Losing weight or maintaining it is never an easy task. It is an undertaking that involves consistency and diligence. However, with the sedentary nature of office life and the peer pressure to indulge in unhealthy binges at social gatherings, this consistency demands a whole lot of effort. However, a morning walk and a good evening workout can be a boon even in such a life.
Doubling up on daily workout sessions can take weight loss endeavours to the next level. If done correctly and with a healthy diet, working out twice a day can help you lose weight faster. The idea is to burn more calories than you eat.
Benefits of Working Out Twice a Day
Increases Training Volume
Working out twice a day has more benefits than working out once a day, particularly when it allows you to boost your overall training volume.
In addition, the advantages of doing two workouts a day get a boost if you squeeze in a 45-minute morning workout and a 30-minute evening workout instead of a single 60-minute morning workout. The repetitions will provide you with 75 minutes of activity, which is 15 minutes more than if you did just one lengthier bout.
Improves Strength and Endurance
Due to increased muscle protein synthesis, fat oxidation, mitochondrial growth, and power output also increase. In addition, increasing training volume by exercising twice daily can improve muscular strength and size.
Research shows that strength training two times a day results in more neuromuscular adaptations than training once a day. Muscle strength and power improve due to increased muscle fibre activation.
Also, working out twice daily can lead to beneficial metabolic adjustments that aid glycogen savings and increased aerobic endurance. It is encouraging news, especially for marathon runners.
Enhances Mental Health
Exercise has mental and emotional advantages that one should not disregard. For example, endorphins are hormones that improve your mood and give you a sense of well-being when you work out. In addition, low- and moderate-intensity workouts help the body and mind feel at ease and more relaxed by lowering cortisol levels.
As per research, challenging workouts, on the other hand, cause cortisol levels to rise because the body sees intensive exercise as a stressor. Working out twice per day can offer you a double dose of feel-good neurotransmitters, relieve pent-up stress, and aid your brain feel fresh twice the same day.
It Assists You In Fitting It All In
Many people have rigid schedules and cannot exercise for prolonged periods. You may get in all the movements and training you want without waking up early in the morning to fit in a continuous workout by separating your exercise into two periods.
Likewise, many runners don’t have the time, enthusiasm, or stamina to perform multiple types of exercise in one session. So completing two workouts a day can help them have different types of exercise.
Improved Skill Development
Research says that working out can lead to skill development, and how well you can practice relies on how regularly you can do it. Effective workouts include multiple muscle groups and different energy supplies. So, working on complex movements or preparing for a field activity, a single workout day isn’t enough. Instead, you practise your technique twice by doing twice as many workouts. Also, this pays off in terms of movement proficiency, strength and muscular growth. In addition, more consistent practice equals more focus, and more focus equals more progress.
Advice for Beginners
- While accurate time tracking isn’t required, you should have at least six hours gap between the two workouts. If your workouts are considerably closer together than this, you’ll be too exhausted to perform well in round two. As a result, most people find it most convenient to go to the gym first thing in the morning before work and then again after work. Going during your lunch break and then again later in the evening works fine, as long as you wait at least six hours between visits.
- It would help if you also keep your workouts to a maximum of 40 minutes, omitting the warm-up. But, yes, a decent warm-up and cool-down are essential for speeding up recovery, especially since you’ll be back in the gym before the day is over.
- An adequate cool-down (like 5-10 minutes of light aerobic exercise) such as running helps the heart circulate the accumulated blood packed in the pumped-up muscles. It additionally boosts the removal of lactic acid and other metabolic waste. Finally, it lets the muscles relax and stretch to their full lengths after a contraction during a good lifting session. If you’re continually exhausted, you’ll become tired of two-a-days shortly. Therefore, a rapid and efficient recovery is critical to the program’s success.
- When you exercise twice, you’ll sweat twice as much. Therefore, keeping track of your water intake is integral to training twice in one day. Since fluid loss can have a significant impact on your output, it’s vital to stay hydrated during your sessions. Drinking water throughout the day is sufficient to get you through two sessions. Still, in a hurry, half a litre of water per pound dropped during a workout should suffice.
- The pre-workout diet should primarily consist of carbohydrates, with some protein added for muscle development. Carbohydrates are the primary source of energy that fuels your muscles. In addition, protein can aid in preparing your muscles for strenuous exercise. Consume food one to three hours before your workout.
The HealthifyMe Note
If you are a beginner, it is essential to know whether you need to work out twice or not. After that, knowing the correct exercises to balance your fitness regime and supporting it with your diet is also crucial. Hence, you must consult a trainer to help you go about your plans correctly to prevent injuries.
How to Plan Your Workouts Twice a Day?
Naturally, nobody wants to become injured or harmed. So even if you’ve been exercising for the last six months and want to work out twice daily, you’ll need to be strategic about implementing your plan.
