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Working Out Twice a Day: Pros, Cons and Tips

As a personal trainer, I often get asked the question, “Is working out twice a day good or bad?”  A 2-a-day workout generally means having 2 separate exercise sessions planned in a single day. These workouts can have benefits, but they also come with potential drawbacks. Let’s take a look at whether this format is right for you and your fitness goals. 

Often, two-a-day workouts are depicted in brutal workout scenes like the Remember The Titans training camp scene, but working out twice a day isn’t just for professional athletes. Most commonly, it consists of 2 distinct workouts with substantial rest between sessions.

Whether you’re a bodybuilder, marathon runner or someone in between, athletes may split their training into separate sessions as part of a higher-volume training plan. This might mean separating weight training and cardio, or splitting upper-body and lower-body workouts to give different muscle groups more focused attention.

Can You Work Out Twice a Day?

The short answer is yes, but it’s more important to consider whether working out twice a day is the right choice for you specifically. 

While you can work out twice a day safely and effectively, it may not be ideal for beginners, those returning from an extended break or those looking to increase muscle growth.  

That said, if you are splitting a HIIT workout and a recovery session involving stretching or light walks, you may not be creating the same recovery demands as 2 intense workouts. This can be an effective way to build movement into your schedule while still prioritizing recovery. 

Whether 2-a-days work depends on your fitness level, recovery capacity, nutrition and scheduled rest.

Who Should Consider 2 Daily Workouts

For people who are well-established in their fitness journey and looking to overcome a plateau or take on a new challenge, 2-a-day workouts could be a wise option. Endurance athletes, bodybuilders and CrossFit athletes may use 2-a-days to increase training volume while working in scheduled rest so they can approach each workout with more energy. 

Separating sessions also provides an opportunity to prioritize nutrition, mobility, sleep and hydration between workouts. 

If you have met your previous fitness goals, simply want to increase your training volume or have an excuse to eat a few more guilt-free carbs, then 2-a-days might be a good option for you to try. And remember, just because you try something new doesn’t mean you have to keep it up forever!  

Potential Benefits

While I may love being in the gym for hours at a time, not everyone does. By adding a second workout to your daily routine, you can create more flexibility in your schedule and combine multiple types of training into a single day without having 1 lengthy workout session.

Being able to fit in a dedicated cardio session on the treadmill or stationary bike can take up a large amount of time and leave a busy mom or career woman with little time to add a HIIT or strength training circuit. Splitting these sessions can help you work toward your fitness goals without sacrificing other equally important parts of your daily life.

If you are looking to increase your training volume without burning out, splitting your upper-body and lower-body workouts or separating different muscle groups is another potential benefit of a 2-a-day.

Another potential benefit is the ability to approach each workout with more focus and energy! Instead of trying to fit strength training, cardio and other forms of exercise into one long session, separating them allows you to give each type of training your full attention. For athletes with specific fitness goals, such as improving endurance, building strength or increasing muscle growth, this can be particularly useful because each session can have a clear purpose.

Drawbacks and Considerations

While there are benefits, there are also some potential drawbacks and necessary considerations. No matter what the fitness goal, adding an additional workout to your routine places extra demands on your body. While not necessarily bad in itself, it can become problematic if nutrition, hydration and recovery are not prioritized.  

Athletes of all levels are at risk of overtraining when they allow recovery and rest days to take a back seat. This becomes an even greater concern as you increase your training volume. Additionally, you may increase your risk of overuse injuries if you don’t allow your body the recovery time it needs between workouts. 

To help avoid fatigue, burnout, overtraining and injury, be sure to use the time between and after workouts to hydrate, refuel and rest as much as possible. This can help you get more out of your 2-a-day program while giving your body everything it needs to recover. You may also want to consider implementing another rest day to your training week to help manage the increased training demands as best as possible.

