March 16, 2018
Todays’ guest post is from Trysh Sutton with Pure Path.
Cycling, especially mountain biking can be extremely taxing on the body. The inflammation that is felt after such as workout is due to microscopic tears in muscle fibers, something that is completely normal and actually necessary for increasing strength and endurance. Before the gains of these exercises manifest themselves, however, recovery is important. Recovery can be slow or quick depending on what you do before and after a long or steep ride and below are just a few tips to help your body back to the starting point so you can continue to do what you love.
1. Rest
The human body has the ability to repair itself if you give it a chance. Sleep is also healing since the hormones for muscle building surge during shut-eye, while hormones which breakdown muscles decrease. You should aim to sleep seven to nine hours every night and short, power naps during the day lower stress hormones and promote recovery.
2. Cool Down
After a hard ride, it’s important to slowly turn it down to get your body reacclimated to it’s relatively rested state. While you’re pedaling hard, your blood vessels, particularly in your legs expand so if you stop quickly, the blood may pool and make you lightheaded. This blood pooling also affects your ability to carry fresh oxygen and nutrient-rich blood to the muscles and metabolic waste out.
3. Eat After You’re Done
After working out, eating is vital to replace what you have lost. Carbohydrates and proteins are important after hard sessions. Supplements such as branched chain amino acids tend to decrease exercise-induced muscle damage and promote muscle building and repair. High protein foods such as nuts, legumes, eggs, beef, and chicken are also helpful in recovery.
4. Recover Electrolytes
Electrolytes are essentially chemicals that conduct electricity when combined with water. They help the body in a number of ways such as regulating muscle function and rebuilding damaged tissue which is important after a hard workout session. Common electrolytes we lose during exercise (particularly due to sweating) are sodium and potassium and a hard two-hour ride could easily cause you to lose over 1000mg of sodium and 250mg of potassium. A 250mg drop in potassium isn’t a big deal for most diets but unless you eat a diet high in sodium, which has its own drawbacks, you may need to replace the sodium you’ve lost to aid your recovery.
5. Hydrate
Along with the sodium and potassium that you lose during a ride, you also lose a lot of water that needs to be replaced. On the surface, it may not seem like much but the effects of dehydration can occur quickly if you do not replace the water being lost during and after your ride. After you’ve been sweating for a while, your body will start to retain more water to keep itself functioning well. This flipside to this is that you’ll sweat less, causing a rise in body temperature which could lead to fainting.Furthermore, because of the decrease in available water in your body, your blood becomes thicker and sluggish which means that muscles won’t get fresh blood as quickly or efficiently, leading to extended recovery times. A good rule of thumb to rehydrate is to drink 1.5 times your body weight lost.
6. Familiarize Yourself With Essential Oils
Essential oils are organic compounds extracted from plants and they have a variety of uses, one of which is easing inflammation. Some oils, such as lavender, peppermint and frankincense, have analgesic properties and are quite popular for their abilities to reduce pain felt in muscles and joints and using them is as easy as mixing a few drops with a carrier such as olive or coconut oil and massaging into the affected area.
7. Massage
Massage therapy is also important because of how it influences the flow of blood around the body. Massaging the legs pushes out “old” blood and encourages the flow of new, oxygen and nutrient-rich blood to aid muscle repair. Thankfully, you won’t need to visit a massage therapist after every ride as that could add up pretty quickly!Foam rolling is a form of self-myofascial release. This is the removal of tension, which when left untreated can result in performance loss. Unfortunately, muscles carrying a high level of tension don’t adapt easily to foam rolling, therefore, your first foam roller session is likely to prove to be quite painful, but keeping it up regularly will make it easier and you’ll see the benefits with shorter recovery times.
8. Use of compression wear
Compression wear tends to reduce swelling, fatigue and muscle soreness after intense exercise. They work by making your blood vessels narrower which makes the blood flow faster, effectively speeding up recovery.