Then when Thursday arrives, recover properly. Walk. Stretch. Mobilise. Sleep. Hydrate. Eat well. Let your body repair. Then wake up Friday ready to GO AGAIN. That’s the rhythm we’re trying to create.

LOAD. RECOVER. ADAPT. REPEAT.

Don’t train seven days a week at 40%. Train with purpose. Recover with purpose. Then come back ready to perform. Because recovery isn’t the opposite of training.

Recovery is training.

Huge love and High 5’s
Johno