Rest Days

I sat down with Rick Pearson, Senior Editor at Runner's World to discuss rest days and recovery. 

Rick: In your opinion, should the majority of runners have at least one rest day a week? 

For most amateur runners, having at least one rest day a week is vital to give your body a chance to adapt to training. It's important that this is a true rest day too: not adding in cross training or strength training and being mindful if you have an active job. Missing out on rest days can not only hamper the benefits of your training but it also leads to a higher strain and can increase your chances of injury. 

Rick: Should inexperienced runners, as a general rule, have more rest days than those who have been running for several years? In your opinion, might it be wise for newbies to include at least two non-running days in their schedule, whereas a more seasoned runner could get by on perhaps just one?

It's worth remembering that rest days are more than just for physical impact, they are also really important for mental health and balancing your life. If you are newer to running, adding in a couple of rest days a week will help keep the motivation to keep your running going rather than causing you to burn out and will also help you balance family and friends so that you keep your support network as excited and engaged with your running journey as you are.

Rick: What factors other than experience should be considered when it comes to rest days? For example, what role should injury history play?

If you have a history of niggles of injury, it's particularly important to give your body the rest and recuperation it needs. Training loads the body and decent rest enables micro-tears and the strain of training to recover. Without this recovery time, there is a chance of increasing your injury risk. As part of recovering well, it's also important to continue to fuel well on rest days as this helps our body recover from the load we put it through while training.

Rick: Do certain types of run usually require more rest? For example, might it be smart to take a rest day after a long run and again after a hard session? 

Some sessions will have a greater impact load on your body and should be paired with reduced load days. The day after a speed or tempo session, take a reduced load day which could vary based on your mileage and experience from a day cross-training, a full rest day or a very easy run day. This will help give your body time to adapt to training and will reduce your injury risk. The day after a long day can be a good day to consider building in your rest day for the week. For me in particular I like to have a full rest day after my long run day so I can be focussed on all the other things in my life outside of my running and to get me feeling excited for another week of training hard.

Rick: Why are rest days a smart idea in general? What’s happening physiologically when we allow our bodies time to rest? 

With so much talk around stress fractures at the moment, it's vitally important that we remember that proper rest is one of the key ways to ensure our bodies are able to keep running for the long term. Running, cross-training, and lifting all cause the micro-tears in our muscles as we load our body beyond it's usual capability. Add in to this balancing our training with the stresses and busyness of conflicting schedules and we can often prioritise hard runs over good recovery. This will only lead to long term injury. It's important we remember that while a current goal may be important, running for many more decades is vital to protect - both physically and mentally. Give yourself the chance to allow your body to physically recover from the load you put it through and to mentally rebalance. Use rest days as a chance to fire you up for the next sessions.