Is Stress Stopping Your Progress in the Gym?

We all have stress, and some of us have far more than others. Sometimes, stress can become so great that it actually has a physical impact, in addition to the mental strain, and prevent you from reaching fitness goals. Have you noticed that you are not making the progress you expected from your strength training workouts? Instead of chalking it up to a poorly executed routine or waiting for more time to go by to see if you can get there, you may want to instead look towards your martial issues or overdue bills. Constant stress and pressure can have a major impact on your success in the gym. One study shows that persistent stress can majorly impair your muscles’ recovery process after a workout- and any experienced weight lifters knows that muscle recovery is a huge part of sculpting the body you want.

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In the study, University of Texas researchers surveyed undergraduate students about their current stress levels. The participants then performed a lower-body heavy-resistance exercise to failure. During the hour following the exercise, students with higher chronic stress scores took longer to recover their maximum strength than their unworried classmates.

“Your body is in a state of physical stress after a tough workout,” says study author Matt Stults-Kolehmainen, a postdoctoral associate and clinical faculty member at the Yale Stress Center. Think about it: Your heart rate elevates, breathing increases, temperate rises, glucose levels drop, endorphins surge, and human growth hormone flows.

A tough lifting session also creates microtrauma—or thousands of tiny tears—to your muscle fibers. In essence, your body is a complex machine that needs to fire on all cylinders to effectively recover from a difficult workout. (Get more valuable fitness tips and workout advice sent straight to your inbox by singing up for our free Personal Trainer newsletter.)

But if you want to pack on muscle and increase strength, mental stress can slow your fitness adaptations. (Though energy levels, soreness, and fatigue were not influenced by stress, the study found.) While researchers aren’t exactly sure how it plays a role, they believe stress may cause an inadequate inflammatory response, says Stults-Kolehmainen. And inflammation helps heal the microtrauma so you can build stronger, bigger muscles. Previous research has also shown that stress can increase your chances of sports-related injury and slow recovery after illness or surgery.

Now, we’re not telling you to skip the gym if you’re stressed out. “Exercise can actually help you cope with stress, as long as you dial down the intensity,” Stults-Kolehmainen explains. So if you usually perform three intense lifting sessions a week, shoot for one tough workout and two moderate workouts instead. Allow for a couple days recovery after an intense workout, he recommends, or else you’ll continue to see poor results and put yourself at risk of injury. (Discover hundreds of doctor-approved, do-it-yourself fixes for every sports injury imaginable in The Athlete’s Book of Home Remedies.)

Source

A study out from the University of Texas shows that students who were under stress lacked the ability to reach their fitness goals. The study examined the muscle recovery time of those students who were under higher stress levels and suffered from chronic stress. What the study showed was that their recovery time was far greater than their follow students who were under less pressure.

Researchers believe than stress inhabits the inflammatory process that is a key part of the recovery process in the muscles. When you work out, you are putting yourself into a state of physical stress, but those with lifestyle stresses and mental stress can be putting too much of a load on their system.

While working out is actually a great way to reduce stress, it is important to put better stress management tactics into place if you want to see a change in your body. Talk therapy and counseling of all types are known to be effective in this area. Learning how to better manage your finances, schedule and relationships will take a major load off- while you can’t control everything that stresses you out, you can do your part to reduce the chaos of it all.

Watch this video about reducing stress…