Oops forgot one.
Kinesio Tape
If you put this tape on correctly, it’s great for making my muscles relax and not contract. It’s also got tissue lifting properties which enable more blood flow into muscles despite the fact that they’re tight. It’s amazing stuff.

These last few years I’ve been thinking about proper recovery in between workouts a lot, and how it affects my ability to increase my performance. A lot has been written about recovery and how improper recovery can really detract from a race result and lead to injury. As I have explored recovery, not much has been written about some of the other aids to recovery that can speed it up.
Recovery really became important for me as I discovered that, at 40+ years of age, I would require up to 3 days of recovery after my long bike and long run days. Conventional training wisdom states that 1 full day of rest would be enough, and that by the day after I’d be able to hit workouts at normal paces and wattages with no problem. This wasn’t the case for me!
The other piece of wisdom that people fear is that you need at least 3 workout days for each sport to improve in triathlon. I’ve also found this to be false as I increase my long run and bike days, I still improve with only 2 days per week per discipline (not counting recovery workouts in those disciplines). But this is under specific conditions as I would love to move to 3 strong days during my build and peaking phases and not just during the base phase. Those conditions are the fact that I’m 40+ years of age and I don’t recover fast enough, that I never was an athlete in my youth so I can’t draw upon early years of athletic conditioning and ability, and also because I started so late to build my body and we just don’t build strength as fast as we do when we’re younger.
So if you don’t match those conditions, you should still go for 3 good workouts per discipline per week to try to improve and not just move to 2 simply because you’re lazy.
One of my aims became finding ways of recovering faster from my long bike and run days. I’ve also discovered recovery happens in the aerobic system, the muscles in both healing tissue damage and relieving tightness, and there is mental recovery as well. There have been many instances when recovery has happened separately in these areas and not all at once. For example, I may feel good in my lungs and body, which is a sign that my aerobic system has recovered, but my legs still feel tired and tight, which is a sign that my leg muscles have not.
Mental recovery is when you brain needs time to recover from mentally focusing on a long ride or intense training session. Doing hard workouts over and over can fatigue your ability to want to sustain a long and/or intense workout and sometimes you just need a brain break so you can hit the next workout with proper determination and not weakened willpower.
With respect to muscle tightness, many researchers are now working on the neurological basis for recovery, which is to figure out how to get the nerves to stop firing and to let go, which reduces or eliminates muscle tightness. This is tightness that you can’t stretch away; it stays around despite stretching. This tightness is also very dangerous in that if you don’t remove it, over time this will transfer shock and stress to the ligaments and joints which don’t absorb that very well and cause further damage to your body, leading to injury. Muscle tightness also prevents the transport of blood flow to your muscles, so exercise by-products stay around longer (hence soreness), and hinder the flow of nutrients back into your muscles for healing and energy replenishment.
In the last few years, the techniques and devices for recovering have become more sophisticated. While this survey is by no means exhaustive, I will talk about some of the ones I’ve encountered and have used here now:
Time and Rest
The easiest and cheapest way to recover. You just don’t do anything until your body comes back, besides sleeping, resting, taking lots of vitamins, and eating properly. My issue, of course, that just sitting around isn’t good training practice for the 3 days I need, even if it does work.
Ice Baths
This is one of my favorites. Immediately after my long bike or run, I jump into the bathtub and fill it with water and ice cubes and sit in it for about 10 minutes. The ice stops the muscles from creating more exercise by-products and also numbs any pain from training. Then when I get out, I hop into the shower and the hot water restarts blood flow and helps flush any remaining exercise by-products from your muscles.
The one downside is getting enough ice to do this. I need probably around 15 lbs in the summer time when the cold water coming out of the faucet is warmer, but only 9 lbs in the winter time. So either you gotta run to the supermarket after training to buy some bags of ice, or you have to fill up plastic bags with ice cubes during the week.
Compression Clothing
I love wearing compression socks and tights. I do find that these are very effective at helping fluid move through my legs and increase circulation, while reducing that swollen feeling when fluid pools in my legs.
