“The ability to recover adequately allows for another level of high performance
in your next session. Without proper recovery, it will take you longer to recover
and therefore longer before you can hit your next quality session.”
Long or short? Long are better
as they have more applicable
uses but if you are travelling often
and want to take the roller then a
short foam roller will also suffice.
Hard or soft or knobbly? The
firmness will really depend on
what you can tolerate, the
knobbly ones are pretty hard
to tolerate for most people so
I wouldn’t recommend one of
those unless you have been
foam rolling for a while and find
that the regular one is
not beneficial.
Pros: Cheap and easy to use.
Cons: Easy to mindlessly roll. Do
not foam roll areas of direct pain,
do not foam roll your lower back,
do not foam roll your IT Band, it is
not a muscle. If in doubt get some
professional advice!
Massage
Post exercise massage is one of
the most sought after modalities
to enhance recovery. At many
of the bigger mountain bike
races you will see tents offering
post race massage, but are they
providing the benefit that you
think they are?
A meta study analysing 22
studies (iii) of massage and post
exercise recovery found that the
most effective massages were
actually rather short in duration
(no more than 12 minutes) and
were most effective after high
intensity exercise.
Another point worth noting is
that no deep tissue massages
were performed but rather
more stroking and kneeding
massage techniques. There
were still positive effects from the
massage after strength sessions
and endurance sessions, but the
benefits were not so pronounced.
Pros: Just lay there and let
RECOVERYsomeone else do all the hard
work for you!
Cons: Not all massages are
created equal. Sometimes
finding a good masseuse can
take a bit of time.Stretching
The practice of stretching is
incredibly common with the goal
to reduce muscle soreness and
reduce muscle stiffness.
Research has shown that
stretching does nothing toreduce muscle soreness however
it is effective in increasing
parasympathic nervous system
activity. This helps the body rest,
digest and recover.
Tight muscles may not actually
need stretching, these muscles
might be tight because they
are fatigued, overworked or
weak. Stretching definitely
will not provide a solution to
this tightness but rather try
using dynamic mobility and
strengthening in this scenario.Pros: Free
Cons: It doesn’t work in the way
you think it does.Compression Pants
The makers of compression
garments must be doing
something right as the market is
worth more than $2 billion this year!
The theory behind
compression garments is that
they increase circulation and
potentially facilitate the removal
of metabolite waste products