This year the family had a very special trip planned for Christmas and I planned for a full 2 weeks COMPLETELY OFF from working out.  So, before we get into the meat of the post please check out the first 5 minutes of the video above –  Mr. R is documenting our trip to CUBA to spend time with our family this holiday season.  So, stay tuned for my Cuba post coming soon including the full video.

Many people talk about how much time the body needs to recoup from long durations of working out.  I normally do 1 week COMPLETELY off after about 8-12 weeks of working out.  Even in P90X the “recovery” week includes workouts.  But, excluding the P90X program, I do try and take a full week COMPLETELY off every 12 weeks.  The recovery week is just that – time for your body to COMPLETELY recover. But is a week enough?

I personally say YES!

I just took 2 weeks COMPLETELY off from working out and about died when I got back into my current P90X + P90X2 Hybrid session.  Take it from me – a week is enough.  It is what I have been doing for years and I just (by “just” I mean this exact week) came back from 2 weeks and it was brutal.  Yeah, I think I’ll be back in about 2 weeks…but there’s another major point other than recovery we need to address.

There is a slippery slope when it comes to taking time off from working out.  For people who truly have changed their lifestyles (when working out has become an ingrained habit) after about a week your body will be itching for a workout…it’s almost like your body is craving a workout…it’s like withdrawal symptoms from not working out!  If this happens to you – CONGRATS!  Seriously, this is awesome and something worth acknowledging.

But the longer you go without working out the easier it becomes to not workout!

This is especially true for beginners…so I’d say DON’T TAKE MORE THAN A FULL WEEK OFF!

I truly believe two weeks is too much, a half week too little, and a week is just right!