Tag Archives: muscle soreness

How to recover from a big race.

Posted on May 1, 2023 | Leave a comment

Participating in a running race, like the Run United event this past weekend, can be an exhilarating experience. However, it can leave you feeling exhausted and sore. Most commonly associated with weightlifting, muscle soreness can occur after any strenuous exercise, including running further or faster than usual.

This soreness is called DOMS—delayed onset muscle soreness—and it typically occurs 24 to 48 hours after exercise. It is caused by microscopic tears in the muscle fibers, which can lead to pain and stiffness. The good news is there are several effective ways to treat muscle soreness to get you back to training for your next event. This is the topic of my Health & Fitness column in the Aiken Standard this week.

It is important to give the muscles time to rest and recover to allow the body to repair and rebuild muscle tissue. This means taking a break from exercise or reducing the intensity of the workout for a few days. This rest period allows the body to heal and can help to reduce muscle soreness and stiffness.

Many people like to use heat or cold therapy can help to alleviate muscle soreness. Heat therapy can help to increase blood flow to the affected area, which can promote healing and reduce pain. Applying a warm compress or taking a warm bath can be effective. Cold therapy, on the other hand, can help to reduce inflammation and numb the affected area. Applying an ice pack or taking a cold bath can help to reduce muscle soreness and stiffness. However, cold therapy can also slow the healing process, so it may not be the best approach.

Gentle stretching can help to alleviate muscle soreness after exercise. Stretching can help to improve flexibility, reduce muscle tension, and promote healing. It is important to stretch gently and avoid overstretching as this can cause further damage to the muscles. Stretching after exercise or during the recovery period can help to reduce muscle soreness and improve range of motion.

Massage therapy can be effective in treating muscle soreness after exercise. Massage therapy can help to increase blood flow to the affected area, reduce muscle tension, and promote healing. A professional massage therapist can provide targeted therapy to specific muscle groups or trigger points, which can help to alleviate muscle soreness and stiffness. You can also do self massage using your hands, a ball, or a foam roller, too.

Adequate hydration is important for treating muscle soreness after exercise. Dehydration can lead to muscle cramping and stiffness, which can exacerbate muscle soreness. Drinking water and sports drinks can help to rehydrate the body and replace lost electrolytes, which can help to reduce muscle soreness and promote healing.

Getting enough sleep is important for treating muscle soreness after exercise. Sleep is a critical component of the recovery process, as it allows the body to repair and rebuild muscle tissue. Getting enough sleep can help to reduce muscle soreness and improve performance in future workouts.

Finally, engaging in light exercise or active recovery can help to alleviate muscle soreness after exercise. Light exercise, such as walking, cycling, or swimming, can help to increase blood flow to the affected area, which can promote healing and reduce muscle soreness. Active recovery can also help to improve flexibility, reduce muscle tension, and prevent future muscle soreness.

In conclusion, muscle soreness after a race is common but there are several effective ways to treat muscle soreness, including rest and recovery, heat or cold therapy, stretching, massage therapy hydration, sleep, and light exercise or active recovery. By following these steps, you can effectively treat muscle soreness and more quickly recover from the race or other exercise event.

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I took two weeks off from exercise, and today I’m really feeling it!

Posted on June 12, 2019 | Leave a comment

I have been traveling more than usual lately so I am out of my typical routine, including exercise. In fact, the last serious workout I did was two weeks ago!

I’m back at it this week, starting with an intense boot camp-style workout on Monday. And today, I’m really feeling it!

The soreness I am feeling today is called DOMS—Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness— and, despite how it feels, is actually a good thing.

Curious about what causes it and why it is important in muscle adaptations to exercise? Read more here: https://drparrsays.com/2018/01/08/no-pain-no-gain-pain-no-but-a-little-muscle-soreness-is-okay-even-good/

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Too much of a good thing. Can you do too much exercise?

Posted on April 11, 2016 | Leave a comment

Is it possible to do too much exercise? Given the fact that most Americans do not meet minimum recommendations for physical activity, doing too much may not seem like an issue. To be sure, the biggest exercise problem most people face is not getting enough. But doing too much exercise can have negative effects.

This is the topic of my Health & Fitness column in the Aiken Standard this week.

Exercise fatigue

What constitutes too much exercise? First, let’s review the recommendations. The Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans call for 150 minutes of moderate-intensity or 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic physical activity per week and do strengthening exercises that involve all major muscle groups at least two days per week. This recommendation can be met by a 30 minute brisk walk five days per week or longer, more vigorous workouts two days per week.

Many people do more than this, often an hour or more of vigorous exercise each day. While this may seem like a lot of exercise, they built up to these workouts over months or even years. But they almost certainly started out with shorter, less intense exercise sessions. As their strength and endurance improved they increased the time and intensity of their training. Even now, they likely structure their workouts in order to allow recovery time. For example, a runner might do a long run one day followed by a shorter run the next. Weight lifters usually alternate muscle groups on different days: chest exercises on one day, arms the next, and so forth.

