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What Happens to Your Body When You Stop Working Out for Days, Weeks, and Months? (Outside Magazine)

Posted: Oct 06, 2026 in In the News

This article originally appeared in Outside Magazine on October 6, 2026.

Sometimes a brief pause or a long hiatus can keep us from working out, but what happens during that time, and can you actually lose all your fitness gains? Fitness experts and doctors explain...

“Our bodies are incredibly adaptable,” Jacque Crockford, director of product development at the American Council on Exercise (ACE), told Outside. “They adapt both to the exercise we do and to the exercise we stop doing.” If you’re an athlete, you likely know that brief breaks, including both rest days and periods of low-intensity movement, are essential for recovery, allowing you to avoid injury and ultimately optimize performance. But “if the pause is longer, some of the adaptations we’ve built through training can begin to diminish,” Crockford said...

Read the full article here.