Post Workout Recovery

[redstevie007]

I don't have time to spend an hour in the gym or out on a run any more so I've started Tabata sessions 3 or 4 days a week. Even with a proper warm-up and a stretch afterwards, my body, particularly my legs, is in bits afterwards. Any good supplements/drinks etc I can take pre or post workout to ease the agony and aid recovery? If there's anything that also helps build lean muscle, even better. Being in the forces I do need to be careful of the ingredients, as lots of these things have banned substances in them.

Any ideas?

Edited November 8, 2015 by redstevie007

[DoonTheSlope]

Get yourself a good fish supper. Life's to short to be worrying about all that fitness and healthy living shite

[fringo]

Get yourself a good fish supper. Life's to short to be worrying about all that fitness and healthy living shite

[redstevie007]

Get yourself a good fish supper. Life's to short to be worrying about all that fitness and healthy living shite

I'm in the forces and need to take an annual fitness test, in which I'm required to reach a certain standard. Whilst I agree with your sentiment, and I do wire into my fair share of junk food, I need to balance it a wee bit, hence my question.

[Flora MaDonald]

I'm back doing weights, and swear by a pint of semi-skinned milk. You can buy all that fancy shite, but milk sorts you oot.

[redstevie007]

I'm back doing weights, and swear by a pint of semi-skinned milk. You can buy all that fancy shite, but milk sorts you oot.

I always drink a couple of glasses of water an hour or so before heading for the gym, and often have milk afterwards. Not because I'm aware of any recovery benefits (although with protein and calcium it makes sense come to think of it) but just that it's refreshing.

[PaulS2014]

I don't have time to spend an hour in the gym or out on a run any more so I've started Tabata sessions 3 or 4 days a week. Even with a proper warm-up and a stretch afterwards, my body, particularly my legs, is in bits afterwards. Any good supplements/drinks etc I can take pre or post workout to ease the agony and aid recovery? If there's anything that also helps build lean muscle, even better. Being in the forces I do need to be careful of the ingredients, as lots of these things have banned substances in them.

Any ideas?

Have a look of this website http://www.smarttecnutrition.com/i have used they're products many times and they are very good quality plus all the ingredients are fine if you get pulled in for a drugs test. They have good pre and post workout stuff on there if you want to use protein powder in terms of assisting in building lean muscle however diet and what your actually doing will determined things not just a protein powder.

The other protein powder i would recommend for after the gym is this one:

http://www.optimumnutrition.com/products/naturally-flavored-100-whey-gold-standard-p-202.html?zenid=a7cedf30f32cbbde8996c23333f1f020

Again all ingredients are fine if you get pulled in for a drugs test so no issues there. This is probably one of the most popular one's on the market and should aid recovery. To help with the pain your probably best to look at your diet and what you are eating after the gym and in general really to aid your recovery. Hope this helps.

[deecie]

Pick from:

• Water
• Lucozade
• Stretching
• Bananas

Tried many different supplements and none ever seemed to make any difference.

[Denny's Yard]

IPA

[Slinky]

I always swore by a chocolate milk shake post exercise.

Tell me more about tabata?

[Parklife]

Make sure you're getting enough protein in your diet (about 1.5g per pound of body weight). A whey protein after working out will help. Try and eat a serving of slow release protein before bed (meat or Greek yoghurt.)

Stretch after working out and again before bed. Spend time doing it properly.

Your muscles will adapt and the DOMS will ease off, the more you workout.

Are you doing 4 full body workouts? That's too much IMO. Try doing an upper:lower split (structures like this - upper light, lower heavy, rest day, upper heavy, lower light). Muscles need time to recover. Killing yourself in the gym and being in agony for days wont get you the results you want.

[redstevie007]

I always swore by a chocolate milk shake post exercise.

Tell me more about tabata?

http://www.active.com/fitness/articles/what-is-tabata-training

I love it because I only need to spend 25 minutes in the gym. Since I've switched from aerobic runs and weights to Tabata my VO2 max has improved way beyond what I expected. My core's a lot stronger too. Long way to go to get into six-pack territory but I've lost a stone in 6 weeks.

Edited November 8, 2015 by redstevie007

[redstevie007]

Cheers all, some great stuff there. Parky, I think you're right and I'm overdoing it - 3 sessions a week with one being on the rower to give my legs a break might be the way to go. Going to go and see the PTI tomorrow.

Edited November 8, 2015 by redstevie007

[redstevie007]

Have a look of this website http://www.smarttecnutrition.com/i have used they're products many times and they are very good quality plus all the ingredients are fine if you get pulled in for a drugs test. They have good pre and post workout stuff on there if you want to use protein powder in terms of assisting in building lean muscle however diet and what your actually doing will determined things not just a protein powder.

The other protein powder i would recommend for after the gym is this one:

http://www.optimumnutrition.com/products/naturally-flavored-100-whey-gold-standard-p-202.html?zenid=a7cedf30f32cbbde8996c23333f1f020

Again all ingredients are fine if you get pulled in for a drugs test so no issues there. This is probably one of the most popular one's on the market and should aid recovery. To help with the pain your probably best to look at your diet and what you are eating after the gym and in general really to aid your recovery. Hope this helps.