Massage
I did do this once or twice but I don’t do it very often. Massage on tired muscles does help blood flow through those areas, creating recovery. It also feels good having someone loosen them up in the process. But it is expensive and I don’t find many massage practictioners do the right thing on the muscles as there are many forms of massage and not all work well on specific muscle recovery.
Active Recovery
This is a great way to increase blood flow and loosen up tight muscles. You just do very light workouts in any discipline. While just going out for a light swim, bike, or jog is good, I also think you can train while practicing active recovery so you’re actually getting some benefits beyond recovering. I am a big proponent of neuromuscular training, so active recovery sessions are a great way to train the neuromuscular system while not stressing your overall physical system. This is doing track drills while out jogging, or doing one legged spinning drills and practicing perfect form during fast spinning on the bike, or doing swimming drills. I also find that stimulating the muscles to fire fast again after getting all stiff and tired from a hard training session is crucial to making sure you don’t slow down, so I like to do fast turnover running/swimming and fast pedaling to get my muscles back to firing fast again.
Physical Therapy, ART, Graston
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a big proponent of weekly physical therapy sessions with ART and Graston to help remove tightness and smooth out muscle adhesions to get the muscles functional and loose again. I have found nothing better to get my muscles prepped for another week of hard training than ART and Graston.
Foam Rolling, TP Massage Rollers and Balls, Lacrosse Balls, Softballs
Another form of massage is using these tools to help get into muscles and knead out tightness and soreness, as well as promote blood flow to those areas. Foam rollers are great for overall massaging and can be used for warmup as well. TP Massage Rollers from Trigger Point Performance are excellent for deeper massaging of muscles, as foam rollers can be too broad in surface area and too soft to really get deeper into muscles. TP Massage Balls and lacrosse balls are even better to get into specific points in muscles. Sometimes I also use a softball to massage my quads and to get into my psoas. The idea is to press hard into those tools and move the tool or the muscle underneath to help smooth out adhesions and make the muscle functional again.
Port-a-Vibe and Vibration in Recovery
Newest in my collection of toys, I bought a Port-a-Vibe which is a consumer version of some of those larger much more expensive vibration units you find in big gyms. Researchers have found that vibration stimulates the nervous system, increases metabolic rates, and promotes circulation. I stand on this unit for 10 minutes and it’s great for increasing circulation to my muscles and help with recovery. I have also used it to warmup. Many other benefits are cited, like working out while standing on the unit has shown to increase muscle stimulation and performance enhancements occur.
Deep Muscle Stimulator (DMS)
This gizmo has been around for a long time. The Deep Muscle Stimulator (DMS) is a heavy duty unit weighing about 5 lbs and vibrates at a certain frequency found to be optimal in affecting muscles neurologically. Specifically, when you direct the gun-like unit to your muscles, it pummels the muscle until the muscle’s nerves can’t keep up their firing, hence tightness, and the nerves just tire and relax. Not only does it do that, but it also has normal massage benefits like stimulating circulation to the applied area. I am lusting after one of these, but it costs $2500!!! My PT guy uses one on me and I love it.
Normatec MVP
Check these out – Normatech Sports originally created these out of a need for patients with medical conditions involving poor circulation, or healing after surgery. After giving some units to sports teams, they started using these for recovery and have found some fantastic results. The booties work by using air to create a pumping action against your legs (there are booties for your arms too) that increase circulation. This accelerates the movement of exercise by-products out of your legs and brings in new blood faster. Athletes use these for 20-30 minutes and have apparently achieved amazing results. The Garmin cycling team have used these and they love them. I am also lusting after a pair of these – they require a doctor’s prescription and they cost $5000 a pair! Sometime next year, they intend to create a more consumer version which will cost somewhere between $1000-2000 a pair. Not sure I can wait that long…also the consumer version has less control over the frequency of the pumping against the legs.
Technology is advancing by leaps and bounds. It’s all we can do to keep up with these advances, but us crazy athletes who want to get faster can only continue to lust after these fantastic techniques and devices.

