Recovery

I’ve been thinking a lot about this topic lately and have been trying to figure out how best to convey my thoughts.  I’ve decided to go with one longer post rather than a bunch of small ones.  This will not necessarily focus on how to do the various types of recovery – we teach you this when you train with us.  I’d like to talk more about how we think about it, and what it is.

Traditionally we think of recovery as many different things.  Sleep, nutrition, hydration, rest, stretching, mobility, myofascial release/trigger point therapy, etc.  Hopefully, you spend some time working on these different aspects on a daily basis.  I’m guessing most of us at least try to eat well and get a decent amount of sleep.  You can get by for quite a while with just taking care of those 2 things and working out a few times per week.

Hopefully you are familiar with Greg Glassman’s “What is Fitness” article.  I really like his “Theoretical Hierarchy of Development pyramid (shown below).”  This is a fantastic model for the generalist – aka: CrossFitter.

However, I do think that something BIG is missing from this model – recovery.  What I want you to start thinking about is that recovery = fitness.  If we break it down to the most basic level…  The reason you get stronger, faster, better is a result of 2 basic things.  First, you work out, break down muscle tissue, and your muscles rebuild stronger so that your body can handle that load again.  Along with this your bones, tendons and ligaments also get stronger.  Second, you train your body neurologically.  It learns how to move more efficiently and recruit more motor neurons.  During the time you are NOT working out is when your body adapts.  The key here is that if no recovery is allowed, you would never get stronger. 

So, now that we have that out of the way, why do we treat recovery like it’s an evil twin?  Yeah, it’s not as fun as a tough CrossFit metcon or lifting big weight.  You don’t get that great sense of accomplishment afterwards.  BUT, that doesn’t mean it isn’t important or necessary.  It could stop your progress altogether if you keep ignoring it.  I’m speaking from personal experience on this one. 

Everyone is different and has varying “tolerances.”  Where you are at currently, your personal tolerances and what your background is will play a BIG role in how much time you spend with recovery.  As you get further along in your training, your body can handle heavier loads, more volume and higher intensity.  Your body doesn’t need as much rest time.  Everyone knows this, right?  Here’s the deal though.  You need less rest time, but MORE of many other aspects of recovery.

The body is an absolutely amazing thing.  It is capable of doing so many things at one time.  If I actually stop and think about it – it blows my mind.  It does so many, many things right and we get so very easily irritated when something goes wrong.  Can we really expect to sit in a chair all day at work and not have tight hips flexors?  Can we really expect to repeatedly hammer ourselves with our new found strength without consequence?  Maybe - for a while at least.  I’ll use myself as an example. 

When I first discovered CrossFit, I went at it all out.  I made huge gains very quickly.  Strength went up, and clearly my anaerobic capacity shot through the roof.  I was doing insane amounts of reps that I never thought possible.  But after a while, things slowed down dramatically (as they do with most training programs).  But wait a sec.  Isn’t CrossFit supposed to eliminate these types of problems with its functional movements, constantly varied at high intensity?  YES!  It is, and it does.  As Kelly Starrett talks about, the problem is not with the programming.  The problem is with imperfect athletes.  This was me.  I was destroying myself day after day and it finally caught up.  I kept getting nagging injuries that would sideline and frustrate me to no end.  (*Side note: - proper scaling and personalizing of workouts plays a significant role in their effectiveness.  That is a post for another day.*) 

So what was the deal then?  I didn’t know just how important my recovery was.  I had reached the point where a 5 min warmup, blasting through a Crossfit workout and weak 5-10 minutes of static stretching wasn’t going to cut it anymore.  I was downplaying the important factors like mobility, flexibility, and trigger points.  Fast forward to now.  A typical training day looks like this:  1. 15-20 min warmup including foam rolling or working out any bad trigger points as well as mobility drills.  I really take the time to make sure my body is ready to go.  2.  CrossFit metcon less than 20min 90% of the time.  3.  Remainder of time (usually 20 min or so), serious PNF stretching and more work on trigger points.  A strength day is essentially the same, but longer overall time of the workout.

The point I’m trying to get across is this:  You better spend some time recovering or your body will force you to stop.  60% of my time spent “working out” on a metcon day is spent on recovery.  The more advanced you get, the more you will need.  Take a look at your volume.  Are you working out every single day?  Even the USA national weightlifting team only works out 5 days per week!  Are you scheduling in “back-off” weeks?  If you don’t have a good chiropractor – find one.  If you don’t know what a trigger point is – look it up.  Your goals, overall health and in some cases, your career may depend on it.  Start looking at your fitness from both sides.  It’s not a 1-sided deal.