The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of short and moderate recovery intervals during heavy strength exercise on performance, inflammatory, and metabolic responses in recreational weightlifters. Eight healthy subjects (age = 24.6 ± 4.1 years) performed 2 randomized sequences with different rest intervals: short = 90% of 1RM and 30 seconds rest allowed between sets; moderate = 90% of 1RM and 90 seconds rest allowed between sets. All sequences of exercises were performed over 4 sets until movement failure in the squat and bench press exercises, respectively. Glucose, TNF-α, IL-6, IL-10, IL-10/TNF-α ratio, and nonester fatty acid concentrations were assessed at the baseline, immediately postexercise, post-15 and post-30 minutes. We observed a statistically significant decrease after 30 seconds on maximum number of repetitions (p = 0.003) and total weight lifted (p = 0.006) after the bench press, and there was a marginal decrease in the squat (p = 0.055). The glucose concentrations showed a significant increase post-15 minutes in the 30-second condition (pre-exercise = 86.1 ± 9.1, immediately = 85.3 ± 8.2, post-15 = 97.0 ± 9.0, post-30 = 87.1 ± 5.3 mg/dl; p = 0.015); on the other hand, IL-10 increased post-30 minutes in the 90-second condition (pre-exercise = 18.2 ± 12.7, immediately = 16.4 ± 10.7, post-15 = 16.8 ± 12.2, post-30 = 35.0 ± 13.1 pg/ml; p < 0.001). In addition, the 90-second condition showed anti-inflammatory effects (as indicated by IL-10/TNF-α ratio: pre-exercise = 1.08 ± 1.32, immediately = 1.23 ± 1.20, post-15 = 1.15 ± 1.14, post-30 = 2.48 ± 2.07; p = 0.020) compared with the 30-second condition (pre-exercise = 1.30 ± 2.04, immediately = 0.99 ± 1.27, post-15 = 1.23 ± 1.82, post-30 = 1.28 ± 1.28; p = 0.635). Thus, we concluded that a moderate interval of recovery (90 seconds) during heavy strength exercise allowed higher workload, IL-10 levels, and IL-10/TNF-α ratio in recreational weightlifters.