7 Reasons You Have Sore Muscles

Sidestepping these common mistakes when exercising can prevent achy muscles and joints

- Vera Tweed

Effective exercise challenges your body, making it work harder than usual, and along the way, there will be some soreness here and there. But how much is too much? The trick is to find a happy point where you know you’ve made progress but it feels good, rather than debilitating.

“When we get some of that good, kind of moderate soreness in an area that maybe we haven’t felt before, it’s a good indication that we’ve actually challenged the body,” says Cris Dobrosielski, author of Going the Distance, owner of Monumental Fitness in San Diego, and a senior fitness expert for the American Council on Exercise.