Ask the Experts: An Injury Forced Me To Stop Training. How Much Muscle Will I Lose?
Ask the Experts: An Injury Forced Me To Stop Training. How Much Muscle Will I Lose?
A: Everybody is different when it comes to muscle atrophy, so it’s hard to pin down an exact time or amount of muscle you might lose. How frequently you train, the type of workouts you do, what you’re eating—all of those factors can affect muscle loss. So can your level of immobility. For example, if a part of your body is completely immobilized in a cast, it’s going to accelerate atrophy.
But here’s the good news: You should be in the clear since you’ve only been out of training for five weeks. Studies have found that muscle atrophy in active individuals—like athletes who ordinarily do train regularly—doesn’t occur until at least 12 weeks, and maybe even up to 31 weeks. [1,2]
You may feel a loss of strength or power when you do hit the gym again. That’s because your nervous system can “forget” the movements it performed during training, or is no longer accustomed to the load. But you should recover from that in about two weeks.
References:
1) Anderson, L., Anderson, J., Magnusson, P., Suetta, C., Madsen, J., Christensen, L., et al. (2005). Changes in the human muscle force-velocity relationship in response to resistance training and subsequent detraining. Journal of Applied Physiology , 87-94.
2) Kenney, W., Wilmore, J., & Costill, D. (2011). Physiology of Sport and Exercise.
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Ask the Experts: An Injury Forced Me To Stop Training. How Much Muscle Will I Lose?
Ask the Experts: An Injury Forced Me To Stop Training. How Much Muscle Will I Lose?
A: Everybody is different when it comes to muscle atrophy, so it’s hard to pin down an exact time or amount of muscle you might lose. How frequently you train, the type of workouts you do, what you’re eating—all of those factors can affect muscle loss. So can your level of immobility. For example, if a part of your body is completely immobilized in a cast, it’s going to accelerate atrophy.
But here’s the good news: You should be in the clear since you’ve only been out of training for five weeks. Studies have found that muscle atrophy in active individuals—like athletes who ordinarily do train regularly—doesn’t occur until at least 12 weeks, and maybe even up to 31 weeks. [1,2]
You may feel a loss of strength or power when you do hit the gym again. That’s because your nervous system can “forget” the movements it performed during training, or is no longer accustomed to the load. But you should recover from that in about two weeks.
References:
1) Anderson, L., Anderson, J., Magnusson, P., Suetta, C., Madsen, J., Christensen, L., et al. (2005). Changes in the human muscle force-velocity relationship in response to resistance training and subsequent detraining. Journal of Applied Physiology , 87-94.
2) Kenney, W., Wilmore, J., & Costill, D. (2011). Physiology of Sport and Exercise.