Another thing that has become more clear to me over the past 6-8 months is that while a solid effort workout is great, the benefits of a workout are only as good as your body's ability to absorb that effort. Here is where I find many of the subtleties, and the real benefit of having a solid recovery protocol, is most valuable. If I can execute a tough workout on a Saturday, but my recovery takes so long that I can't go through another tough workout until the following Saturday, then I am at a severe training disadvantage as compared to if I am able to do another tough workout on the Tuesday following the tough Saturday workout. If I can absorb the benefits of Saturdays workouts more quickly, I can get more quality workouts in within a given period of time.
So, with that in mind, the following is what I've pretty much established as my recovery protocol (in no particular order of importance):
- Quality sleep and no interruption of REM cycle
Yes, you've heard it a thousand times. Get quality sleep every night. Get at least 8 hours. The big game changer that I've recently found is that if I wake up naturally, I am much better off. An alarm clock that wakes me up does so when my body isn't quite ready to get up because it's either in a REM cycle or coming out of it. - Nutritionally dense diet
Over the past few years, I've slowly overhauled my diet from that of a typical western diet (high carbs, fat, meat, sodium, etc) with loads of empty calories to one where more and more of my foods are nutrient dense. Oh, I still have the cookie now and again, and still end up drinking soda on a daily basis, but I've replaced white rice with things like brown rice and quinoa, reducing meat intake and replacing it with vegetables, and expanding the list of vegetables I am willing to eat. I admit, I had to cheat a bit - like having bad-for-you cheese sauce slathered over broccoli until I get used to the texture of broccoli so that I could eat it by itself, but it was a process. Along side with that, I try to consume a decent amount of protein throughout the day to provide a constant supply of amino acids to aid in repairing muscle tissue. - Recovery drink
Personally, I use chocolate milk, often with some protein powder added in. I try to consume this within 15-20 minutes after I'm done with a workout, with the aim being to immediately start replacing carbohydrates that were lost during exercise, replacing electrolytes like sodium and potassium, and protein. I like chocolate milk because it's cheap and effective for me, although many people prefer something like Endurox or similar products with less fat (the argument being that fat hinders some of the absorption of nutrients). - Ice bath/raised legs
This is something that I never knew about for a few years, but once I started the practice, the beneficial effect was immediate (as opposed to the diet and recovery drink above, which is hard to see the benefits of). I started with cold water baths after any moderate or hard workout - 20 minutes in a tub of tap cold water. Recently I've started an alternative of propping my legs up against a wall after every run - about 1-2 minutes for every mile. In both cases, the idea is the same - reduce the pooling of blood in the legs after a run to help prevent Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS). I've found this to be extremely beneficial, and do this at the same time I'm consuming my recovery drink. - Cool down
If a run contains any hard efforts, or an extended period of moderate effort - basically anything that will create soreness (which is separate from tightness) - a cool down period is essential. Regardless of what various research says on the subject of whether soreness is a result of lactate accumulation or lactic acid, the simple fact is that I find that a period of easy running following a hard workout reduces soreness, which enhances recovery. I usually try to make this cool down period at least a mile, but if it's been an exceptionally intense workout, either in duration or intensity, I aim for closer to two miles. - Post workout stretch
This is where I've been kinda stupid for a long time, as for a few years I neglected to stretch after a run. Everything was tight, I felt like stretching wasn't going to help, and it might cause more problems! I've come to realize a couple things: 1) yes, muscles are tight, but they are warm after a run and will stretch out rather easily, and 2) muscles seem to have a tightness memory. If I don't stretch at the end of a run, then I'm encouraging the muscles to retrain themselves to a new normal that is a much tighter state than I'd like (and what is good for injury prevention). It doesn't require much stretching - but hitting the hamstrings, calfs, quads and hip flexors makes a huge difference. The standing bow pulling pose from Bikram actually manages to hit pretty much all those at once (except the calfs)! - Yoga. Weekly. Whether I want to or not.
This is no longer an option. Over the summer, I didn't go to yoga for two months, for multiple reasons. By the time that two months was up, I was feeling like my old self again - and not in a good way. My knees were getting tight again and I was all-over achy more often. I ended up taking about 10 days off running and going to yoga 4x in that period before I was feeling 'right' again. It was settled - go to yoga once a week, if for no reason other than flexibility. But beyond flexibility, I find it sort of cements in fitness gains made from workout sessions, dramatically enhances recovery, and works wonders for injury prevention. I've unscientifically decided that one 90 minute session of yoga is equivalent to about 3 days of total rest in its ability to repair micro-tears and other things that one may not be aware of, but can lead to injury if left unchecked. - Fueling during a workout
Recovery from a workout actually begins with proper fueling during that workout. When going any faster than a walking pace (~20 min/mile), you are going to put your body into caloric deficit - and you will do so more the faster you run. Most people burn between 100-150 cal/mile whether walking or running (the number varies with weight) - and most people can only handle intake of a few hundred calories per hour while running. Similar situation with biking (takes ~40 cal/mile, but you traverse more miles on a bike vs on foot, so the end result is similar). So, if you are going to go into deficit, the best way to recover is to minimize that deficit. So while you can certainly survive an hour long run without bringing calories with you - if you want to recover from that workout as fast as possible, calories should be consumed during the activity. - Post workout food
After the recovery drink (which serves as the immediate nutritional solution), proper refueling is critical to replace, en masse, everything that was lost during the effort. I personally have gotten myself into the habit of a Chipotle chicken burrito (brown rice, pinto beans, lettuce, cheese, guac). The wrap provides carbs and sodium, the chicken is lean protein, beans provide additional protein, rice for fiber and whole grain component, cheese for calcium, and guac for omega-3 fatty acids. While such a meal may be a bit high on the calorie scale to have on a regular basis - after a workout where I've just burned 2000 or more calories, it fits the bill nicely as I'm not too worried about calories - and in some regards, calories are just what I'm looking for.
Anyhow - that may all sound pretty complex, but it's really just a matter of habit:
1) Bring sports drink along with any workout
2) Cool down period at the end of the workout
3) Stretch, drink chocolate milk, raise legs, eat food
2) Cool down period at the end of the workout
3) Stretch, drink chocolate milk, raise legs, eat food
4) Go to yoga on Monday evenings
5) Sleep like a baby
