Are Hot or Cold Showers Better for Muscle Recovery
If you are reading this blog, you are interested in the best strategies to enhance your muscle growth and recovery. Whether you’re a weekend warrior, someone trying to build muscle, or someone who participates in sports competitions, you are trying to maximize your recovery and performance in any way you can. This blog looks at the strategy of manipulating shower temperature to facilitate recovery, usually from DOMS (Delayed-Onset Muscle Soreness). To understand recovery, we first must understand DOMS and the role inflammation plays in our body.
Should we take the “Ice” out of R.I.C.E.
R.I.C.E., which stands for rest, ice, compression and elevation, is an acronym familiar to many. Whether you are an “average Joe” or an athlete, coach, doctor, therapist or trainer it’s fairly common knowledge that if you are experiencing an acute soft tissue injury, R.I.C.E. is the standard operating procedure to get on track for a speedy recovery. As medicine becomes more evidence based we look to research to support much of our clinical decision making. Does current research still support the R.I.C.E. protocol? (more…)
