Recovery Time

[Lizard]

I was going to go to the gym today but I don't feel that my muscles have fully recovered from last time (day before yesterday), there is still some soreness. Is two days always enough time to recover? I've been eating plenty of protein but havn't slept as well as I should. If I don't go today I might have to wait two days.

[Tom Yum]

I know what you mean. If you're just starting, be carefull not to overstrain yourself. The soarness wears down as you get further into a strength program.

When I picked up where I left off, I eased back into training by doing 12-15 reps for about 2 weeks and then moved into the sub 10 (strength building) rep sequence.

Stretch your muscles, get a good 15-20 min warmup and use good form on your lifts.

[Thai Bri]

I've seen experts write that this soreness (DOMS - delayed onset muscle soreness) isn't actually an indicator of whether or not you're recovered. Your body will tell you that by your progress, or lack of, at the next session.

As a beginner 3 times a week is fine. When you get more experienced you'll probably need to reduce it to twice a week, or maybe even 3 times every two weeks.

Many lifters split their programme (a simple way would be legs/torso one session, arms, chest the next etc) so that they can still train often yet allow different muscle groups to get enough rest.

[Tim Mousel]

If you're an advanced lifter you may want to take that extra day for recovery. It's possible you could be overtraining.

If you're on a beginner level of lifting, you should go ahead and lift after 48 hours of recovery time. Sometime the best way to get rid of the soreness is to workout. Just be sure to get a good warmup, statically stretch the sore muscles and try to avoid eccentric contractions as much as possible as they theorized to contribute to soreness.

Tim

[Lizard]

Actualy I quite like the soreness, it lets me know that I've excersised. Well I decided not to go that time because I was unsure. But tomorrow I will definately go, I'm really looking forward to it. It sounds crazy but it actualy helps if I imagine being an orc (one of the big strong muscly ones) before I lift. That's psychology for you.

[Builderofmuscle]

I haven't felt the soreness that I used to feel for the past three or four months. I mean occasionally I'll feel my back being sore, or my quads, but that's standard if ur a martial artist.

Also, I don't think that bodybuiling-style routines are really that great for martial artists, but that not what this thread is about. But it's true that DOMS has nothing to do with ur recovery. MANY studies have concluded that comlete metabolic recovery occurs within 48 hours of exercise. If metabolic recovery has taken place, a muscle can be worked again via the same training method, even if the muscle is still sore from a previous session. Moreover, numerous studies have shown that training a muscle while it is still recovering does not adversely affect recovery.

[Disciple]

I would have to disagree somewhat with the statement that soreness does not correlate with the degree of recovery. Yes, muscles can recover in 48 hours, but this is all dependent on how many sets you do, how intense was the workout was, use of forced reps, supersets, etc. and lifting to muscle failure. A lifter who has some experience and is not engaged in circuit training (appromximately 3 sets or so per muscle group) should definately not train each muscle every 48 hours.

Try some of the above techniques (burns, forced reps, negatives, super sets, giant sets, rest-pause). They will make your muscles much more sore than standard sets, but more recoverry time is required afterward to prevent overtraining.

[Disciple]

If you want to speed up recoery from soreness for a particular muscle, do some light, high rep/aerobic type work for that muscle. This will increase blood flow to the muscle and help remove the lactic acid buildup. Look up the "Cori Cycle" in any biochemistry or physiology text if you want an explanation of how this works.

[Builderofmuscle]

This is a martial arts forum, so why are we training each muscle individually? I used to do this, and it has only made me slow. WHOLE-BODY movments such as olympic lifts should be utilized, as well as bench presses, squats, and deadlifts

tHE INFORMATION above about DOMS and recovery was from MuscleMedia magazine.

[Disciple]

I haven't read the Muscle Media Article, but I would bet that it contains something about circuit training or 48 hour recovery being for beginners doing workouts with less of a total workload.
There is a lot of crap published in body-building/fitness magazines. It's sometimes difficult to evaluate everything you read.

As for working individual muscles, whoever started the post said they were interested in MMA AND bodybuilding. I believe it is possible to do both. Also, remember that squats, bench press, deadlift are also staple bodybuilding as well as power lifting exercises.

[Builderofmuscle]

well, I guess that's true. The muscle media magazine has contributors such Pavel Tsoutsaline, and Charles Staley. I trust them. I don't read all the other bullshit magazines like Ironman, Musclemag, and Muscle and Fitness.

If your a bodybuilder, I guess that's all right. But I personally don't you can do both, because bodybuilder's aren't required to be powerful, strong, and fast, while in martial arts these qualities are crucial.

[Tim Mousel]

Actually, the lactic acid is removed within a couple hours and is not responsible for DOMS.

[Disciple]

True,

Bodybuilders are not required to be explosive and powerful. This does not mean that some of them aren't however. Many of the top bodybuilders include power lifting routines in their mass gaining cycles. Many of them also started out as power lifters.
Power lifting type workouts and body building type workouts bring about two different types (or components) of muscle hypertrophy. I think I explained something about this in another post. The type of hypertrophy caused by power lifting increases someone's strength and explosive power. Body building type hypertrophy causes an much larger increase in muscle size as well as increased glycogen storage capcity (in the muscle) and increased capillary formation, which together equal greater muscular endurance. I think all these qualities can greatly benefit a competing mixed martial artist.

[Biker]

Saying bodybuilders can not be explosive in their movements is to do them a disservice. The muscle fibers that grow the most, become the biggest on a cellular level, are the white, fast twitch muscle fibers. All that size does not come from training the much smaller slow twitch fibers.

[terry]

Dude, you got it backwards.