Feelings During Exercise, Part Two: Soreness
Soreness is not always the end-goal for a workout, but it also shouldn’t stop you from training more.

Good Morning!
This is Part Two of Feelings During Exercise (FDE). In this series of newsletters, I’m addressing common thoughts and feelings that the layperson has during the course of their fitness journey that can spurn questions and concerns.
For those who are embarking on their fitness journey by themselves with little more than a few google searches and an online program, this will be incredibly helpful information from a seasoned professional on how to respond to those feelings.
In Friday’s newsletter, I discussed Pain and why it’s a much more nuanced topic than just “ouch, that hurts. No more of that.” Today, I’ll be talking about soreness, a cousin of pain, but not to be confused with actual stinging pain.
Have you ever trained so hard (or for the first time ever?) that the next day you woke up feeling as if you couldn’t move?
If you answered yes, you’ve likely experienced an extended bout of soreness from exercise, which is excellent! This means you pushed your body past a threshold it previously thought wasn’t surpassable. Or rather, your brain thought it wasn’t, and so the natural neurological sensation that follows in the coming days is an alert to your body that says “recovery is happening.”
Soreness Explained
When muscles are sore, it means they’ve been contracted to a degree of actual tearing, but not tearing in the sense of actually ripping injuriously. Instead, these microtears set the stage for increased muscle growth and strength, provided you’re sleeping appropriately following intense exercise and fueling muscles with the correct amounts of protein, amino acids, and digestive enzymes.
(Read here about how to properly supplement protein and figure out how you can best optimize your fitness and recovery.)
But soreness can, at times, feel debilitating and downright hampering. You might consider taking a few days off from a soreness spell just to allow for that recovery to happen.
Today, I want to be very clear about one thing as it pertains to soreness.
For beginners, those crippling soreness days will warrant a day or two off. But for seasoned exercisers (those with a year or more of training age), most soreness can be trained through, even if you’re training the same muscle group at a lighter load!
That’s right.
You actually shouldn’t avoid training when sore if it’s not a severe case of delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS, more on this in a moment). It’s actually smart to train around soreness when possible to keep your fitness regimen going, even if that means dealing with soreness in another muscle group days from now.
When exercising for an extended period of time, you will become more familiar with aches and pains not related to soreness and the actual feeling of soreness.
Soreness isn’t necessarily a limitation of movement. Tense muscles won’t move as flexibly, but they can still move (and may even be stretched for some feelings of immediate relief, although research on stretching and soreness relief isn’t fully conclusive).
An injury or pain will likely inhibit movement altogether and cause sudden aches upon an attempted movement. Injured muscles will likely cause a more global pain, and you’d likely feel an injured muscle as soon as you pull or strain it during the workout (this isn’t always the case, but most of the time a pull or strain is pretty noticeable).
This is all to say that soreness is not pain, and pain is not soreness. Soreness might feel painful to untrained muscles, but it is not to be confused with exercise routine-impeding pain.
DOMS, Further Tips for Managing Soreness, Recovery
Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS) is a common condition that often occurs after intense or unfamiliar exercise.
This soreness can last for multiple days, and isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s also possible that you might not feel this soreness a day after, but maybe two or three days after a workout.
DOMS is considered a normal part of the muscle recovery process and is generally not a cause for concern. However, if you're experiencing severe or persistent pain for extended days after a workout, it's essential to consult with a healthcare professional to rule out any potential injuries.
Something of importance to note: When you become a regular exerciser, the frequency of soreness should decrease. With your body becoming more accustomed and familiar to exercises, soreness won’t always be a thing, and shouldn’t always be the main indicator of progress.
I felt that beared saying because “soreness chasing” is a real thing in the fitness world. You don’t have to be sore to have had a great workout.
Similarly, if you do feel sore after a new exercise or workout, that’s because that’s what it is. Newness to the muscles precedes some eventual soreness, and it shouldn’t be a cause for concern when a sudden bout of soreness comes about after a newer and tougher workout.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to High Performance Health to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.