Day 95 - Grow Younger Every Day Step 9: Yin and Yang - Exercise and Recovery

Step 9 is all about covering both ends of the fitness spectrum. What I mean by this, is that even though it is important to exercise intensely and train with a purpose, it is also extremely important to take time to rest and let your body recover.

I find that most people seem to forget that your body recovers and repairs during your "down time". This is a time of growth, when your body repairs the tissues that you damaged, assuming you are exercising hard enough!

Oftentimes I see individuals who wish to "intensify" their training programs by making workouts longer, as well as working hard for 6/7 days a week. Unfortunately, this may do more harm than good.

I personally believe that if you wish to intensify your training program, stick to 5/6 days a week, intensify each individual workout by increasing resistance/interval times/etc., but ensure that you take at least 1 day of recovery and 1 day of 'active recovery' by doing lighter exercise.

I know a lot of folks who get rolling on a momentum high, and feel as though taking a step back to recover, they are going to not only lose momentum, but also the results they have gained thus far. Fact of the matter is, the opposite is true. The time you take to rest and recover is the time the body repairs and improves.

For a general guideline, if you are exercising intensely, I would recommend at least 1 day of complete recovery a week, 1 day of lighter exercise per week, and one recovery week after every 3-6 weeks of intense exercise. Recovery weeks should consist of a week of lighter than usual exercise. I highly recommend that you stay at least somewhat active, but just tone down the intensity just a bit.

Remember that a long life-long road of exercise and healthy eating will allow you to take time off from time to time to relax, enjoy leisure activities, and let your body recover and grow!

Quote of the day:
“All our dreams can come true – if we have the courage to pursue them.”
- Walt Disney

Day 74 - Michael Phelps' Super Jammies

Well, actually, I guess they are technically Under Armour's, but Phelps claims to wear the suit after workouts, swim meets, and when he sleeps. Either way, this is a pretty cool looking suit in my opinion, and almost want to pick one up, if not for the expensive price tag, just to feel like a superhero.

I have written about the use of compression garments in the past, and their role in performance recovery, although the study I wrote about discussed how compression garments aid in recovery during exercise by improving venous return and oxygen exchange at a cellular level.

Under Armour, on the other hand, claims that their suit helps recovery by reducing water retention in the muscles.

Imagine experiencing 50% less soreness, 50% less fatigue, and 30% more power after a workout or game. That’s exactly what Recharge® was built to give you. When you train or compete, your muscle fibers get damaged and take on water—making you sore. The UA Recharge® Energy Suit with its super-tight compression fit pushes that water out so your muscles recover faster. From world-class triathletes to MMA champions to pro football and soccer players, all kinds of athletes are recovering better and faster with Recharge®.

As I said, I have read and written about the benefits of compression garments in the past, and even use compression shorts during my workouts on a consistent basis, but these pieces of clothing should be taken with a grain of salt.

Sure, there may be benefits to using compression garments, including quicker recovery and performance enhancements. I am not disputing the fact that there are pros to wearing pieces of equipment such as this, I just think that the costs of such a suit may not yield as many benefits as may be desired, especially for someone who considers themselves a "weekend warrior".

For somebody like a weekend warrior, a well-structured exercise program, coupled with a well-balanced diet will do wonders to increasing performance. In fact, those two factors alone will more than likely place you head and shoulders above your competition.

On the other hand, someone like Michael Phelps may wish to experiment with such equipment, as even having miniscule improvements to his performance times can make the difference between a gold and missing the podium altogether.

Regardless, I always find it interesting and exciting to see just how far scientific advancements combined with human performance can take our levels of athleticism. I am looking forward to the Olympics!

Quote of the day:

"How long should you try? Until."

-Jim Rohn

Day 18 - Foam Rolling Advice (Video)

Quote of the day:

"Success is not a destination, it's a journey."
~Zig Ziglar

Warrior Training

***Things just got even crazier! Click here to see my revised schedule, including training for TOUGH MUDDER!***

Even though I just started week 6 of my 9-week mass-building phase, I am already gearing up for what I plan on doing following my meatheadedness (is that a word?). Part of the fun of being fit and active is being able to focus on your goals. Part of the fun of goals is being able to change them from time to time based on your aspirations or mood at different times of the year.