- More challenging exercises should be the first thing you do in the morning, and you should do less strenuous exercises later in the day. It keeps you on track and allows you to recover quickly after your first, more strenuous workout.
- Perform lengthier workouts in the morning and shorter workouts in the evening. Sweating more in the morning can help you stay mentally fit and productive throughout the day.
- Prioritise diet and water in between exercises to help your body recover and prepare for the next session. Again, this aids repair in the time between and after each workout.
- Include naps in your day to boost rest and recovery. Sleep is essential for peak function. Naps can also help with productivity, stress reduction, and attentiveness. As per studies, they even help you enhance your motor skills and endurance.
- On rest days, raise your calorie and nutrient consumption to assist recovery.
- Manage stress levels as it could delay recovery and cause fatigue.
- Consider including massage or meditation in your recovering days.
Workout Twice a Day: Who Should Do it?
Athletes
The practice becomes more specialised for athletes as they move closer to a competition or event. However, this does not negate the importance of keeping a healthy lifestyle. Keeping the strength and conditioning exercises separate from regular sport-specific practice will help stay fresh and healthy.
Trainees from different disciplines
Working for cardiovascular performance, strength, and muscle building can be difficult. Every training session has limited time and energy, and pushing both ends of the equation can be tricky. However, splitting one session into weightlifting and the other into cardiovascular training can help advance in both key areas.
The On-the-Go Lifter
Twice-a-day training offers a great deal of flexibility. Getting a hard workout while juggling job, school, or family obligations is tricky at its best. Dividing your routine into two equal-timed sessions, if done correctly, can allow you to achieve all workout goals without significantly compromising with significant tasks of the day.
Heavy Training Followed by Recovery
If you have trouble stretching post your regular workout, a second session focusing on recovery and mobility can be a good idea.
Whether you weight train, engage with more rigorous cardio or perform high-intensity interval work, your first session can include your regular, hard workout.
A recovery activity can then be added afterwards in the day, such as low-intensity cardio, yoga, stretching, or body rolling. Remember that rehabilitation is just as vital as a strenuous activity to reduce the risk of injury.
Cardio and Strength Training
If you enjoy weight training and cardio on the same day but dislike the time commitment, consider splitting your workout into two different routines. Start your day with the most challenging workout.
If you like to lift heavy weights, do your strength training first in the morning, but if you’re practising for a race, go for a run or a bike ride first. Then, at night, reverse the process.
Cycling Twice a Day
Overtraining and burnout occur fast if you complete two random workouts in one day. The correct method to plan your programme is to match the higher energy demands and maximise the fat-burning and muscle-building system.
Such plans are best suited for breaking through plateaus or for days you are highly passionate about working out, and the prospect of heading to the gym seems tempting. For example, cycling twice a day should be done for two weeks and one week off—to prevent overtraining. Otherwise, you’ll burn out and strain your muscles too.
Designing A Two-A-Day Program
One of the most successful methods to build your programme is to lift hard in the first session and lighter in the second. It allows you to develop your high-threshold muscle fibres—those with the greatest strength and growth potential—with a short, intense workout in the morning while squeezing in a longer, simpler workout in the latter.
Drawbacks
Organising Your Time
One of the most prominent disadvantages is having to devote a significant portion of your day to exercising. While there are advantages to training twice a day, it also adds to the burden of managing commuting, social or family obligations, household tasks, mealtime, and various other schedule problems. Therefore, even if each session is only a few minutes long, you must incorporate it into your routine.
Consumption of Food
If you’re thinking of training twice daily, you may also need to make dietary changes. Meals, particularly specific macronutrients like carbohydrates and protein, are critical in recovery.
Staying hydrated is also essential to make each session as fruitful as possible. Assuming you’ve reached a certain level of intensity, you might want to consider planning your food around your workouts to ensure you’re not overtraining your existing recovery capacity.
Overtraining Possibility
The danger of overtraining, injury, and emotional and physical fatigue is common in the workout programme of exercising twice daily, especially if you are upping the training load with your two workouts.
Since the body is performing more physical labour, it is natural that larger training volumes lead to an increased risk of musculoskeletal problems. Working out twice a day also reduces the time your body has to recover between sessions of physical activity and stress.
Psychological Impact
Exercising twice daily can raise cortisol levels, weaken your immune system, affect your appetite, and induce sleep disturbances. Cortisol levels will directly affect the intensity and frequency of your workouts.
Exercising twice daily can be psychologically challenging and has the precise impact of consuming more time and energy throughout the day, whether from the extra minutes spent exercising or travelling to a training place, arranging your gear, bathing, and so on. Moreover, as per research, the intensity and frequency of workouts directly impact stress levels in the body.
Summary
Pay attention to your actions and how your body reacts to them. Don’t attempt to push yourself any further than you can. Splitting the workout into two different sessions while preparing for a significant competition or occasion is an excellent strategy to boost miles or repetitions while allowing your body a break in between exercises. Combine the workout routine with a healthy diet for the best results.
