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Reply With QuoteWhen I take a short break(2-3 weeks) I almost always GAIN strength not lose it.
Senior Member
Specifically for women. If you are strength training and take a break for two weeks, how much strength is it normal to lose?
During the break you are not a couch potato, just not at the gym lifting.
Senior Member
When I take a short break(2-3 weeks) I almost always GAIN strength not lose it.
Senior Member
Don't know about 3 weeks but ditto to one to two. Sometimes your body appreciates the break. Probably the same reason that 3 lifting days a week MAY be too much...
Senior Member
I'm a dude, but I second this.Originally Posted by ecole66
Senior Member
Depends on how overtrained I was. If I was overtraining, trying to hit 1rms 3x a week, then I will likely gain strength from the break. If I take a break for too long otherwise, like a month, then I lose it.
Senior Member
Definitely not overtraining. I lift twice a week at most, only once a week in the summer since we are swimming and playing more. Every time I'm away from the gym for a week or two, I have to bump way back on weights again.
Senior Member
you won't lose muscle in that amount of time. 'strength' is funny. the actual number you hit on the lift can vary simply from being out of practice, or low on energy, but it doesn't necessarily indicate that the muscle is weaker.
the best we can do to quantify strength is to go with the number on the barbell, or time-under-load, but nothing's perfect.
anyway, long-winded, but you won't lose strength or muscle in two or three weeks.
"dean ornish and dr. davis think the palmitic acid our bodies use for fuel while we sleep is poison if we eat it. zero-carbers like charles washington think the oldest fuel in our evolutionary history – glucose - used by organisms a billion years ago and without which the brains of modern mammals cannot survive for more than a few minutes – is an unnatural toxin if you eat it. both views ignore basic facts of medical physiology and defy evolutionary history." - kurt harris
Senior Member
I have never lost strength taking a break for 2 weeks but never tried to not lift anything for 3 weeks though. The only thing that I notice is if I take 1 week off from running then I have to work my way up again.
Senior Member
I've never lost strength by taking a even a month off and just being active. If you're going on vacation don't feel the need to hit the weights.
I think of strength training this way: If it's that hard to gain strength and I can lose it in such a short time was it actually worth the effort to gain it in the first place.
Would I be putting a grain-feed cow on a fad diet if I took it out of the feedlot and put it on pasture eating the grass nature intended?
Senior Member
I third it.
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