As I sit here 48 hours after lunging a quarter mile, I feel as if I am physically an old man.( The decrepit physically useless stereotype of one that is pushed by society)
I’m walking with a wobble. Both standing up, and sitting down are a challenge, and I can’t help but think that this is the “leg day soreness” that so many complain about.
Now is training to this level of soreness necessary, or even beneficial?
On the former, it is not. Physically doing a moderate amount and training with frequency is far more useful overall. On the latter note, this is more grey, less black and white.
Is training to the point of being unable to function beneficial in the physical sense? To this, it is not. From a survival perspective is is not as well, being physically incapacitated, unable to move, etc has never helped in a fight or flight scenario.
There is however a manner in which this gut check style of training is useful.
Mental Toughness + Discipline.
There is great benefit to knowing what you are capable of, and having the ability to push through pain/challenge/doubts etc. That’s why it’s called a gut check. You find out if you do in fact have the guts.
The benefit of doing ridiculous looking sessions lies entirely in the mental.
Now I would not advocate training like this all the time, the physical adversity it causes is not worth it, but at a minimum this style of training needs to be done at least every couple of months. Doing two in one week I’ll admit is fairly insane, but hey if you want to have at it.
Those like me who hate taking days off will actually be ok with doing so after such sessions.
Back to the point. Soreness is not necessary, but occasional gut check workouts are. Depending on what exact parameters you use the gut check may leave days of soreness or very little at all.
A lot of gym movements I have very high work capacity on, it may be related to the metabolic cost of certain movements. Leg press insanity doesn’t stick with me, nor does squatting insanity, but these are just up down. I think it was the adding of another dimension that made the lunging so rough in DOMS. I’ve done 500+ rep leg sessions before, the volume isn’t what caused the issue.
It was the volume, the “weirdness” of the movement( same reason burpees suck), and the low amount of breaks combined. I’ve comfortably done lunges for 1 or 2 sets of 100-120 yards no problem, and assume that if I had taken an hour instead of sub-20 minutes to finish the lunging I’d probably not be sore right now, or if I was it would be the primed style that makes me even stronger.
I believe in volume, I believe in high work capacity, but I also say minimize the soreness. Keeping the reps crisp, doing them all the time, and stopping once you feel the pop is about to leave really seems to be the best manner overall to train. I’m never really married to a certain number of sets, I may be intending to do a heavy 3×3, but either only do 2 because of the issues with “pop”, or I may end up doing 12 sets, or extending it to sets of 5 as the “pop” was there that day.
If you are unable to train the same movement within 48 hours you did too much in some capacity. Now I want to make sure I clarify that due to adaption over time the thresholds of what you can handle vs what you can not should raise significantly.
You don’t want to be the person who never adapts, or adapts to exactly the stimulus they use and never progresses. Don’t be the guy who benches up to 225 daily but hasn’t progressed his bench since 17.
I’m simply noticing now that the people with the highest levels of brute strength seem to rarely grind reps. Not doing it frequently doesn’t mean they can’t however. I also notice that the powerlifters don’t seem to get sore like the bodybuilders. I’ve also noticed if you take 2 guys same build, but one who does “bodybuilding” the other powerlifting, it is the powerlifter who is stronger, far more athletic, and seems to appear more rugged ie density of muscle. Size comes down to calorie intake.
And maybe that in itself is why I am sore right now. Maybe if my calories were at ~8k yesterday and today I’d feel fresh as can be.
Lots of food and lots of rest can allow for crazy training, but you have to scale the variable together.
Basically try to keep from getting sore. It’ll just put you out of commission for lengths of time. Occasionally doing something crazy is necessary for the mental aspect, but moderate intensity pushed to just shy of that threshold is ideal. That level can be done all the time, and that is where the best gains lie.
Get Strong!
-J