By Kerry, Owner & Head Coach, CrossFit Arvada
I want to tell you about a conversation I had with one of our members a few months ago.
She’s in her late 40s, been with us for a couple of years, and she pulled me aside after class with that look I’ve learned to recognize. A little frustrated. A little embarrassed. She said: “Kerry, I’m doing everything right. I’m showing up five days a week. Why does my body feel like it’s fighting me?”
I knew the answer before she finished the sentence.
She wasn’t recovering.
The Mistake I See Most Often — At Every Age
Here’s what a lot of people believe, especially when they’re finally fired up about fitness: more is always better. More days, more intensity, more pushing through. Rest feels like laziness. A recovery day feels like a day you’re falling behind.
I believed this too, once. Back when I was a newer member in 2012 and couldn’t get enough of what this gym was giving me. I wanted to be here every single day. And my body eventually had a very firm conversation with me about that.
The truth — and I say this as someone who has been a nurse, a member, a coach, and now the owner of this gym for the last six years — is that the workout is the stimulus. Recovery is where the actual progress happens.
Let me say that again, because it’s important:
You don’t get stronger during the workout. You get stronger during the recovery.
The workout breaks down muscle tissue and stresses your systems. Sleep, rest, nutrition, and mobility work are what allow your body to rebuild — stronger, more resilient, more capable than before. Skip that part, and you’re just breaking yourself down over and over without giving your body the chance to come back better.
Why Recovery Changes As You Get Older
This is the part I really want to talk about, because it’s the thing that isn’t discussed nearly enough in the fitness world.
At 25, you can push hard five days a week, sleep six hours, eat whatever, and bounce back by Tuesday. I remember that body. I no longer have it, and most of our members don’t either — and that’s completely okay.
At 45, at 54, at 67, the equation shifts. It doesn’t mean you can’t work hard — our 83-year-old member would have something to say about that. It means that recovery has to become part of the program, not an afterthought.
As we age, a few things change that matter enormously:
Our muscles take longer to repair. Our joints need more deliberate care. Our sleep, which is where much of the hormonal recovery magic happens, often gets shorter or lighter. And the cumulative stress of life — work, family, all of it — sits in our bodies in ways it didn’t when we were younger.
This isn’t a weakness. It’s just physiology. And once you understand it and work with it instead of against it, everything changes.
What Recovery Actually Looks Like
I want to make this concrete, because “recovery” can sound vague and abstract. In practice, it comes down to a handful of things that most of us are undervaluing.
Sleep. I know, I know. But nothing — not ice baths, not supplements, not foam rolling — comes close to what a full night of sleep does for your body. This is where muscle repairs, where hormones reset, where your brain processes stress. Seven to nine hours is the target. If you’re sleeping five and wondering why you feel beat up all the time, there’s your answer.
Rest days. Two rest days per week is a minimum, not a luxury. On those days, your body is doing the work you trained for. A gentle walk, some stretching, time outside — that’s a perfect rest day. Lying on the couch is fine too. Both count.
Mobility and stretching. The ten minutes after class when people are chatting and rolling up their jump ropes? That’s when I try to get our members to roll out, stretch, and breathe. It’s not glamorous, but it’s the difference between feeling good at 60 and feeling stiff and achy at 60. As a nurse, I’ve watched people lose decades of quality life to joint immobility that was preventable.
Nutrition and hydration. You cannot out-train a body that isn’t fueled. Protein after a workout, water throughout the day, enough food to actually support the energy you’re expending. I’m not here to give nutrition prescriptions — but I will say that undereating while overtraining is one of the most common patterns I see, especially in women.
Listening to your body. This one is the hardest, and it’s the most important. There is a difference between “I’m a little tired and don’t feel like going” and “my body is genuinely telling me it needs a day.” Learning to tell the difference takes time, and it takes honesty with yourself. Our coaches are always here to help you figure out which one it is.
What I Tell Every Member Who Pushes Too Hard
I pull them aside — just like that member a few months ago — and I tell them something that surprises almost everyone the first time they hear it:
Taking a rest day is not falling behind. It’s part of the training.
The elite athletes you see at the CrossFit Games? They have entire teams dedicated to their recovery. Coaches, physical therapists, sleep specialists. They take recovery just as seriously as the workout itself — because at the highest levels, that’s where the performance gap lives.
You don’t have to be a Games athlete for this to apply to you. Whether you’re 28 or 68, whether you’ve been training for six months or six years, the principle is the same: your body needs time to absorb the work you’re putting in.
A Note From the Nurse in Me
I spent years in healthcare watching the long-term cost of people ignoring what their bodies were telling them. Not just in terms of injury — though that’s real — but in terms of burnout, inflammation, chronic pain, and a complicated relationship with movement that sometimes lasted decades.
One of the things I love most about what we do at CrossFit Arvada is that we coach the whole picture. Not just the workout, but the sleep, the nutrition, the rest days, the check-ins. When a coach notices you’ve been in every day for two weeks and asks how you’re feeling, that’s not small talk. That’s part of the job.
We want you here for the long haul. A sustainable fitness practice that supports your life at 54, at 64, at 74 — that’s the goal. Not burning bright for three months and then disappearing because your body finally said enough.
The Bottom Line
Work hard. Show up consistently. Push yourself — safely, with coaching, at your own pace.
And then go home and sleep. Eat something good. Stretch your hips. Take Sunday off without guilt.
That is the full program. And the members who embrace all of it — not just the hard parts — are the ones I watch transform year after year, decade after decade.
Our 83-year-old member didn’t get to 83 moving well by accident. She takes her recovery seriously. So does our 71-year-old who outlifts people half his age. So does the 55-year-old who came in two years ago barely able to get off the floor and now coaches her grandkids’ soccer team.
Recovery isn’t the soft part of fitness. It’s the secret ingredient.
We Coach All Of It
At CrossFit Arvada, you’re not just getting a workout. You’re getting coaches who care about what happens between the workouts too.
Come talk to us. Come try a free class. Come find out what a fitness practice that actually respects your body — at any age — feels like.
📍 14700 W 66th Pl #6, Arvada, CO 80004 📞 (720) 331-8891 🌐 crossfitarvada.com
Classes available mornings, evenings, and Saturdays. All fitness levels welcome.
Kerry joined CrossFit Arvada as a member on day one in 2012. She became a coach in 2015 and took over as owner in 2020. A former nurse, she brings a background in preventive health to everything she teaches — including the importance of rest.