Last year, I competed in a Warrior Dash run. It was my first time competing in such an event, and I had a blast. I had so much fun, in fact, that I have decided to register and compete again on Saturday July 21st.

I would be lying if I didn't say that I thought the Warrior Dash last year was going to be easy. Come on, I am a guy who stays very active with hockey, P90X, Insanity, Asylum, etc. I figured a silly 5km run would be, well, a walk in the park. I was wrong.

I did fairly well at the event, finishing in around the 30min mark from what I remember, but I wasn't anticipating the amount of hills involved with the course I ran. To be honest, for those of you familiar with "mud-runs" like Warrior Dash, I felt the 'obstacles' were fairly simple and easy, I didn't really have a problem with them at all. But as I mentioned before, there were a lot of hills to run up and down. The event I attended was held at a ski resort, so the entire race wound its way up and down ski hills - steep ones - so I certainly was gassed by the end!

On top of all of that, my training, or lack thereof, could've been better. Now I will not admit to being a great distance runner, but I certainly knew that when I finished that race, that I could have done better.

As I said, I was very active leading up to Warrior Dash last year, but my activity was not really focused on what I was to be competing in. Sure, I was doing some leg work, some upper body work, and even some cardio, but none of that was really becoming specific enough to maximize my results at the race. On top of all of that, I was completely naive in thinking that doing Tony Horton's P90X MC2 One on One: Base & Back the day before the race wasn't going to hinder my results. I have touched on this in the past before as well, speaking about proper recovery.

Any individual who trains for a specific event should know that the recovery time is just as important - if not more important than the training itself. Your training should be aimed at making your physical performance peak at the right time. You can be a very active person, but your body is constantly progressing through different stages of repair and/or known as the "General Adaptation Syndrome". Professional athletes know this, as they attempt to get their physical abilities to peak right at the beginning of their season, and then simply "maintain" their strength and power throughout their sporting season.

The schedule (listed below) will be to focus on a few things. First of all, I will be training in 3 periodized phases. Phase 1 will be designed to create a base-level of fitness while increasing my overall conditioning. Not only that, but Phase 1 will be my step back into serious anaerobic conditioning. I have been enjoying my mass phase, but I am currently focusing on building muscle, so my conditioning has taken a bit of a back seat, so it will be time to start to work off some of the "goo" (see: body fat).

Phase 2 will be building off of Phase 1, building strength while maintaining overall fitness levels. There will naturally be a bit of muscle hypertrohpy at this point, but the main goals will be to increase strength and athleticism.

Finally, Phase 3 will be designed to increase my performance for the event. The idea is to build on the strength gained in Phase 2 and make that strength dynamic and useful. Strong muscles are only as good as what you train them to do, so Phase 3 will be aimed at making them fast and efficient. I will then end off with a few recovery days to rest up and recovery before the event on Saturday July 21st, 2012.

I will be combining P90X2 and Insanity: The Asylum for majority of the schedule but there will be a few routines from Insanity and the One on One series thrown in as well. One thing that may seem very unusual to me at first is the order of the weeks. When I first started out P90X a few years ago, "Day 1" of each week was always on my Monday. I eventually transitioned to Sundays being "Day 1". Now, since I will also be playing summer hockey late on Monday nights, I will be coordinating my schedule so that Tuesdays are my "off" days. That results in my weeks running Wednesdays to Tuesdays.

Phase 1
3 weeks
Wednesday April 25th - Tuesday May 15th 2012

Day 1 - X2 Balance & Power
Day 2 - Asylum Speed & Agility and Relief
Day 3 - Asylum Strength
Day 4 - X2 Core
Day 5 - Insanity Pure Cardio
Day 6 - AM: X2 Total Body and X2 Ab Ripper - PM: Hockey
Day 7 - Off/Recovery

Recovery/Transition Week
1 week
Wednesday May 16th - Tuesday May 22nd 2012

Day 1 - Asylum Back to Core and One on One 20/12 Abs
Day 2 - Insanity Max Recovery
Day 3 - One on One Road Warrior
Day 4 - Yoga
Day 5 - Asylum Overtime and X2 Ab Ripper
Day 6 - AM: Insanity Cardio Recovery - PM: Hockey
Day 7 - Off/Recovery

