How Your Body Bounces Back When You’ve Strayed From Exercise Knvul Sheikh - The New York Times
go to original February 1, 2024

When it comes to cardiovascular fitness and muscle strength, the adage is true: Use it or lose it. While regular exercise can improve heart health and increase strength and mobility, taking weeks or months off can reverse many of those benefits.

That’s not to say that rest days are not important. In general, short breaks can help you physically and mentally recharge, but whenever possible, you should avoid extending your time off for too long so that hopping back on the wagon doesn’t feel too daunting or miserable.

“Your body adapts to the stimulus you provide,” said Dr. Kevin Stone, an orthopedic surgeon and the author of the book “Play Forever: How to Recover From Injury and Thrive.” “Your muscles become used to the stress and the testosterone, the adrenaline and endorphins — all the wonderful things that circulate from exercise. When you take that away, the body initiates a muscle loss program.”

What You Can Do to Keep Fitness Loss at Bay

While the cardiovascular and muscular changes that occur after a long break may sound dramatic, the good news is that most people do not cut out all activity in the same way that participants are often instructed to do in an exercise study.

If you have to travel or stay in because of bad weather, doing something is still better than nothing, Dr. Coyle, a professor of kinesiology and health education at the University of Texas at Austin, said. Swap dumbbells for body-weight exercises. Try smaller “exercise snacks” throughout the day, take the stairs as much as you can, or better yet, set a goal to do a few short high-intensity interval workouts.

“If you spend just a few minutes a day doing interval training, that’s sufficient to keep blood volume elevated and mitochondria relatively high,” Dr. Coyle said.

If you’re a competitive athlete, tapering the intensity or frequency of training right before or after a big race or game can actually be beneficial, as long as you are intentional about it. For example, many athletes plan for a two- or three-week taper in order to give their bodies time to restore their glycogen fuel tank and allow muscles to recover.

Those who need to take longer breaks can try cross training or switching to a different sport, like skating or swimming. Or perhaps focus on improving balance instead, through aerobics classes or dance to keep the same muscles active in different ways.

“Overall fitness is a combination of many factors,” Dr. Stone said. “It’s not just muscle strength and cardiovascular fitness.”

Read the rest at The New York Times