What you do during a workout is crucial to your health. No one disputes that. However, what about after your workout? What exactly happens to the body as it cools down? Is it important to have a routine to follow? If so, what's best?
Although there are various opinions floating around, many scientists have come to a consensus on most aspects of the topic. They’re summarized here for your benefit. Read on to find out the recovery formulas that will care for your body after you’ve worked up a sweat.
A Little Something Extra
It’s no secret that exercise tears down your muscles, and you lose some of the carbohydrates that are stored in them. In other words, your body is temporarily weakened due to the stress that you put on it. Your job, then, is to build it backup and supplements are the best way to do it.
The reason why supplements are so important is because they restore key nutrients that your body loses when you exercise. For example, carbohydrates, glutamine, creatine monohydrate, and branched chain amino acids (also known as BCAA) all help your muscles heal faster. Beta-alanine lets your pH level find its balance again.
Since you know your own body better than anyone else, it’s up to you to decide which supplement is best for you. However, scientifically speaking, there are just certain things that your body needs to be able to recover quickly and effectively.
For example, those BCAAs we mentioned above are essential for muscle growth and repair — and your body has no way of producing them on its own. The only way to get BCAAs is through your diet. And, not all BCAAs are as bioavailable as others, either. Rapidly absorbed BCAAs, such as those found in Progenex Recovery and Progenex More Muscle, help cut down on recovery times in ways that normal dietary BCAAs can’t match. Progenex uses only top-quality hydrolyzed whey protein isolate, which is protein that comes pre broken down into peptide sequences that can be immediately absorbed into the bloodstream (rather than having to wait for normal digestive processes to do the work). The end result is faster recovery and reduced down time.
Plenty of Liquids
Your body needs water, and that’s doubly true right after you workout out. But that doesn’t mean that plain old water (as in, the colorless, tasteless stuff that comes out of the faucet) is necessarily the best stuff for you. Specially formulated recovery drinks and hydration-focused recovery formulas help ensure that your getting the water your body needs with the added bonus of including recovery-aid supplements to help get you back into gear quickly.
Consuming the right amount of fluids — meaning as much as possible — will help you get the most out of your workout both during and after. And while recovery drinks and recovery shake options are easily the most effective choices, if you don’t have any available you could potentially use coconut water, which is high in valuable potassium, electrolytes, and medium-chain triglycerides to speed up the process of rehydrating your body and rebuilding your muscles. That said, coconut water doesn’t do anything for force-loss recovery (your muscles ability to generate force) or rebuilding depleted glycogen stores.
Also, be aware that not all “recovery” drinks are as effective as some claim. For example reports that chocolate milk is an effective recovery formula are, for lack a better word, absolute garbage. Sure, the calories and loads and loads (and loads) sugar in chocolate milk may give you a quick boost after a strenuous workout, but so would a handful of pixie sticks. If you want something that actually speeds up and aids in the repair process, you can do a lot better.
Take It Easy
That’s not all there is to it, though. Post-workout muscle recovery obviously isn’t as strenuous as the workout itself, but to get the best results for your body, some amount of activity is still necessary. One of those activities is stretching.
Meant to be as relaxing as it is challenging, stretching warms up your muscles by increasing blood flow, which in turn allows nutrients to move faster to heal the damaged areas. Light cardiovascular exercise can accomplish the same objective, but stretching allows more opportunity to rest, which is equally important, and probably a lot more inviting following strenuous exercise.
Speaking of rest, nothing can replace sleep in your recovery formula. Even if you don’t take a nap right after your exercise, it is vital that you make time in your schedule for a reasonable amount of sleep at an appropriate time. And just like how there are recovery formulas for post workout, there are also recovery drinks for when it’s time to hit the hay. Progenex Cocoon gives you a nice, slow-release micellar casein coupled with a tryptophan peptide to give your body the materials it needs to not only recover while you sleep, but also to sleep deeper and more soundly.
If you can afford it, indulge in one of the ultimate forms of relaxation — massages. It keeps your muscles from tightening up and encourages them to mend themselves faster. Of course, it also just feels nice. Aside from that, rolling your muscles with a lacrosse ball or foam roller is another marvelous way to fulfill the same task. According to scientific studies, cold baths are also highly effective at cooling down your muscles and preparing them to heal, if you can handle that.
Recovery with Progenex
When it comes to exercise gains, the less downtime you can safely get away with, the more time you’ll be able to devote to improving your body and reaching your goals. Progenex recovery formulas ensure that your body has the readily available nutrients it needs to get you right back in the game. After all, the idea behind exercise is to break down and then rebuild muscle, and with Progenex, you can speed up the cycle in ways that just isn’t possible with other recovery drinks (and certainly not possible with chocolate milk).
Give Progenex Recovery a try, and see how it feels to cut down on the down time.