Yesterday I went out in 50 degree cloudy weather to go do some climbing laps on Kings Mountain and Old La Honda. I did not anticipate the temperature drop on top of the mountain, which combined with the wind chill factor did me in.

Clearly I did not dress correctly. My exposed finger gloves and half covers for my shoes weren’t enough to prevent near frostbite on them as I zoomed down Kings after my first climb. I think the wind chill was in the high 30s and my body was starting to really shut down. I considered going to Old La Honda and doing that once but it was too much. I went for the fastest way home as I felt like my body just couldn’t give anymore and didn’t want a total shutdown out on the road.

I made it home and stood in a hot shower for many minutes to get warm.

Suck.

I hate training in cold. I’m already of low body fat such that low temps are just uncomfortable. Keeping warm during cold day workouts just saps me of extra energy keeping warm. It also increases the risk of getting sick too. I remember forcing myself to go out for 6 hour rides back in late 2004 to prep for my first Ironman NZ. I got sick a few times but also during those cold rides I never felt like I never could really push hard because so much energy was used to keep warm.

Time to watch the weather better and just wimp out more and enjoy longer focused interval rides on my Computrainer.

I just went to my physical therapist and he turned me on to some tools made out of plastic, which were very much like metal Graston tools but much thinner. I doubted that they could hold up to the abuse of scraping my muscles, but after a treatment session, they seemed to hold up fine. They also exhibit another vibratory quality than thick stainless steel; you can feel and hear the vibrations of the adhesions and bumps within muscles much better (so thick stainless steel better than a spoon, but plastic better than either).
These are the tools of Gua Sha, whose roots are in China now in the US. In China, these tools are often made of jade, or bone, or animal horn. When I first mentioned Graston to my mother years ago, she told me that the Chinese had been doing this kind of treatment for a long time, probably longer than Graston has been around.
Gua Sha stands for “scraping sand” and that’s what you do with the tools, which is to scrape your muscles. The principles are the same as Graston although the explanations are often in Eastern concepts, using qi and energy meridians and flow. My PT person told me that he went to a seminar and the teacher who is a Westerner had also incorporated a lot of other concepts, like the concept of Anatomy Trains where muscles are linked together around the body and often treating the entire muscle chain is much better than treating just the local affected area.
Gua Sha scraping can be light up to super deep, resulting in a bruised appearance lasting many days. My PT person and I talked about this and we both feel that extensive bruising resulting from super deep scraping is bad for people in-season. I’ve often felt the results of deep Graston the next day when my muscles are too traumatized to perform well, even as they are healing.
For a more in-depth discussion on Gua Sha and its usage, pick up this excellent book from the Gua Sha Tools website. It’s packed with lots of detailed information, and crosses from Eastern and Western philosophies.
I did want to mention that I found a Graston tool substitute that was better than my spoon. A few weeks back I searched the internet looking for, perhaps, a set of used Graston tools on ebay or elsewhere. Amazingly, I could not find one instance of a used set anywhere! But after much searching, I found the STARR Tool. The website is a bit ghetto as far as design goes, and with anxiety I pressed the Buy link to purchase the STARR tool. Thankfully, it arrived a few days later!
The stainless steel STARR tool is excellent. The steel transmits the vibrations much better than a metal spoon I was using and it has multiple edges to be used on various parts of the body. Its heft really allows me to get into muscles deeper too. It also comes with a CD that goes over the basics of scraping technique.
While I admire Graston very much, I also like the fact that people are getting alternatives out there, especially for an adventurous soul such as myself who dares treat my own ailments. I can’t get into my PT person’s office all that often, and between visits, I bust out my trusty STARR tool and help my body along in its healing and recovery process.
I did buy a set of Gua Sha plastic and jade tools, so once I get them I’ll do a post on how they feel relative to my STARR tool and Graston as well.

