this is a dangerous assessment. yes micro-tearing allows for bulking and greater muscle mass and DOMS is indeed an indicator of that process occurring BUT When a man is limping 48 hours after the exercise and that is considered an improvement, he is not exhibiting healthy muscle development, he has been given an injury. if the reaction is this intense you've guaranteed the opposite effects you wanted from working out (ever wonder why some people have muscles that bulge out like bubbles and are not uniform to the body's overall frame? it's because somebody was too intense with a workout and permanently damaged the muscle,)I suppose my description was a bit more hyperbolous than I intended it to be. To put it another way, I had to plan my path around campus based on how I can avoid stairs for the next week. Surprisingly going down stairs was worse than going up. If you do an intense leg work out after such a long time not working them out, they'll suffer from Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness, which is nothing to be worried about. It's rather expected. Hell, I was a hockey player before I started going to the gym, so my legs were hardly inactive leading up to the gym, but that didn't prevent the DOMS. Kept getting back to it each week, and in no time DOMS was no longer an issue. Even my second time working out my legs after the initial resulted in a much milder and shorter-lived case of it.
Now he's already got the big one out of the way, he should be fine moving forward from here.
a body can't magically adapt to something beyond it's capabilities by sheer determination alone. slow and steady wins this race and showing humility towards your strength will always make your efforts fruitful.
yes but not to these extremes. Doms is simply a reaction and isn't actually making you stronger, rather it allows your body to realize it needs to "unlock" it's potential so next time it's better prepared. it's muscle memory for specific stressors. just because you can lift 50 pounds with poor form, you shouldn't keep doing it for example. you should hit around 65-80% of your max abilities at low reps (no more than 5-7) for safe results and that's for strength training. Dentetsu is doing endurance training in a body that thinks it's strength training instead. I'm telling him to do the parts he can do without pain and make substitutes for those that do hurt him because being sore and being in pain are two different animals.It's not magical adaptation. A sedentary body is not used to the stress of working out and has poor recovery. Our bodies adapt to many things, and it's not magic. You yourself even mentioned the concept of plateauing from continuing the same workout for an extended period of time. Your body adapts to the workout routine you have set up and you have to change things up to something it's not accustomed to.
“Although DOMS is associated with something negative, it’s actually a physiologically positive reaction,” says Dr. Szymanski. “Once your body is exposed to whatever made you sore, the next time your body will say, ‘I got it, I’ll protect you.’ It’s actually a beautiful thing.” http://www.runnersworld.com/race-training/why-delayed-onset-muscle-soreness-good-thing
Pain is an indicator of a problem. The body is rejecting further stressors to protect itself when it is in pain; not adjusting to stressors so it can be more prepared for next time. I seriously believe you don't understand that or you didn't fully grasp Dentetsu's situation.