Phase 2
4 weeks - alternating
Wednesday May 23rd - Tuesday June 19th 2012

Week 1/3
Day 1 - X2 Chest, Back & Balance
Day 2 - Insanity Plyo Cardio Circuit
Day 3 - P90X+ Abs/Core Plus and Insanity Cardio Abs
Day 4 - One on One Shoulders & Arms MC2
Day 5 - Yoga and X2 Ab Ripper
Day 6 - AM: X2 Base & Back - PM: Hockey
Day 7 - Off/Recovery

Weeks 2/4
Day 1 - X2 V Sculpt
Day 2 - Asylum Vertical Plyo and Relief
Day 3 - One on One Killer Abs and 20/12 Abs
Day 4 - One on One UBX
Day 5 - Yoga and X2 Ab Ripper
Day 6 - AM: X2 Base & Back - PM: Hockey
Day 7 - Off/Recovery

Recovery/Transition Week
1 week
Wednesday June 20th - Tuesday June 26th 2012

Day 1 - Asylum Back to Core and One on One 20/12 Abs
Day 2 - Insanity Max Recovery
Day 3 - One on One Road Warrior
Day 4 - Yoga
Day 5 - Asylum Overtime and X2 Ab Ripper
Day 6 - AM: Insanity Cardio Recovery - PM: Hockey
Day 7 - Off/Recovery

Phase 3
3 weeks
Wednesday June 27th - Tuesday July 17th 2012

Day 1 - X2 P.A.P. Lower
Day 2 - Asylum Speed & Agility and Relief
Day 3 - X2 P.A.P. Upper
Day 4 - Run Training
Day 5 - Asylum Vertical Plyo and Overtime
Day 6 - AM: Asylum Game Day and Relief - PM: Hockey
Day 7 - Off/Recovery

I will complete the schedule on Tuesday July 17th and then have a few days of stretching/yoga to recover before the race on Saturday July 21st.

Diet

Once I finish up with my mass phase, I will be cutting back from my quite-consistent 4k calories a day to either maintain or slightly reduce my weight from there. Some people may ask, "Why build muscle to then turn around and try and lose weight?" If done properly, the idea behind a mass building phase is to do just that - build muscle. Because of the large amounts of calories consumed to try and increase muscle tissue, it is inevitable that I have gained a few extra non-lean pounds as well.

I then follow that up with some high-intense interval training combined with some resistance training and a correct diet, I will aim to "cut" the fat off of my body so that I lose a bit of weight losing some body fat while attempting to maintain as much muscle as possible.

So for my diet, I will be aiming for a slight calorie reduction and a 40/30/30 plan again. The only difference here is that I will be aiming for about 40% protein rather than carbs.

Summary

I will keep everyone updated on my progress through this intense schedule as well as my results at this year's Warrior Dash, so stay tuned!

Sources:
Photo - http://www.accelerator3359.com/Wrestling/bios/warrior.html

The Importance of Recovery

Recovery is an important component to any health and fitness lifestyle. Not only does your body need time to repair, but time 'off' can allow you to mentally re-focus on your goals and build motivation to continually succeed.

In the past, I have written about the details of Periodization. This is a training philosophy that has been used for years to train athletes. The fortunate part about periodzation is that the principles can be applied, with great success, to average 'weekend warriors' and fitness enthusiasts alike.

The idea behind periodization is that your training cycles or phases are broken up into 'chunks' of training - usually in 3-6 week blocks - to cause continual adaptation to the body. The idea behind this is that the body will continue to grow and change to challenges its faced with up until a certain point, where it will eventually "plateau" and no longer adapt to the physical demands that are placed upon it. Lately, periodization has been couple with buzz words like "muscle confusion".

One of the key concepts and practices associated with periodization, however, is recovery. Recovery is crucial to add into any exercise program so that an individual does not continue to push themselves to adapt. Continual adaptation to the body can lead to a reverse effect that can cause either short-term or long-term maladaptations.

