Researchers have found that you can maintain your muscle strength after a month of no exercise. They just won't work as efficiently or energetically as they used to – so it may be time to decrease the reps a little bit when you get back to the gym!
If you stop exercising for a month, you'll likely lose some muscle mass, strength, and cardiovascular endurance. Metabolism may slow, and fat gain could occur, especially if diet remains unchanged. Energy levels might drop, and mood could be affected due to reduced endorphin release.
If you stop exercising for a month, your body undergoes noticeable changes. Your cardiovascular endurance decreases, making physical activities feel more tiring. Muscle mass starts to decrease due to lack of use, and your metabolism may slow down. You could also experience weight gain due to reduced energy expenditure.
Taking a few months off from strength training can feel scary, but rest assured that you likely won't lose all of your gains after just a month or two of no training. During your extended break, find ways to stay active where you can and focus on eating a good diet.
The Timeline for Losing Muscle
1 to 2 Weeks: You may start noticing a slight loss of strength. This is due to the decreased demand on the muscles, which causes them to begin breaking down. 3 to 4 Weeks: Inactivity has led to a significant decrease in muscle strength and size decrease.
According to a 2013 study on muscle development, retention, and decay rates among specific athletes, declines in muscle strength would become noticeable in about three weeks. Thus, athletes can take between two and four weeks off from training without seeing any noticeable losses.
What would happen if you took an even longer break from exercise – say, 2 months? One study found that 2 months of detraining in elite athletes resulted in unfavorable changes in body composition, impaired metabolic function, and development of cardiovascular risk factors.
In research done by pro bodybuilder Jeff Nippard, the typical timeframe for getting muscle back is that it takes half of the time the person took off. If you took a month break from lifting it would take two weeks of consistency in time and intensity of workouts to build back that muscle lost in a month break.
"A lot of people feel and look less tight and toned when they stop working out," he explains. "It's more of a cosmetic thing." When you don't work out regularly, your body composition starts to change. With little physical activity, muscle cells shrink.
However, according to new research, even 10 weeks off from the gym doesn't deteriorate muscle size and strength nearly as much as previously thought. In fact, "for the group training continuously for 20 weeks, progress clearly slowed after the first 10 weeks," says PhD Student Eeli Halonen.
Your Body Responds
As muscle cells get smaller, fat cells tend to get bigger. After all, the muscles aren't working hard enough to burn away calories. This can lead to weight gain as soon as 14 days (or earlier) once you stop exercising, according to Men's Journal.
Although there seems to be a stigma around taking time out from work, taking a career break is completely normal and it's nothing to be ashamed of. In fact, there are many reasons for taking a career break, such as improving your professional skills, gaining more life experiences and caring for your mental health.
You won't lose all your gains. In fact, you will perform better after you take the time to rest. Even if you are someone who is not experiencing the signs shown above, it is still a good idea to take a break or deload every 6-8 weeks or so. This will make sure you are always fresh and ready to give the gym your best!
While this is of course physically impossible, needless to say 'nonsense', the myth of turning 'fat into muscle' or 'muscle into fat' may have its background in the fact that not only does physical inactivity cause a decrease in muscle mass and an increase in fat mass, but a chronic high fat diet also exerts ...
The body likes to hold on to strength for as long as it can. Inactivity for most people (non-athletes) will result in decreased muscles strength at a rate of one to three percent per day with noticeable strength loss occurring after about two and a half to three weeks.
There are several research-backed reasons why you might notice a slight weight gain after exercise. These include muscle gain, water retention, post-workout inflammation, supplement use, or even undigested food. In most cases, post-workout weight gain is temporary.
You may become underweight for many different reasons. You may be born naturally small and your low BMI can be due to your genes. You may have a very high metabolism and find it hard to put on weight, even if you eat foods that have a lot of calories.
The “whoosh effect” is a term for the noticeable weight loss that some people report while following low carb diets such as a keto diet. Some people believe that the whoosh effect happens when fat cells lose fat and fill with water. Researchers have not scientifically proven the whoosh effect, however.
For the majority of people, it takes roughly 130 quality hours to get fit. A lot of people ask me where I got that number. It's equivalent of training hard, an hour a day, 5 days a week, for 6 months. Your hours can't be half-ass hours, either.
Researchers have found that you can maintain your muscle strength after a month of no exercise. They just won't work as efficiently or energetically as they used to – so it may be time to decrease the reps a little bit when you get back to the gym!
So if you lose 1lb (0.45kg) a week you could hope to reduce your waistline by an inch after four weeks. Dieticians advise that if you eat 500 calories less than your daily requirement you will lose about 1lb every seven days (expect some variation from person to person).
And your muscle strength will generally decrease after one month. “Much of this effect can be minimized by doing much less intense exercise than usual during the period of relative inactivity,” he says. “It's helpful to break up the inactive periods with some form of exercise to minimize the degree of deconditioning.”
While dieting without exercise may help you to reduce the number on the scale in the short term, it's hard to say if this weight loss can be sustained in the long run.
There's no hard and fast rule for how long a “break” from exercise should be. It may be as short as a few days, but it's important to realize as well that it can also be up to 1-2 weeks without any significant detriment or loss in previous fitness gains.