When I used to weight lift a lot, one of the things that I learned which was really important was when to back off during training, or just not train completely. You basically had to be able to distinguish between when you were just a little tired but you still could work out, and when you really shouldn’t work out like when you’re injured or sick or burnt out, etc. You also have to figure out when your brain is just being lazy and you can workout, even if you don’t feel like it.
Backing off during training can be a hard thing. We’re all hard charging athletes and we always want to give it our all for every workout. We follow what our coaches give us and if we don’t follow their plan exactly, then we get an anxiety attack and feel like we’ll never finish our goal race. If we miss workouts, we feel like we’re not gonna make it.
The reality is that you can have what I call “backing off” at the macro and micro level and still be fine for the race. Macro level is when you get sick or injured, and you have to take off multiple days (maybe weeks) to get better before you can go back to training. Micro level is when you either have to skip one workout due to some factor that will resolve itself within a day, like not being recovered enough from the day before, or extra soreness, or low energy levels. Whether you can have a great race depends on so many factors and not just if you miss a workout or two, or even for a week or more. Generally, backing off at the micro level, ie. taking a day off, skipping a workout, reducing pace/watts, etc, doesn’t have much effect if it happens temporarily. Backing off at the macro level for too long, ie. being sick for a month, taking weeks to heal a pulled muscle, being lazy on workouts for many weeks, etc., will definitely affect performance.
So don’t worry about it so much! Back off because you should and don’t stress about it. But do pay attention when you back off for a long period of time.
How do you tell when to back off? It took me a while to figure out how to tell when I should back off and how much. Here are some things I learned:
1. If I’m sick, then of course I should not train.
1a. But figuring out when I can start training again after being sick can be tough. When I finally feel physically a bit more energetic, I usually start with recovery workouts to get the body readjusted to training again, before leaping into full bore training. I try to keep workouts short, like 15-30 minutes, and not overstress my system until I’m 100% back.
2. I have tried to fine tune my sensitivity to my physical condition. This is intuition, and knowing how your body responds to stress and how fast it recovers, and a sensitivity to the condition of your muscles and overall system. Only experience can tell you what your body needs on that day. So keep alert and a log if it helps, and get to know your body as much as possible.
3. I find that the five key things to keep track of are your heart, lungs, muscles, energy level, and brain. Warning signs are when my heart rate is a bit high, or my lungs feel stretched still from an intense workout the day before (I usually feel what can be described as a “cool” sensation in the middle of my chest), or my muscles are sore or tight. Or sometimes my brain just doesn’t seem to have the same willpower as it may have on another day. Or my energy level is low and I feel tired. These all tell me that I need to be more mindful and potentially may need to adjust my workout to fit.
4. The easiest days are when I approach my workout and feel mentally fresh and my body feels energetic. The other easiest days are when my body is overly sore and I feel mentally and physically tired: an obvious sign that I should take a day off. The toughest are days when I am right about to workout and am on the edge of feeling not all that energetic and maybe I’m not fully mentally psyched for working out. But through experience, I know that often when I start the workout, my energy comes back to me when I start.
On days like this, I usually don’t worry about being lazy – it’s not really in my nature nowadays and I always look forward to working out. But I don’t know exactly what I can accomplish during the workout, and am not sure whether I can push the limits or just do a recovery workout, or somewhere in between. So I usually am prepared to adjust my workout midstream to what I can handle at that moment.
I find that it is during the warmup that I can figure out most of the time what awaits me in the rest of the workout. As I warm up, I approach my goal workout speeds (swim or run) and/or wattages (for bike workouts) and see how my body responds. If I am feeling like my exertion level is too high and unsustainable, then I know I’ll have to lower paces or wattages during the main set or else I will flame out before the workout ends. If I feel good, then I will be OK for the goal paces/watts.
Another potential factor: sometimes if I approach a workout feeling a bit tired, I can bring my workout up to goal paces/watts simply by having a longer warmup. By getting my blood flowing slowly with more time, I am able to get my system moving and potentially still hit my goal paces/watts.
5. If I make it past the warmup, then I may adjust again during the workout if something is not right. This can be a perceived exertion that is rising too fast for me to make it through the workout. It can also be a sapping of willpower that could evaporate if I am powering through some really fast paces or watts and trying to hold them for long intervals.
6. One macro level adjustment I have made was my recovery in general. By doing so many intense weekend rides doing Old La Honda and Kings Mountain climbs, along with a 2-3 hour run, I have found that I actually need another 2-3 days of recovery. Just taking one day off is not enough; I will do recovery workouts for 2 days after and then I’m fine on the 3rd day for a normal pace/watts workout. I know this because I have tried to sustain paces/watts after one day and my exertion and heart rate leap in the first few intervals.
Instead of fighting this, I just merely added it into my workout regime and it has not affected my race times at all; I’m still getting PR times race after race. It’s almost unintuitive that you could rest more but still yet race faster! I chalk it up to my age, my fitness level, and what I need to do to race faster.
The important thing to note is that we’re all different as humans. We all come from different fitness backgrounds and levels, and that coupled with our age and genetics means we can train a certain way. We need to develop a sensitivity for what our individual bodies need, and not stress about how others are training. I am a big believer in individualized training and I think this is where a lot of generic plans and group training can harm people. Developing an awareness of how our bodies work, and coupling that with a good coach (who won’t train you like you’re in the army and/or shame you into doing senseless workouts), will work wonders for your race performance.
So take a day off if you really need it or back off on the paces and watts – don’t stress about it and you’ll still race fine come race day.

