Check out the “Mash Squat Every Day” E-Book with 4 twelve week programs for weightlifting, powerlifting, super total, and bodybuilding. Find out more below:
Join Team Mash Mafia for weightlifting, powerlifting, athletic performance, bodybuilding, running, or a hybrid approach. This team is already taking over weightlifting, and I plan on taking over all of the other disciplines one at a time. Check it out below:
The Squat Every Day Learn 2 Lift Clinic is coming to Canada, and then the 3-Day Mash Camp is happening at the Compound. To find out more, check out the link below:
Mash Mafia Squat Every Day Learn 2 Lift Clinic
Recover Correctly –
A simple guide to recovering from training and competition
I feel that many coaches prescribe recovery work but don’t know how to correctly implement or perform the giving tasks. This is a difficult subject, as I believe that people react differently to certain methods of recovery. Your body is different to everyone around you, yes, similar but not the same. This is why, as a practical coach I am a big fan of going by how you feel, as well as going by the textbooks. I feel that if something genuinely makes you feel better then you should continue doing it as long as it makes you perform better in training and competition. So, if the science shows that what you are doing might not actually work, but won’t inhibit performance then carry on doing it. Recovery work is not just about muscles and joints; it’s about hormones too. If something makes you feel better, your hormone balance will be better. When our hormone balance is better, we perform better athletically!
When we take part in training or competition, we are causing our body stress. The body is in its sympathetic nervous system state or the “war” response. This nervous system response prepares the body for acts of exertion by dumping hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol into the blood stream. Although these are great for short-term performance as they help to increase alertness, aggression, blood flow, blood glucose levels and increase metabolism, they can only be used for so long before causing problems. Staying in this hormonal preset for too long can cause problems such as adrenal fatigue, which can be incredibly hard to get out of, especially if you are pretty dependent on high amounts of caffeine. The direct aim after training or competition should be to get your body in a parasympathetic state or “Peace” response. This will allow the release of hormones that will aim to restore the body back to homeostasis. Here, in this homeostatic state is where your body will recover and repair the effect of what you have been doing. So when your coach says take a rest day it will benefit you…take the damn rest day!
Soft tissue work
Soft tissue work should be a mainstay of any recovery protocol. The treatment of enflamed, tight, matted tissue can be the catalyst for being able to perform at your very best, preventing injury and allowing for consistent training and competition. There are various ways in which we can treat the soft tissues of the body. Massage and self-massage techniques are two of my favorite methods of recovery for my athletes and myself. This method of recovery is accessible for all and doesn’t necessarily call for the work of a masseuse. Self-massage or myofacial release techniques can be very easy, and cost effective to perform. My go to pieces of kit for self-massage are the PVC pipe and lacrosse ball. I use the PVC pipe as a roller and find that this out of all the options I have tried provided me with the “deepest” massage. For the same price as a happy meal you can get yourself endless hours in the pain cave, because trust me, this stuff hurts like a b***h if you are experience some soft tissue trouble, but the benefits far out way the moments of discomfort. The act of massaging a muscle or tissue is used to help increase blood flow through matted areas and aid with the return to normal tissue length. Increased blood flow and a return to normal tissue length will increase contractile productivity of that muscle meaning that the next time you go to use it, your going to get more out of that muscle. Think about that before you go into your next heavy squat session, this could be the difference between you hitting a PR!
Other methods of soft tissue work such as Active Release Therapy, acupuncture, dry needle, hot cupping and Graston technique are also great ways of relieving distressed tissue, however you will need the help of a qualified practitioner. Active release therapy and needlework is something I had done throughout my own rugby career with great success, especially with reoccurring quad and upper back problems. Active release therapy employs a series of movement and massage techniques to really attach the given area, along with dry needle and acupuncture his can be an effective weapon in your recovery. Graston technique is something that I have not personally tried but know various people have had success with. Graston uses a variety of metal tools, which are scraped and rubbed down muscles and tendons to disperse adhesions or scar tissue. This technique can be fantastic for chronic stiffness from scar tissue build up.
Hot Baths
I think hot baths are not used enough in sports for recovery. For years we have been taught that the horrid ice bath is the only way forward for recovery, well I personally tend to disagree. The act of cooling the body and in turn decreasing blood flow seems fairly counter productive considering that art if recovering from training or competition is flushing fresh blood and nutrients into the muscles. Now, although I just said that the act of cooling is counter productive I do believe there is a place for “cold therapy” in certain situations such as the treatment of injury. Stopping as bleed in a muscle from a training injury is one of those situations, so if one of your players takes a hefty blow to the muscle belly don’t start shoving him into the hot tub because Ricky said colds bad. What I’m saying is in the hours and days between training and competition, increasing blood flow and intern nutrient output to the muscles is what I try to achieve and using hot baths is an easy and effective way.
Salt baths are a great add on the hot baths. Adding salts such as Epsom salt to your bath can also help with the recovery process. The theory being with Epsom salts is that the salt breaks down in the hot water into magnesium and sulphate. The then broken down minerals are absorbed through your skin and help to relieve muscle soreness and stiffness, although not proven, again if it makes you feel slightly better then it’s a plus.
Compression
Compression is something I have done since I started competing in sports competitively. My father being a sportsmen himself, at a very good standard used compression leggings and shorts as a method of recovery and I guess that I just thought that this was the norm. This being over ten years ago I guess he was a little ahead of his time. Well-done dad! The act of compression simply restricts the inflammation and swelling of a problem area, usually the area with high involvement in your given activity. Dispersing the fluids that build up will cause less interruption in performance of the muscle.
