Former gym rat Gwen Stefani has thrown in the towel on exercise. “This past year, I kind of stopped working out. I think my body just needed a break. And so I did that and focused more on feeling good as opposed to beating myself up,” she recently told Marie Claire UK in an interview.
While recording and promoting No Doubt’s sixth studio album, Push And Shove, the singer, clothing designer, wife, and mother of two decided that working out, something she once felt she “had to do,” had to go. Last year, Stefani claimed she was addicted to exercising, according to the magazine.
However, that all-or-nothing approach to exercise is what Stefani and other exercisers really need to rid themselves of, says Barbara Bushman, Ph.D., a professor of kinesiology at Missouri State University.
“Rest can be just as important to fitness as working out,” she says. Why? Your body doesn’t get stronger during exercise. It gets stronger while it’s rebuilding itself from that exercise. Overtraining deprives your muscles of the time they need to heal, diminishing results and risking injury. What’s more, people who work out too hard for too long may be less healthy than people who don’t work out at all, according to a review recently published in the British journal Heart. During excessive exercise, the body releases more free radicals than the body’s antioxidants can handle, risking harm to internal organs and tissues.
“However, rest doesn’t mean lying in a hammock. Rest should be part of your workout, not an alternative to your workout,” Bushman says. Unless you have a medical condition that prohibits you from exercising, physical activity should always be part of a healthy lifestyle. Putting exercise on hold for more than two weeks can lead to loss of muscle mass and a decline in fitness.
Have you been beating yourself up with exercise? Here, five ways to make rest part of your workout, improve your fitness gains, and love the gym again:
Full article here:
http://www.womenshealthmag.com/fitness/should-you-take-a-break-from-working-out
While recording and promoting No Doubt’s sixth studio album, Push And Shove, the singer, clothing designer, wife, and mother of two decided that working out, something she once felt she “had to do,” had to go. Last year, Stefani claimed she was addicted to exercising, according to the magazine.
However, that all-or-nothing approach to exercise is what Stefani and other exercisers really need to rid themselves of, says Barbara Bushman, Ph.D., a professor of kinesiology at Missouri State University.
“Rest can be just as important to fitness as working out,” she says. Why? Your body doesn’t get stronger during exercise. It gets stronger while it’s rebuilding itself from that exercise. Overtraining deprives your muscles of the time they need to heal, diminishing results and risking injury. What’s more, people who work out too hard for too long may be less healthy than people who don’t work out at all, according to a review recently published in the British journal Heart. During excessive exercise, the body releases more free radicals than the body’s antioxidants can handle, risking harm to internal organs and tissues.
“However, rest doesn’t mean lying in a hammock. Rest should be part of your workout, not an alternative to your workout,” Bushman says. Unless you have a medical condition that prohibits you from exercising, physical activity should always be part of a healthy lifestyle. Putting exercise on hold for more than two weeks can lead to loss of muscle mass and a decline in fitness.
Have you been beating yourself up with exercise? Here, five ways to make rest part of your workout, improve your fitness gains, and love the gym again:
Full article here:
http://www.womenshealthmag.com/fitness/should-you-take-a-break-from-working-out
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