Whether you are a professional or amateur athlete, or just a fitness enthusiast at heart, everyone can benefit from some time off. Now, let me be clear in saying that time 'off' does not necessarily mean sitting on your rump and doing nothing. Recovery periods can include physical activity, but generally, you are encouraged to decrease intensity for days of rest.

I believe that every individual should include at least 1 day/week of recovery, as well as at least 1 full week of recovery every 3-6 weeks of training. Often times you will feel the need for some time off anyways if you are pushing yourself hard, as your body will be needing time off to rejuvenate and repair.

Often times, I see individuals who have been training hard, feel the need to skip recovery days, or weeks, as they feel it will cause them to take a 'step back' and lose some of their momentum. This is simply not the case, as the body not only needs time to recover, but also does majority of its 'growing' during down time. I can understand the feeling of momentum and that 'go, go, go' attitude, day in and day out, but please listen to me when I tell you that recovery is vital to your long-term success!

Recovery time is not all that bad, however, as it allows you to take a step back and re-evaluate your situation. Below, I have detailed a list of positive things to remember during recovery time.

Mentally Re-Focus

I personally find when I am in a training phase, I have to mentally focus and be prepared to push myself as hard as I can for every given day. By pushing ourselves to our limits, we truly feel and see remarkable changes.

The problem with this is that by being mentally focused on a specific goal for a set period of time can not only become physically exhausting, by mentally exhausting as well. I find I can push myself harder knowing that I have a day off at the end of each week, or knowing that I have a recovery week coming up that will allow me to take a step back.

Not only that, but once I reach my recovery day or week, I can spend some time to mentally re-focus on my upcoming training block. That down time allows my brain to rest and not worry about getting up every morning to hit the weights or cardio training hard. I can just focus on staying mildly active and enjoy the journey my body is taking to recover so that I can come back stronger than before!

Physically Repair

This, I find, is where many people seem to be confused. Thinking that taking 1 day off, or 1 whole week off, can turn you into a little weakling overnight is just utterly wrong. Often times, when a recovery week is used in between training phases of a properly-structured workout program, some individuals feel that their muscles are just wasting away. This is simply untrue and you should remove this from your brain immediately.

First of all, the recovery time is used for just that, so that your body can physically recover. During recovery, your body is repairing tissue that you tore apart while working out so that you can come back stronger than before.

I see many people, while doing a program like P90X say, "After I took that week off between Phase 1 and Phase 2, I came back feeling weak!" You must remember that a program like P90X is specifically designed to continually challenge you in new ways so that you create a total-body transformation in a short period of time. Because of this, you are supposed to feel weak again after a week off, because the training modalities have changed to shock your body in new ways again (see "muscle confusion" or "periodization" above).

Stretching

A few blog ago, I wrote about a research study I read that indicated how helpful stretching is. I will fully admit that I sometimes neglect to stretch as much as I should after intense workouts. Either I am just too exhausted to put the time in, or I am running short on time, I tend to neglect my stretching when I need it most.

Having said that, I really enjoy recovery days/weeks because I can take my mind off of working my biceps/chest/shoulders/legs/etc. and focus on other things like balance, coordination, and my flexibility. Not only is stretching good for recovery, but it has been shown to increase strength as well!

"Muscle Confusion"

I mentioned this above, but I would like to discuss this a bit further here. I see many individuals at the gyms these days that go to the gym and do the same things day after day after day and never change their routines. If you are comfortable with your current level of fitness, and don't feel bored to death by doing the same things every time, then this will work for you.

On the other hand, if you wish to continually adapt and change, periodization is for you. Now, to separate periodization blocks, you will want to insert a recovery week in between phases to allow the body to fully adapt from one phase before progressing onto another.

Having said all of that, the recovery week itself allows a tiny bit of "muscle confusion" as your body is automatically going to be challenged in new ways.

Summary

Recovery time does not have to be all doom and gloom. For many fitness nuts out there, taking time off feels like they are taking a step back or losing momentum when this is simply not the case. Just remember to enjoy your days off as much as you enjoy your hard working days, as they are all a part of the bigger picture. All of these days combined makes for a healthier, better feeling, injury-resistant, and happier you!

Sources:
Photo - http://worldfitnessnetwork.com/the-truth-about-muscle-recovery-time-short-version/