Mobility And Active Recovery
I think that the athletic performance world is really embracing mobility. People are starting to realize that if you are stiff, rigid and missing range of motion in a joint or muscle, you are not going to be as efficient as you could be. Mobility protocols can be as simple or as complex as you want to make them. A mobility session can be a simple as sitting in their bottom of a squat for a few minutes and finding some problem areas to target. There are various ways to increase mobility, including single joint or multi joint manipulation, stretching, banded stretching and movement drills which use power bands to pull joints like the hip into the correct place in your hip capsule to allow for greater range of motion and development of mobility. There are a few people I like to look towards when it comes to mobility, and like most things I like to grasp from as broader spectrum as possible, taking snippets from everyone I meet, everything I read and experience. Some of the people I use for my mobility fix are, Kelly Starrett who’s most people’s go to guy for everything movement based, Stephen Braybrook a friend of mine who runs a company called the movement man. Stephen comes up with some fascinating ideas and observations on human movement I would give him a read if you get the time. I also learned a lot from my time at Mash Elite working on my terrible mobility with Ryan Karas, owner of Vigor Performance, Colorado. Some truly painful but productive stuff went on with my ankle and hip mechanics during my time there. My personal method for mobility work is to target a specific area, firstly working single joint then multi joint to take what work I have done into a movement pattern such as squatting or overhead pressing.
Active recovery is something that was introduced to me at a young age, and is something I’ve tried to use after most competitions or matches. Active recovery is just another way of getting fresh blood through the body, get the joints supple and prepare you to go again basically. Active recovery can be as simple as going for a walk with the dogs and doing some mobility drills when you get back, taking a barbell and doing some super easy complexes to get some blood flow. If you are super sore from training or competition try doing some active recovery every couple of hours, just 10 minutes moving around should do it, provoking a fresh blood flow each time. This is something I heard Stan Efferding talk about, and he believes this helped him break the world records he broke, so it can’t be bad right?
Nutrition
What are we putting in our body to replace what we have taken out? It is only in recent years that I have realized how pivotal a role nutrition plays in recovery, and specifically the quality on nutrient that we put in. When I was coming up playing what I would call an elite standard of rugby we had some nutrition advice but not much so my after game nutrition usually consisted of as many calories as I could consume as fast as I could consume. Although the need for replacing calories burnt is important I also believe that the quality of the nutrients we place in will directly impact our rate of recovery. This is mainly due to two facts, healthier nutrient dense sources of food will have a greater impact per gram than more refined processed foods and secondly, foods that’s irritate or enflame the digestive system will cause greater blood flow to the digestive area. Causing greater blood flow to the digestive area will in turn take away some blood flow to eh muscles that we are trying to recover, even if it were 1%, we are in a world where the 1%’s win things. Depending on the activity I vary my first meal after training but my usual go to is a 70/30 split of carbs to protein with very little fat within the first 2 hours after a workout. The reason for the low fat after workouts is because I want to rapidly replenish my glycogen stores and get amino acids to my muscles as quick as possible, and digesting fat will slow that process down. My go to carbohydrates after a workout or competition now will be a mixture of higher GI fruits with some branched chain amino acids directly after a workout, then 20 minutes later a whey protein isolate with a slightly lower GI fruit. I like to use an inverse scale when talking GI around workouts with the scale going 90-100 with the first 10 minutes of finishing, 75-90 around 30 minutes, 90 minutes after 60-75 and there after I try to have all of my carbohydrates under 55-60 on the GI SCALE, mostly these come from root vegetables and whole grains.
Sleep
I left sleep until last as I find it the most interesting, and I remember a study I read in school saying that the large majority of people will remember 80% of the first and final paragraphs of an article and 20% of the Rest, so I wanted to finish with something I feel most people including myself neglect. I feel that sleep is the biggest aspect of recovery and the least understood. The list of adverse effects that a lack of sleep can have on human performance is just startling. From negatively effecting hormone balance and insulin sensitivity to impaired decision making and alertness the toll that a lack of sleep will take on your training is huge. I fully understand, as a self employed person myself that people’s schedules can dictate the amount of time that they have to sleep, but what I don’t understand is when they delegate unnecessary things such as Xbox over sleep. If you know that you have to be up in 8 hours to go train or compete, then get yourself to bed because you literally are whittling away the percentages of your best performance with every minute you deprive yourself of optimal sleep. If you find it hard to get a full night sleep, taking naps throughout the day if you can will help with the recovery process, especially on your off day. Chucking a mid day nap in on your off day is a great way of getting extra recovery.
Overall I think that recovery should be seen like a pie chat, with different sections making the full pie. Leaning too much towards one method will not give you the benefits of a balanced recovery protocol. I also think that finding the best methods to suit your body is important and just because your favorite athlete does one thing doesn’t mean that same thing will benefit you in the same manor. Sport and athletes are evolving, and to keep up with this evolution we must be at our physical, mental and emotional peak as often as possible. In order to do this, recovery is KEY!
Thanks for reading
Ricky Mcfarlane
Instagram:THEMCFARLANEMETHOD
Twitter: Ricky_mc90
Don’t forget about the Mash Elite Weightlifting Team Camp:
We are hosting a three-day camp July 8-10 at the Mash Compound. It’s going to look like this:
• Day 1 Max Out Friday with the team and social afterwards
• Day 2 Clinic with Coach McCauley, Coach Wilkes, me and the team
• Day 3 Clinic about meet day prep and strategy, and then a sanctioned meet
We’ve decided to limit the camp to only 20 people, so don’t wait if you’re interested. Here’s the link to find out more: