Recovery.
Such a vital component to achieving fitness success yet not many people take it seriously.
Let’s take a quick look into why recovery is so important for muscle and strength gains, performance and fat loss.
First off, you don’t build muscle when you train. You actually break it down and rebuild it through recovery. As you heard me say before, the amount of lean muscle you possess dictates the rate of your metabolism. The faster your metabolism the more fat you burn.
By simply reading that statement, you can see why recovery plays such a vital role in your progress.
So how do we enhance recovery you might ask?
Well, let’s begin with sleep. When you sleep your body produces highly anabolic hormones like testosterone and human growth hormone. These hormones are key factors in the development of strength and hypertrophy. Adequate sleep is between 7-9 hours per night. Not only will sleep improve your fitness, but it will also enhance your cognitive ability, productivity and even sex drive. Like jacked traps weren’t enough! If you are only sleeping a few hours per night start to get to bed an hour earlier and work your way up to 7-9 hours per night. Your Mrs. Will be happy you did!
Second, is food. Especially immediately following your workout. Since you are breaking down muscle in the gym you need to start the recovery and rebuilding process right away. You can do this by eating within 30 minutes after your training session. Make sure you base this meal on protein and carbohydrates. A high quality whey protein powder and banana or two is usually my go-to.
Another way to speed up your recovery process is taking contrasts baths. Basically what you can do is set the shower to as hot as you can tolerate for 1 minute, followed by as cold as you can tolerate for one minute. Repeat that process 4-6 times. What that does is dilate the blood vessels when the water is hot, bringing in fresh blood and nutrients, then constricting the vessels when the water is cold, pushing out the lactic acid that’s causing some of the soreness. Try it out and you’ll notice the benefits right away.
Next you should definitely take advantage of getting a massage or, if you can’t swing that every week, you can use a foam roller. Soft tissue work like that breaks up tons of scar tissue and will help in the recovery process. Make sure you do some static stretching as well after your weight training sessions.
Last but not least, take naps. If you can nap for 20-30 minutes per day you will reap the benefits of higher test and hgh levels as well as feeling refreshed and ready to get more done. Some may look at taking a quick power nap as being lazy but studies have shown that people that take quick naps in the middle of the day are actually more productive than people who don’t. Try it out to see for yourself.
Well I hope you guys loved the post and start utilizing these recovery methods to become a bigger, stronger, healthier you.
If you have any questions feel free to comment below or shoot me an email at chris@tutelatraining.com.
Catch you guys on the next one!