How to Structure 2 Workouts in 1 Day

When structuring a 2-a-day, consider the intensity, muscle groups and recovery demands of each session. Pairing harder and easier workouts, allowing adequate time between sessions and avoiding excessive training volume can help you get more from each workout without compromising the rest of your training week.  

Pair a Harder Workout With an Easier Session

An easy way to structure a 2-a-day is to pair a demanding workout with a lower-intensity session. For example, you might complete strength training in the morning and follow it with an easy steady-state cardio session later in the day. You could also pair a challenging HIIT workout with an active recovery session such as walking, light cycling, Pilates, mobility work or stretching.

The goal isn’t to make both workouts as difficult as possible. Instead, separating the intensity allows you to increase your overall training volume while giving your body a break from high-intensity work. Your easier session should feel noticeably easier than your hard session and should leave you feeling better rather than more depleted.

This approach can also be useful when you have multiple fitness goals. If you are working to build strength and improve your cardiovascular fitness, you could use session one for weight training and session two for low-intensity cardio. The exact combination will depend on your fitness level, goals and ability to recover.

Avoid Training the Same Muscles Hard Twice

This is important. Training the same muscle or muscle group twice can be appealing because “twice the work, twice the results,” right? Not exactly.

Hitting your chest hard multiple times a day might make you think your bench press will increase dramatically, but the reality is – without adequate recovery time – you may increase your risk of overuse injury and reduce the quality of your second workout. Your muscles need time to recover between demanding training sessions, and adding more work doesn’t guarantee better results.

This doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t use 2 exercises that have some muscle overlap. For example, deadlifts and pull-ups primarily target different muscle groups, but both require core strength for stabilization. That doesn’t mean you’ve trained your core twice in the same way or need to avoid pairing these exercises. The important distinction is whether you’re intentionally placing the same muscle group under significant training stress twice in the same day.

Give Yourself Enough Time Between Workouts

When programming 2-a-days into your fitness routine, I recommend allowing 4-6 hours between workouts whenever possible. A useful benchmark is to schedule 1 workout before the workday and 1 after. If your schedule is more flexible, then I would recommend one before breakfast and another before dinner.

That 4-6 hour recovery window can provide time to rehydrate, refuel and recover before your second session, but keep in mind a longer break may be appropriate when both workouts are demanding.  

Don’t Feel Like You Need 2 Workouts Every Day

Getting the best out of your training week is more important than getting the most out of a single day. 2-a-days can be a useful tool and are worth considering, but not if they make the rest of your training week harder to recover from. If adding a second workout leaves you consistently fatigued or affects the quality of your other workouts, it may be time to scale back.

Be sure to use this tool to support your specific fitness goals rather than adding a second workout just because you can. Putting 2-a-days into your schedule with purpose can help strengthen your training plan while allowing you to stay consistent throughout the rest of the week. 

Remember, more exercise isn’t always better exercise; the best schedule is one you can recover from and maintain. 

Doing Strength Training and Cardio on the Same Day

Strength and cardio are among the easiest types of exercise to pair in a 2-a-day program, but there are a few things worth considering.

When combining strength and cardiovascular training into a 2-a-day, be sure to put your priority workout first. If your fitness goals include building muscle and gaining overall strength, prioritize your strength-training sessions. This allows you to put your best effort into the workout when you are most recovered.

The inverse is just as true. If you are training for a marathon or Ironman, prioritize your cardio by putting your endurance session first, when you are most rested.

FAQs

Finding the Right Fitness Schedule for You 

Implementing the right tools to help you reach your fitness goals can feel overwhelming when there are 1,000 opinions and they are all different. Remember, you don’t need to be a part of every fitness trend or routine to get great results.

Consistency, nutrition, rest and recovery are just as important as multiple workouts. If you are considering two-a-days, be sure to measure them against your fitness goals, and don’t be afraid to stop if you find they aren’t benefiting you. You can always try to implement them again later.

Remember, this is a journey, not a sprint. Set yourself up for success and keep pushing!

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