cardio during my 1st week off? (break after 6+ months of overtraining)

[rrbb]

Ok so without going into way too much detail... I started training for the first time in my life this past September (2010). I am 6 feet tall and was around 140lbs (I am aware how thin that is, no need to remind me). I started training one muscle group once a week and saw incredible gains. I went from benching a little over 50% of my BW to over 100% of my BW in 2 months. Almost every muscle group in my body saw similar gains. I was replete with energy, my body looked better than ever and I felt INCREDIBLE for the first time in my adult life.

Then I got the bright idea (as I'm sure many of you other rookies have had) that if I work each muscle group TWICE a week I will get DOUBLE the results! So I did just that. I started training 4 days on and 1 day off from late November until a few days ago. The only break I had from my training regimen came from the multiple times I came down with a stomach flu/regular flu/cold/etc. I started getting sick more and more often and started having HORRIBLE insomnia on my days off from training. I'd lay in bed the entire night squirming around in what I now realize must have been due to the release of excessive amounts of cortisol in my body (please correct me if you think this is inaccurate).

My big gains quickly turned into even bigger losses. My squats, bench presses, bicep curls, skull crushers, OH presses, EVERYTHING started to decline. At first, in denial and due to my lack of knowledge, I attributed this all to the fact that I had taken 5 or 6 days off each month due to illnesses and those days off were causing me to lose all of my gains. So even though my body was telling me to slow down I took it to mean I need to hit the gym even harder to make up for being sick!

Anyhow a few weeks ago I joined BB.com and started reading up on proper training/resting routines and realized not only was I working each muscle group 2x a week but my split was also working each muscle group an additional 1-2x a week...so I was doing some muscles 3-4x a week! I did bis/tris/back on day 1, chest/shoulders on day 2, legs/forearms day 3, abs/pushups/planks on day 4 and then 1 day of rest and then I'd repeat...

Anyhow now I've realized my big rookie mistake and am taking a week off from training. On day #2 right now. However, last night's restless, nightmarish insomnia led me to realize unless I do SOME exercise, in some capacity, I will never sleep and will never fully recover...so that leads me to my question....

Cliffnote: I overtrained for the past 4-6 months with not enough days off. I am taking 7 days off from training to get my body to recover. Is it OK for me to do LIGHT cardio (1 mile jogging) each day after work during my week off? Today I did just that and I feel a lot more relaxed and feel like I might actually sleep tonight. I did a jog/walk/jog/walk mile, switching between the two paces and finished with a 12.5 minute mile. I haven't done cardio for the past 6 months due to my difficulty keeping weight/mass on my thin frame.

Is that TOO fast or is that OK to do once a day for the next 6 days? Hopefully I won't need to do it, but just in case is that OK to do during my week off due to overtraining?


Symptoms I have noticed recently:
- Extreme daytime fatigue
- Depression
- Insomnia
- Significant loss of strength
- Multiple illnesses
- Runny nose


Note: I'm sure some of you are going to try to tell me I wasn't overtraining and that you've trained my routine for the past 10 years and added your penis-pushups in as supersets to all exercises but I do not have the same body as you, so please don't try to tell me how stupid or how much of a pussy I am for considering this to be overtraining!

[rrbb]

Follow-up questions:

If due to the stress I put on my body from overtraining has this led to an increase in cortisol production? I assume it has because I'm sleepy in the AM and wired at night which is indicative of a overstimulated adrenal gland...

- To reduce cortisol levels should I stop:
- Drinking coffee each morning? I only have 1 cup a day.
- Stop taking dextrose with my protein PWO shake? (Insulin spike NOT good for me?)
- Stop taking maltodextrin with my PWO shake? (Same as above)


Thanks!!

[jhemfl]

From what I read it sounds like you were def over training. If you enjoy exercising (like I do, I can't stand taking breaks from any form of exercise) and want to do some kind every day.


