How to prevent overtraining of lower leg muscles?
Original question: How many times a week are we supposed to blast the legs in order to prevent "overtraining"? My answer: All muscles are alike. Leg muscles are not different from any other muscle group, so I advice to avoid overtraining at any cost if it is related to bodybuilding and weight training. To begin with, I would like to make a statement and that is “undertraining is always better than overtraining” because with undertraining, you can still make some progress in any sport but with overtraining, no progress will be possible. And our legs are the mostly trained muscle group as we do cardio and walk generally with our legs only. See, muscles would never know whether it is Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday or Friday or so on. All they know is that they are subjected under increased stress and stimulation. They know that they have been lifting something and to recover, they demand fuel (good diet); otherwise, they stop everything and sit on a strike to not work and produce no results. So you need to deal with them tactfully and using the biological science, the way its meant to be by nature. No one can change that even any bodybuilding superman.
How muscle formation takes place in case of overtraining?
Now, you must understand that how does muscle formation takes place in case of overtraining. Well, it happens like this. You subject muscle under stress, stimulate it by moving a certain weight in a set way, avoiding a muscle pull or strain, then cells and tissues break down, and when they recover having sufficient rest and diet (even massage and meditation), they form muscle. Each time you lift heavy, more cells/tissues break down and a bigger muscle forms next. If you work them, again before they have recovered, that would amount to overtraining and instead, they will shrink and only shrink, making you weak and depressive. Everyday is a kidney, liver, pancreas day no matter what muscle you blast. They have to filter the waste of the byproducts the muscles throw out. Cells and tissues are broken because of muscle fibre recruitment during a set. When they are completely recruited and stimulated, they are exhausted. Its then that you can claim I have worked out my muscles, so the heavier you lift, the more rest you need. There are innumerable methods to grow muscle through the periodization method. If you wish to follow the safest and simplest method without following any periodization knowledge, then I suggest a heavy workout from a single muscle group, lasting not more than 30 to 35 minutes a day including warmup and stretching plus abs. Take a day off, go again the third day, another muscle group and a day off again.
Ideally, I can tell you to do a sample workout split like below:
For week 1:
Day 1 (Monday): Legs plus lower abs
Day 2 (Thursday): Chest and Back
For week 2:
DAY 1 (MONDAY): Shoulders/traps plus upper abs (place weights on your chest)
DAY 2 (THURSDAY): Arms (triceps and biceps)
Points to be remembered:
- Get involved in brief but intense cardio before the workout.
- Abs are just like any other muscle made up of amino acids and have fibers and cells and tissues; therefore, work out heavy with weights as suggested.
- As suggested, there are innumerable methods to build muscles and they all work including this one.
- The sample split routine is for “heavy weightlifting” and if you lift light, a muscle group can be worked out twice a week and if moderate, then once a week.
All the best and all izz well.