Exercising while sore?

[Jspot]

So, I'm still relatively new to the science of weight training even though I've been on and off for a few years now. My brother, while introducing me to fitness and a more healthy lifestyle, explained to me that if you train a muscle, and it becomes sore, you should not do that exercise again until the soreness is gone, in order to give yourself enough time to actually heal before tearing down your muscle fibers again. In all my time weight training, I've always stuck by that. If I ever felt too sore to exercise, I didn't.

However, a friend of mine, I'll say his name is Sam, disagrees with me. Or, not even so much actually disagrees with me, but simply wants to go against that principle. He's asked me for advice several times about the whole soreness thing, and I simply told him how I handle it, and that while I'm not sure of how/why or even if I'm correct, that exercising while sore is a bad idea. Regardless though, he has kept asking me the same question over and over hoping for me to say it is okay for him to do so. Supposedly, he has been exercising mainly his arms lately (he also refuses to take my advice on a full-body workout spread throughout the week) almost every two days, with soreness.

I figured I'd ask you guys about this. Am I wrong in thinking exercising a sore muscle is bad/risky? If I'm wrong, is it okay? Are there benefits? If I'm right, what are those risks and why is it bad? I want to be able to tell him straight away to stop what he's doing if this is going to be bad for him.

Any information is very appreciated.


Also, I didn't want to make a separate thread about this: I've been getting some light tightness/pain in my sternum after doing dips. I read another thread about how it could be Costochondritis? I don't know if that directly or even indirectly related to the fact that on occasion of strenuous jogging/running I can get pain in my lower side beneath my rib cage... but, I don't know. Obviously I'll have to cut the exercise out, but I'd still like to know what it could possibly be.

[Jspot]

Anyone?

[AphtaLyfe]

Muscle soreness is not an indication that you should not be training on it.

If you give a muscle 72 hours and its still sore, then normally its fine to train on it again.

When you first start lifting the soreness is extreme, and after a while you don't get sore as much/often.

My biceps are rarely sore after back/bicep day and I work them pretty hard.

Whereas my legs are pretty much permanently sore week long. (legs 2 days a week)

Which is why most people recommend 72 hours between lifts to ensure proper muscle recovery/growth. If you don't work the muscle very hard, then you can drop it to 48hours or if you work it extremely hard you might want to wait a little longer than 72 hours.

Soreness once again.... is NOT a definitive indicator of your muscles being unready to lift again.

-Good Luck