Focus on maybe 1 or 2 small muscle groups a workout and then do compound workouts on your big muscles and then cardio on your days off.


So for example:

Day 1:
Bicep Curls
Bicep Hammers
Seated Rows
Bent over Rows



Day 2:

Go out in front of your house set up some kind of visual markings and do some suicides until exhaustion




Day 3:
Bench Press (inc, dec, or flat; mix it up on different days)
Fly's (inc, dec, or flat; mix it up on different days)
Leg Press
Squats



Day 4:

Again, go out into an open area (street, parking lot, park)

Do 10 sets of full exertion sprints; Sprint as fast as you can as hard as you can until exhaustion, rest, repeat 9 more times


Day 5:

Military Press
Side lateral raises
Deadlifts
Jump Squats


Day 6:

Walk, it sucks but you need cool off days. Walk when its hot out or in a sauna suit if your in colder weather. Or you can swim if you're a decent swimmer, don't try to swim if your form sucks it will kill your back.



Day 7:

Entire workout of stretching. You can google some nice positions that will really stress your muscles and get you sweating. Plus, stretching at the end of the week just feels great. I was never able to touch my toes without straining and with 3 months of stretching for 20 mins (the time it takes my preworkout to kick in) and 1 full day of stretching. I can now straight leg place my palms on the ground.




P.S. If you can find some tractor tires somewhere, like at a gym or junkyard. Go flip those once a week as well.



The above routine is what I started doing 4 months ago. I've gone from 225 to 198 and I'm seeing crazy strength gains, my burst speed (I play basketball frequently) has just gone through the roof.


If you ever plateau, you don't need a week off. Instead instead of your final set going to failure on a high weight, make your final set a dropset, which = pick a weight you could do around 20 times, do it until failure, then lower the weight a substantial amt, 20lbs for big weight, 10 lbs for little weight and then INSTANTLY WITH NO REST do another set until failure and then drop weight a 2nd time and INSTANTLY WITH NO REST do a 3rd set. The 3 dropsets are considered 1 set, this 1 set of 3 different weights you do as your last set in each muscle group. Do these for a week every 10 weeks and I promise you won't plateau.

[rrbb]

thanks man! i appreciate the response!!

I spoke with my doctor who said taking a week off from exercising will not help my insomnia. I need to lift but 20-25% less volume than I had been doing. So I will see how that goes if I can ever f**king fall asleep...ugh

[jhemfl]

thanks man! i appreciate the response!!

I spoke with my doctor who said taking a week off from exercising will not help my insomnia. I need to lift but 20-25% less volume than I had been doing. So I will see how that goes if I can ever f**king fall asleep...ugh

Yeah I had insomnia for a while too. I was doing power sets at the gym (instead of taking an hour to workout, just doing every exercise in half the time but with little rest in between) and I was sore every day and not getting good results the following days in the gym.

Ever since I started taking a good 30 second-minute in between every workout and just focused on control and form. No more soreness and great results.

[RickNavarro]

Have you checked to see if your supliments are causing those side effects? Never heard of anyone having those issues before. According to your training schedule working same muscles 4xs a week is something you shouldnt do but the symptom sounds like suppliment side effects to me.

[redmond3]

hey!

First thing I have to say, is that lately I have been feeling exhausted throughout the day, even if I got 7/8 hours of sleep. My theory was correct, it was because I didn't cycle off my creatine. I was taking it for over a month or so, as soon as I cycled off, I WAS FINE!

One thing that will help you is taking multi-vitamins.

You were overtraining, you can properly workout out each body part 2 times a week without training. Maybe your volume was crazy!

Cardio is good, but since you are trying to gain, do not do too much cardio, 5 to 10 mins after you workout is fine. 5 minute warmup before weight lifting is a great idea also.
Helps you increase your appetite also.

What is your workout routine like now??? Also if your not eating properly it will affect your recovery rate, that could also be the problem.