A friend and I were IMing one night about her muscles cramping up. I thought that it would be interesting to write a post about it, since in my early triathlon career, I suffered from cramping in the most inopportune times during races.
I read an article in one of the popular triathlon magazines that talked about the causes of cramps and what can help prevent them. It actually showed some evidence that electrolyte supplementation didn’t help prevent cramps. Then there are all the medical research into what happens within muscles to create these painful situation. Of course, each coach and athlete has their own formula for preventing and managing muscle cramps.
In this post, I’m gonna skip all the scientific stuff and talk about my own discoveries. Note that everyone is different, and I think that applying a systematic way of figuring out why you cramp and what can prevent it can be your formula for success.
What causes cramps?
What I’ve found causes cramps are:
1. Electrolyte depletion. I sweat buckets in general and that just causes electrolytes to flow out of my body. This increases during warmer days, and seems to be less of an issue during cooler days. During races, I always build up this layer of grit on my skin, which is just the salt buildup from sweating so much and for such a long time. Thus if you don’t replace electrolytes, you’re more likely to cramp. So those who get dehydrated during races are really susceptible to cramping.
2. Over-contraction of muscles, especially muscles that are already tired and/or tight. My classic example of this is trying to stretch tight quads during a race. You reach down to grab your ankle and pull your leg back towards your butt. But since your hamstrings are also tired, they seize up in a cramp while trying to stretch your quads! Needless to say I NEVER stretch my quads now during a race. Another example is when I swam last week, and for some reason my plantar fascia was very tight. Then I shoved that foot into a fin and swam a long set with fins. The plastic boot on the fin was snug, but it also squeezed down on my foot so much while I was kicking that it caused my whole foot to cramp up. Not fun.
3. The muscles just get overtaxed and overworked, and thus cramp in protest, despite your mind willing the body to do more. This has happened to me early in my triathlon career at half and full Iron distance races. I have found two instances why this happens. The first is due to simple pushing of my body, typically my legs, and then towards the end of my race I cramp up because they are tired and I’m trying to either go faster, or go up a hill, etc. The second has to do with imbalances in my body. I have found that I naturally exert more of my right leg because it’s stronger than my left. This tires out my right leg more so than my left, and thus it can cramp up whereas my left is still OK.
What can prevent muscle cramps?
1. Electrolyte supplementation. Depending on how your body is, it could be that all you need is to drink Gatorade instead of water, or you may need take electrolyte tablets several times an hour plus electrolytes in sports drink and gels (like me). It varies widely between individuals and also in race conditions. I’ve been able to back off on electrolyte tablets during races with cool conditions successfully.
2. Get stronger. I would say that along with 1, this is the other really important measure for preventing muscle cramps. By really focusing on getting stronger during training, I have found that this has been the other major factor in preventing my muscles from getting to a potentially cramped state. So lots of hill repeats, and practicing accelerating up hills, for both running and biking. This also applies to interval work, especially on the bike, to extend the duration of maintaining watts while pedaling.
3. Kinesio tape. The curative/supportive properties of this tape are amazing. By taping from insertion to origin, you provide a slight tug to muscles in the “resting direction”, which helps muscles to relax and reduce the possibility of cramping.
4. Sportlegs pills. This amazing supplement helps minimize the production of lactate and exercise by-products in the muscles. When there is no “burn” in my muscles, it helps them stay relaxed even when tired and/or when I push hard. By not having exercise by-products in my muscles, they stay less tight and less susceptible to cramping.
5. Heat acclimatization. Adapting your body to function at high effort in hot weather helps your body figure out how to function under those conditions and not cramp, or just plain collapse. It learns how to sweat and to deliver energy and oxygen to muscles during hot weather, which is critical if you’re going to race during super hot days.
To discover what worked for me, I started experimenting. I didn’t do any kind of special blood testing. Suffice to say, it took a while to figure out what would work and what wouldn’t.
I started by upping my electrolyte intake during races and found that I got up to 3 Saltstick caps per hour, plus 2 scoops of Endurolyte powder in every tall water bottle, plus a scoop of First Endurance EFS. I also take a Powergel every 45 minutes, with its own set of extra electrolytes. I also take 3 Sportlegs capsules every 3 hours, and it’s amazing how I can push hard and barely feel any burn, but only just a general tiredness in those muscles. This works for me and keeps me going during races.
But I didn’t feel good about taking all that extra stuff, even during training. So then I made sure I got my body more adapted to the high stress of racing. I made sure I did negative split training on every long run, or would descend during loops up to 3+ hours. I did up to 4 laps up Kings Mountain and Old La Honda, which just toughened my legs to biking at continuous hard effort for long periods of time.
Then I also started running mid-afternoon, when temps were highest. I ran 3+ hours in 90+ degrees for many weeks. It was tough at first, but quickly got easier until I was able to run and do negative splits and descends.
It worked wonders for getting me through races both faster and cramp free.
A bit unscientific, and a collaboration of many different things I’ve read about or been told about. But I can’t argue with the results either.

