What if everything you've believed about soreness is wrong? How surprised would you be if the best strength training left you feeling energized, not exhausted? In this episode, I shed light on muscle soreness. Most people think a workout is only good if you’re sore afterwards. Not true! You’ll learn why soreness isn't a sign of success but actually a big problem, especially if you have an autoimmune condition, and which exercises contribute more to soreness.

Muscle soreness is one of three things. First, soreness could be from doing a new exercise, not being used to specific movements, or doing too much. Two, too much time under tension in the eccentric loading phase of exercises. You’re either doing too many reps or too many eccentric dominant moves in general. Or third, improper nutrition around workouts.

When looking at impressive workouts on social media, for example, it's important to remember that the impressive workouts aren’t what those people did to get there. They worked toward that goal. Some workouts make you more sore than others. There is a significant link between muscle soreness, systemic inflammation, and the power of exercise selection. Less is more! Your workout doesn’t need to make you incredibly sore to have been a great one.

DOMS, or delayed onset muscle soreness, is actually related to inflammation. Muscle soreness is “damage,” but remember, not all inflammation and damage is bad. It's when there is too much inflammation that it becomes a problem. Women who struggle with autoimmune issues want to avoid workouts that cause excessive soreness, because they're already susceptible to being sore, and they're already managing the inflammation related to their condition.

Taking all of this into consideration, wanting a program for myself not to over-fatigue my body, I created Strength Without Stress. It's a collection of exercises that are concentric-based, where maximal load is when the muscle is in a shortened position, allowing you to lift more without soreness. Working smarter, and not harder, is the key to striking the right balance in your workouts.

Emphasis is determined by the time spent under tension, and if the targeted muscle is in a lengthened, stretched, or shortened position. Once I started masterminding my workouts so that I didn't do too many eccentric exercises, where the muscle is in a lengthened position at maximal load and force, everything changed.

A concentric contraction is when a muscle shortens as it produces force. It shortens to overcome the weight load to cause movement. A great example of this is a bicep curl. In general, concentric contractions don't cause soreness. An eccentric contraction is the opposite. It's when the muscle is lengthening as it produces force, and these are the special exercises that cause soreness. A great example here is a squat where you're lowering down to the ground and you're resisting the load that you're holding, and then you're returning to a standing position.

So the exercises that are eccentric, dominant, and therefore more taxing to the muscle, and therefore tend to cause soreness, are barbell back squats, lunges of any kind, Bulgarian split squats, Romanian deadlift, good mornings, bench press or a bicep chest press, chest fly, overhead tricep extension, supine hamstring curl, and push ups. My Strength Without Stress program combines all of my favorite concentric exercises with just the bare minimum eccentric exercises.

Remember, soreness isn’t the goal. Finding the perfect collection of exercises where you can actually increase your weight loads consistently over time, so that you experience intense moments during a set is. Strength training should make you feel great the next day, not knock you down!

If you want access to my 4-week Strength Without Stress program for...