[Louch]

Normal milk and somegthing sweet to top up glucose levels so you don't get too hungry too fast. Make sure you are getting salt intake, and I take iron tablets as I don't eat a lot of red meat or dark green leaf veg. Low iron can make you feel much more fatigued than you are

[PaulS2014]

F*ck me there is some crazy advice on here!!! Firstly bin the milk advice, the type of training your doing and goals you need you will need more than milk especially a bloody milkshake. Meat before bed?!?! If your going to have anything have some nuts or if you want to have a slow release protein before bedtime Google "Casein Protein" which will be helpful.

Do not have Lucozade, jesus christ i can't believe someone recommended this. You would just be pumping a bottle of sugar into your body and if being lean is your aim Lucozade is not your friend.

The type of training you are doing is excellent and is pretty much PHA training (peripheral heart action training) which is excellent for losing weight as you have discovered and i am a big advocate of.

If you want a hand with anything else drop me a PM as some of the stuff on here is well wide of the mark and bordering on ridiculous!

[Denny's Yard]

http://www.active.com/fitness/articles/what-is-tabata-training

Since I've switched from aerobic runs and weights to Tabata my VO2 max has improved way beyond what I expected.

How are you measuring that?

[redstevie007]

How are you measuring that?

I use the method and calculator here:

http://www.brianmac.co.uk/rockport.htm

Every fortnight I do the Rockport Walk as it's an easy way of checking fitness level. As a 42 year old my VO2 Max should be 38ish to 40ish, which it was a couple of months ago, so average. The last time I did it (last Monday) it was 42.1, so quite an increase after 6 weeks of interval training.

Edited November 9, 2015 by redstevie007

[redstevie007]

F*ck me there is some crazy advice on here!!! Firstly bin the milk advice, the type of training your doing and goals you need you will need more than milk especially a bloody milkshake. Meat before bed?!?! If your going to have anything have some nuts or if you want to have a slow release protein before bedtime Google "Casein Protein" which will be helpful.

Do not have Lucozade, jesus christ i can't believe someone recommended this. You would just be pumping a bottle of sugar into your body and if being lean is your aim Lucozade is not your friend.

The type of training you are doing is excellent and is pretty much PHA training (peripheral heart action training) which is excellent for losing weight as you have discovered and i am a big advocate of.

If you want a hand with anything else drop me a PM as some of the stuff on here is well wide of the mark and bordering on ridiculous!

but, but the TAMB's the font of all knowledge

Cheers, I might take you up on that

[Armchair Bob]

Cheers all, some great stuff there. Parky, I think you're right and I'm overdoing it - 3 sessions a week with one being on the rower to give my legs a break might be the way to go. Going to go and see the PTI tomorrow.

Parkie's right - no point training too much, training damages the body, its the nutrition and rest period that builds strength.

That Tabata looking interesting too. I am all over the place after 4 back-to-back 15-second sprints so doing 8x 20-second ones (albeit with 10 second rest between) sounds extremely challenging...

[redstevie007]

Parkie's right - no point training too much, training damages the body, its the nutrition and rest period that builds strength.

That Tabata looking interesting too. I am all over the place after 4 back-to-back 15-second sprints so doing 8x 20-second ones (albeit with 10 second rest between) sounds extremely challenging...

The 10-second 'rest' is a bit of a red herring. If it's sprints or the rower I'm doing then yes, I either step off the treadmill (or stop rowing) or walk for 10 seconds, but two of my sessions are weights based, and the 10 seconds is just for transmission from one exercise to the next. After the set of eight I take a minute's rest and then repeat 6 to 8 times. The main thing to remember is that the 20 second work intervals should be the absolute max effort you can manage. It's absolute murder and frankly it feels like I'm killing myself but as I've said I've seen really quick benefits in terms of fitness and weight loss.

[Parklife]

Meat before bed?!?! If your going to have anything have some nuts or if you want to have a slow release protein before bedtime Google "Casein Protein" which will be helpful.

What's the problem with that? Animal protein is slow release. Personally i always have either cottage cheese or greek yoghurt but some turkey breast or something before bed would do just the same job, as far as i understand.

[ShedTA]

There was a programme on telly a while back about recovery drinks. They monitored two sets of rugby players over the course of some training sessions and gave one set a lucozade type sports recovery drink and the other set milk. From recollection the milk was just as good, and poss even better at helping the players bodies recover than the sports drink.

[Armchair Bob]

The 10-second 'rest' is a bit of a red herring. If it's sprints or the rower I'm doing then yes, I either step off the treadmill (or stop rowing) or walk for 10 seconds, but two of my sessions are weights based, and the 10 seconds is just for transmission from one exercise to the next. After the set of eight I take a minute's rest and then repeat 6 to 8 times. The main thing to remember is that the 20 second work intervals should be the absolute max effort you can manage. It's absolute murder and frankly it feels like I'm killing myself but as I've said I've seen really quick benefits in terms of fitness and weight loss.

You do 8 sets of 20 secs max effort+10 secs between, then repeat that 8 times? For a total workout time of 32 minutes rather than 4 minutes as advised??

[redstevie007]

You do 8 sets of 20 secs max effort+10 secs between, then repeat that 8 times? For a total workout time of 32 minutes rather than 4 minutes as advised??

Tabata's always 4 minutes - 8 x 20 seconds work and 10 seconds rest = 8 x 30 seconds = 240 seconds = 4 minutes (apologies if that sounds patronising but I can't think how else to explain it ). How many 'sets' you do is up to you but I do 6 to 8 sets (so 24 to 32 minutes).