I just watched the instructional DVD, Clinical Kinesio Taping and finally got some of the finer points of Kinesio taping technique. Here they are:
1. Taping from origin to insertion is supportive and enhances muscle activity. So you tape this way when there isn’t necessarily injury, but you want to help achieve peak performance with maximum support.
2. Taping from insertion to origin is curative and helps in recovery, and reducing muscle tightness and spasms.
3. Putting the muscle in flexion, or stretching it, and then laying the tape down helps enhance the tape’s “lifting” effect on the fascia. When muscles under the fascia are tight, they swell and push against the fascia, reducing fluid and blood flow which is essential for recovery, removing activity by-products, and getting fresh oxygen and nutrients to the affected area.
Amazing stuff this tape!

Yesterday I went to see my physical therapist. The week before, I had somehow pulled and/or spasmed my left back, ranging from the top trapezoids/neck down the middle back and into the lat area. It was during weight lifting that this happened and it was very annoying and painful for a long while.
The result of this was to then cause a kinetic chain domino effect. Those muscles are linked from the left side down into my right glutes, and down my right hamstring and so on. In the short few days that my left back was affected, it also caused my right lower back and glutes to tighten up, as well as down into tightening up my hamstring. This all manifested itself as a shorter right leg.
When I got to my physical therapist, he checked my leg length and all this tightening was enough to pull my right leg up by almost 1/4″ shorter than my left!
In the old days, physical therapists might prescribe an orthotic with a small lift in the heel to take up the room left by the shortening of my leg. However, I now perceive this as a crutch and not a permanent solution. In fact, I have a propensity for a shorter right leg, as its muscles tighten up and pull it up. But I have also found that through physical therapies, corrective exercise, and proper technique will actually remove the issue. Thus, having an artificial lift in my right leg, which was to correct for a condition, was now annoying a now normal condition of two corrected even legs! Needless to say, I scraped off the wedge and now have two relatively even legs….except when special conditions occur like my spasming left back.
Now I know that I have to keep special watch on muscle tightening of any sort, and also be wary of its effect on the kinetic chain of muscles in which it lies. It’s why I go to physical therapy every week to have ART and Graston specialists work over my tight spots and make sure that my body is balanced and even, and that nothing is pulling too much. Otherwise, leaving a condition like that untreated would result in further injuries further up and down this kinetic chain.
After experiencing this, I am now a firm believer that this is a major cause of injury in many runners, where muscles start getting tight and they are not given time to loosen up, and the kinetic chain starts tightening which eventually leads to injury. It’s too bad that more people do not have the time or resources, or even the desire to go more to a good physical therapist; I think it’s one of the reasons why I can keep running and racing faster and for longer distances without getting injured.
For way too detailed information about kinetic chains, check out Anatomy Trains.