Is it okay to do strength training twice a day?

There is never an absolute "yes" or "no" to this question. The core depends on who you are, what you want, and how much energy you can devote to recovery.

My friend who is a professional bodybuilder basically does two exercises a day during the preparation period. In the morning, he will do 40 minutes of aerobic exercise on an empty stomach and focus on the weak parts. For example, he had a weak posterior shoulder, so in the morning he would do 4 sets of face pulls and 3 sets of reverse flyes. During that time, he slept for 9 hours a day, ate 2.5 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight, and had the team doctor perform regular fascia relaxation. After three months of preparation for the game, he lost 8 points of body fat and gained 2 pounds of muscle mass. The effect was indeed much better than practicing once a day.

But for ordinary enthusiasts, there is a high probability that something will happen if you do this. Not long ago, there was a young man in my gym who had just been practicing for more than half a year. He got excited after watching online experts clocking in to practice twice a day. He got up at six in the morning to do chest exercises, and went to the gym to rub his arms after get off work in the evening. As a result, he just lasted for 10 days and lost 12 kilograms in bench press weight. He tossed and turned at night and couldn't sleep. When he went for a physical examination, his cortisol was twice as high as normal. It took him half a month to rest before he recovered.

The fitness circle has never stopped disagreeing on this matter. Those who support it believe that it is more efficient to split the training into two sessions and limit the duration of a single session to less than 40 minutes. The nerve excitability and muscle endurance will be at their peak, and there will be no need to row at the end of the training to make up the number of sets. The weak parts can be isolated and increased, which is more efficient.； Opponents believe that ordinary people do not have professional recovery conditions. Stimulating twice a day puts an extra burden on muscles and nerves. On the contrary, it is easy to overtrain muscles and even injure joints.

Of course, it doesn’t mean that ordinary enthusiasts can’t practice training twice a day. If you really want to achieve a small goal in the near future, such as preparing for an amateur bodybuilding competition or powerlifting competition, you can also try to adjust, but you have to stick to the bottom line: at least 6 hours should be separated between two trainings. Don’t hit the maximum weight both times. It is best to do the main event once. After weight training, focus on weak areas or do functional training. Make sure you sleep at least 8 hours a day and eat at least 2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight. Try it for a week or two. If you find that your resting heart rate is more than 5 times higher than usual, you have lost weight during training, or you are obviously exhausted and still have insomnia, stop immediately.

To put it bluntly, our bodies are just like mobile phones. If you use a fast charger and leave it plugged in, charging it twice is no problem. If you usually use slow charging and carry videos and games in your pocket every day, charging once is not enough, so don’t force yourself to do it twice. After all, training is the process of tearing down muscles, and recovery is the core of growing muscles. If you put the cart before the horse, no matter how much you practice, it will be useless.