Top Tips To Speed Up Gym Recovery

Writer and expert7 years ago

After a workout, it’s crucial to have a routine specifically designed for gym recovery. Without it, you can experience muscle aches and pains for longer than necessary. You're also likely to experience break outs on your face and body caused by excess sweating. To make sure you recover as quickly as possible post-workout, discover our top tips below.

How To Aid Gym Recovery

Recovering after a workout isn't as complicated as you may think. Believe it or not, the time which you spend resting is just as important as the time you spend in the gym. Simply follow our 20 tips below to aid gym recovery and leave your body feeling refreshed and pain-free.

Spend More Time Sleeping
Whilst you sleep, your body can heal and recover much more quickly. Also, when you are tired, your mood can be altered alongside your tolerance to training. Make sure to get enough sleep between workouts so reduce fatigue and keep you at the top of your game.
Eat More Protein
Most people are already aware that protein is incredibly important when it comes to working out. But the correct amount to consume alongside the reasons behind it are often unknown. A good measurement to follow is to consume 1-1.6g of protein per kilogram of body weight per day, depending on the amount of exercise you have done. This will help your body to rebuild muscle tissue.
Boost Your Carbohydrates
Similar to how protein is needed post-workout, consuming carbohydrates is essential too. As the muscles major source of energy, they refuel your body's glycogen levels. Aim to consume a small snack containing roughly 50g of carbohydrates within an hour of completing your workout.
Stay Hydrated
Dehydration is not only dangerous, it also increases the time it takes for your body and muscles to recover. Making sure that you drink enough during your workout and having 2-3 glasses post-exercise will dramatically shorten the time it takes to recuperate.
Get A Massage
Working out can cause your muscles to develop painful knots. Getting a massage post-workout can make huge improvements in speeding up your gym recovery by removing these knots and reducing muscle inflammation. Bonus: A massage speeds up the production of mitochondria in the cells, increasing your ability to create energy to recover quickly.
Use A Foam Roller
If you cannot afford to get a professional massage, a foam roller will be able to do a similar job. By rolling back and forth on the foam, use your body weight to roll out the muscle knots or painful trigger points. Just remember to avoid rolling over bony areas and remember to stretch afterwards.
Have A Cold Bath Or Shower
After a workout, you will have small tears within the muscle fibers, otherwise kown as microtrauma. Exposure to cold water will constrict blood vessels, reduce swelling and tissue breakdown, and flush waste products from the body. This is a good method to use to treat large areas of the body.
Use An Ice Pack
If you have exercised a small area of muscle, you can use the above method to treat it without having to submerge your whole body in water. Placing an ice pack on the area will have the same effects as the cold therapy from a bath to help aid gym recovery.
Take Adequate Breaks
As mentioned earlier, your rest time is just as important as your workout. Ensuring to take a 24-72 hour break between intense workouts will allow your body to recover completely, allowing you to get the most out of every single one of your gym visits.
Avoid Alcohol
First of all, drinking alcohol dehydrates you which will leave you feeling sluggish. It will also damage your body's ability to restock on glycogen. This means that your muscles may not be able to function optimally for up to 5 days, setting you back in your exercise routine.
Listen To Music
Remember how listening to upbeat music during your workout can distract you from pain and motivate you to keep going? Doing the same thing with relaxing music during recovery works just as well. Your mind will be able to focus on something calming to avoid overthinking and becoming stressed. Overall, your body will recover more quickly.
Remember To Stretch
During a workout, lactic acid builds up in your muscles. This acid is what causes pain and soreness afterwards. If you make time for just 20 minutes of stretching post-exercise, it will warm your muscles and increase blood circulation. In turn, this helps your muscles to recover faster from intense workouts.
Reduce Stress
When you're stressed, your muscles take longer to recover, and they don't recover as well as when you're relaxed. Either take time to practice yoga or meditation, or spend time doing something you love which doesn't require overthinking. You'll feel better for it both mentally and physically.
Do Light Exercise
After exercise, if you're suffering from aching muscles it's too easy to sit down and avoid moving as much as possible. Even though its stopping you from feeling the pain as intensely, this is only a temporary solution. If you keep moving around, your muscles cannot seize up and the movement will improve your circulation for a speedy recovery.
Take Multivitamins
Being healthy decreases the time it takes for your muscles to fully recover from a workout. To make sure that you're not lacking in any important vitamins or nutrients, take multivitamins regularly after working out and you'll recover as fast as your body is capable of.
Drink Cherry Juice
It's been scientifically proven that drinking cherry juice can help to reduce the swelling from damaged muscles. Drinking just one glass will also help to hydrate you, helping you to recover faster with less pain.
Take Time For You
If you always work, go to the gym and do things for other people, you're not giving yourself the all important time for you. Try to take at least one hour out of your day to just sit back, watch TV or read a book and enjoy being able to do nothing. It will do wonders for your recovery too.
Wear Compression Garments
By increasing the blood flow throughout the muscles, tight compression garments speed up recovery after a workout. To get the most effective results, wear the compression garments for several hours after the gym and once you remove them, you'll experience less pain than you'd normally feel.
Try Anti-Inflammatories
Sometimes, the post-workout pain is just too much to handle. If you've tried everything else and nothing is working, anti-inflammatories such as ibuprofen or aspirin can work wonders.
Have A Gym Recovery Grooming Routine
Taking care of your body and skin post-workout is important, yet often underrated. Not only will you look better on the outside, you'll feel better on the inside. Unsure of what to invest in? Look below for our top picks to aid gym recovery.