When beginning an exercise program, is it smart to start slowly and work your way up to longer, more intense sessions. A common occurrence is that new exercisers do too much too soon. This can lead to severe muscle soreness that limits the ability to exercise on the following days and, in some cases, injury. At the very least, a negative experience can cause a person to stop exercising. In fact, one of the most common reasons people quit an exercise program is injury or soreness early on. Taking it slow in the beginning can help you avoid these problems.

Even athletes with years of training experience can overdo it. Athletes are known for long, intense training sessions to develop the high levels of strength and endurance required to be competitive. But training too intensely or for too long can have negative effects. This phenomenon is called overreaching or overtraining and, for some athletes, can be as big a problem as not training enough. Overtraining can lead to poor immune function, reduced motivation, and fatigue, all of which can have a serious impact on performance.

Many competitive athletes intentionally do less in the days and weeks leading up to a big event. This is a process called tapering and it involves reducing training time and intensity, even including a rest day. This allows the muscles to recover and reduces the risk of injury. While many athletes—and coaches—think that a hard workout or practice before a big game is a good idea, failure to taper is more likely to lead to poor performance.

If you are like most people, you are probably not doing too much exercise. But you should make small increases in your time and intensity to reduce the chance of injury. If you are training for a run such as a 10k, half marathon, or longer event, you should cut back on your training time and plan a rest leading up to the race. And while more exercise is generally better for health and fitness, keep in mind that doing too much, especially early in a training program, can have the opposite effect.

Nutrition, exercise, and health information can be confusing. 
But it doesn't have to be that way.
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No pain, no gain? The truth about muscle soreness and what to do about it.

Posted on April 27, 2015 | Leave a comment

If you exercise, especially if you lift weights, you have probably heard the adage, “No pain, no gain.” This may serve as motivation for some people, but the belief that exercise results in pain might be a good reason not to work out for others. If you are one of those people, you should know that idea that exercise should hurt is simply wrong—muscle pain during or following exercise usually suggests an injury. However, some muscle soreness is unavoidable, especially if you are new to exercise.

The cause of this type of muscle soreness—and what you can do to prevent and treat it—is the topic of my Health & Fitness column in the Aiken Standard this week.

sarcomere

This soreness is called DOMS—delayed onset muscle soreness—and it typically occurs 24 to 48 hours after exercise. It can range from a mild reminder that you worked out to more severe soreness, weakness, and tenderness. DOMS can occur after any type of exercise, but is more common following weight training, especially if it is your first session or a particularly intense workout.

A common belief is that lactic acid build-up in the muscle causes muscle soreness. This is based on the fact that during intense exercise like weight training the muscles make energy for contraction anaerobically (without oxygen), which leads to lactic acid production. This is in contrast to aerobic exercises like walking or jogging that produce energy using oxygen, with little lactic acid build-up. This belief that lactic acid causes DOMS has been shown to be false since any lactic acid that is produced during exercise is cleared shortly after you finish, long before muscle soreness begins. This is one of several commonly held myths about exercise that just won’t go away.

So what causes DOMS? It turns out that strenuous exercise leads to microscopic tears in the muscle, which leads to inflammation and soreness. This sounds bad, but the muscle damage is an important step in the muscle getting bigger and stronger. Your muscles are made up of protein filaments that shorten, leading to a contraction. When you lift weights your muscles respond by creating more protein filaments, allowing you to generate more force and causing the muscle to grow in size, called hypertrophy. The mechanism that leads to creating more muscle protein is stimulated by the damage that occurs during exercise. Without that stimulus, muscle growth wouldn’t occur. This is why weight training programs call for increasing the resistance over time to overload the muscle. Without increasing the weight, you wouldn’t get much stronger.

While the muscle adaptations that are associated with DOMS are beneficial, you may wish to avoid or limit the soreness aspect. You can do this by beginning your exercise program slowly. Resist the temptation to do too much too soon! Build up your time and intensity slowly over several weeks and start weight training with lighter weights. Remember, your goal is to begin an exercise program that you will sustain. Many people have quit working out because they started off with exercise that was too intense. While your goal should be to exercise every day, there is nothing wrong with taking a day off between workouts early on.

If you do experience DOMS you should rest those muscles until the soreness subsides. You can also try an over-the-counter pain reliever or applying ice to the sore muscles. If the soreness isn’t too severe, you can still exercise, but keep the intensity low. Weight training sessions should be scheduled a few days apart to allow for muscle recovery, but aerobic exercise can usually be done every day. If your arms are sore from lifting weights, you can always go for a walk!

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