How Long Will It Take?
If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen my stories this weekend about a headline I read: "How Long Does It Take to Get Fit Again?"
This is the kind of question that frustrates fitness professionals because there's no clear cut answer, yet people think there should be a "right" answer thanks to headlines and stories in popular media outlets.
Everyone wants an answer. 7 days. 21 days. 4 weeks. 8 weeks.
The truth is that every person and every situation is different, and anyone who tries to act like there's a specific, one-size-fits-all answer needs to spend a little more time working with actual, real, live humans.
How long it takes to "get fit again" depends on:
a person's base fitness level
how they define "fit"
why they stopped being fit in the first place
how long it's been since they've done physical activity
how much time, intensity, and frequency they can devote to training
how their nutrition, sleep, and stress impact their training
and other external circumstances, like health concerns or access to different equipment.
How long it takes to solidify a new routine or create a new habit also depends. Contrary to popular belief, there's no magical number of days to form a habit. On average, it takes about 66 days (sorry 30-day challengers!) but can take up to 254 days, depending on the person and the behavior.
How long it takes to actually see the progress depends, too, on things like:
what transformation you're trying to achieve
how committed you are
how consistent you are
and factors outside your control, including age, work and life demands, your health and your family's health, etc.
That doesn't mean there'snotimeline for things like regaining fitness or seeing progress!
It means you need to give yourself a reasonable amount of time --Atomic Habitsauthor James Clear advisestwo to eightmonths-- to make a sustainable change. If you're getting frustrated and it's only been 10 days, it doesn't mean what you're doing isn't working. It means you need to keep going.
If you feel like you've fallen out of a routine and you're wondering how long it will take you to get fit again, first remember that the sooner you start, the sooner you'll see results. It always takes longer when you wait to begin!
According to the studies inthis article...
After about 12 days of inactivity, you might have to work a little harder when you get back to the gym. Note: It might feel A LOT harder if you were inactive due to travel, illness, or a traumatic stress event, all of which can have physical impacts.
It takes about 3 weeks of inactivity to experience significant changes in cardiovascular fitness -- so taking A rest day is literally not going to "set you back."
Muscle size and strength doesn't really begin to decrease until after 8 weeks.
Oh, and my favorite takeaway from the whole thing:"The extent to which different people experience a decline in fitness depends on age, genetics, lifestyle, diet and prior level of fitness."
Like I said, It Depends. 😉
