Recovery isn't a Hack.

Sep 13

7 min read

Recovery has become one of the most talked-about subjects in strength and conditioning.

And I think that's a good thing.

For a long time, athletes tended to think about training as the important part and everything else as secondary. Now we understand much better that the training stimulus is only one part of the adaptation process. What happens between training sessions matters. Sleep matters. Nutrition matters. Hydration matters. Training load matters. Stress matters.

But as the recovery industry has grown, I think we've created another problem. We've started looking for the recovery tool. For a while it was foam rolling. Then massage guns. Then compression boots. Now it's ice baths, saunas, cold plunges, breathwork, and whatever new piece of technology happens to be getting promoted this month.

I'm not saying these things are useless. Many of them have legitimate applications, and some can be very useful in the right situation. The problem is that we seem to have developed the idea that recovery is something we can fix with a single intervention.

It isn't. Recovery is a biological process, not a product.

What Does "Recovery" Actually Mean?

I think part of the problem comes from the way we talk about recovery. We say things like, "I need to recover," or "I'm going to do my recovery work," as though recovery is another training session that we perform.

It really isn't.

Training creates a stress that disrupts the body's normal state. The body then has to deal with that stress, restore what was disrupted, and eventually adapt so that it is better prepared for the next time it encounters a similar demand.

That process requires resources.

It requires enough energy to support the work being done. It requires adequate nutrition, hydration, and sleep. It requires managing the total amount of training stress. It requires time. It is also affected by everything else going on in an athlete's life.

That's why recovery is multifactorial.

There isn't one thing that determines whether an athlete recovers well. There are a bunch of things that contribute to it, and the importance of each one can change depending on the athlete and the situation.

That should probably change the way we think about recovery.

What's Actually Preventing Recovery?

If an athlete tells me they're having trouble recovering, my first question isn't going to be, "Which recovery tool are you using?"

It's going to be, "What's causing the problem?"

Maybe they're sleeping five hours a night. Maybe they're not eating enough. Maybe they're dehydrated. Maybe they've increased their training volume too quickly. Maybe they're sparring hard four or five times a week. Maybe they're cutting weight. Maybe they're dealing with an injury. Maybe they're under a tremendous amount of stress outside the gym.

Those are all recovery problems, but they aren't the same recovery problem.

If someone isn't sleeping enough, the answer isn't an ice bath
If someone isn't eating enough, the answer isn't a massage gun
If someone is doing too much training, the answer isn't necessarily another recovery session

Sometimes the answer is to change the training.

That sounds almost too simple, but I think that's part of what gets lost when recovery becomes an industry. The boring answers aren't very marketable. Nobody gets excited about being told to go to bed earlier, eat more, drink some water, or take a day off.

But those things are still extremely important.

Don't Confuse Soreness With a Problem

Another thing I see all the time is the assumption that feeling sore means something needs to be fixed. An athlete trains hard on Monday, wakes up sore on Tuesday, and immediately starts trying to eliminate the soreness. Ice bath. Massage gun. Foam roller. Stretching. Whatever is available. But soreness isn't necessarily a problem.

Training is supposed to create a stress. When the training stimulus is new or demanding, there can be tissue disruption, inflammation, soreness, fatigue, and a whole series of physiological responses that are part of the process of adapting to that training.

That doesn't mean all inflammation is good or that soreness should always be ignored.

Context matters. There is a big difference between an acute injury and normal post-training soreness. There is a difference between temporary discomfort and accumulated fatigue that is affecting performance. There is a difference between needing to be ready to train again tomorrow and trying to maximize a long-term adaptation over the next several months.

The appropriate response isn't necessarily the same in each situation.

This Is Where I Think Ice Baths Get Overused

I've probably put more emphasis on ice baths in conversations about recovery than I actually intend to. The ice bath isn't really the problem.

The problem is over-relying on any single recovery tool.

Ice baths can be useful. There are situations where reducing pain or inflammation can be helpful, particularly when an athlete needs to manage a specific acute problem or has another training demand coming up quickly.

But "I'm sore from training" isn't automatically the same thing as "I need to reduce inflammation."

If an athlete has an acute injury, that's one situation
If an athlete is chronically fatigued because their training load is too high, that's another
If they're exhausted because they're sleeping five hours a night, that's another.
If they're under-fueled, that's another
And if they're simply experiencing the normal soreness that comes with training, that's another

The fact that the same tool can make an athlete feel better in all of those situations doesn't mean that it is addressing the same underlying problem.

That's an important distinction.

Feeling Better Is Not Necessarily the Same as Recovering Better

This is another area where I think we need to be careful. There is value in making an athlete feel better. If massage helps someone relax, great. If foam rolling makes them feel less stiff, great. If an ice bath makes someone feel refreshed, great. If a sauna helps someone unwind, great. Those are legitimate benefits.

But we shouldn't automatically turn "I feel better" into "my body has recovered faster." Those aren't necessarily the same thing. A modality can change someone's perception of soreness or fatigue without addressing the reason they're having trouble recovering in the first place.

If an athlete feels better after a massage but is still sleeping five hours a night and eating 1,500 calories while training twice a day, the massage didn't solve the recovery problem.

It just made them feel better for a while.

And sometimes that's enough. But sometimes it isn't. The coach needs to understand the difference.

Recovery Starts With the Training Program

This is probably the part of recovery that coaches have the most control over.

Recovery isn't something that gets added to the program after the training is finished.

The training program itself has to allow recovery to happen.

If an athlete is consistently being exposed to more stress than they can adapt to, we can't keep adding recovery tools and pretend that solves the problem.

Sometimes we need to reduce volume
Sometimes we need to change intensity
Sometimes we need to separate hard sessions
Sometimes we need to give an athlete an easier day
Sometimes we need to take something out of the program

Good programming considers recovery before the athlete ever steps into the gym.

That's one of the reasons I don't like the idea that a good training program is simply the maximum amount of work an athlete can survive.

The goal isn't to see how much fatigue we can create.

The goal is to create enough stress to produce the adaptation we want while allowing the athlete to recover from it.

Sometimes Recovery Means Doing Less

This might be the most obvious thing in the world, but it's also something that gets overlooked.

An athlete is tired from training, so they add another recovery session.

They're sore, so they spend an hour doing every recovery modality they can find.

They're stressed, so they add another protocol to their already complicated routine.

Eventually, recovery becomes another thing they have to accomplish.

Sometimes the best recovery strategy is much less exciting.

Eat
Sleep
Hydrate
Take a day off
Go for an easy walk
Then come back and train when you're ready

Not everything needs to be optimized. Sometimes the body just needs time.

Recovery Tools Are Still Tools

None of this is an argument against recovery modalities. I use them. Athletes use them. There are good reasons for many of them. The point is that a tool is only useful when we understand what we're using it for.

There is nothing wrong with using an ice bath because it helps an athlete feel better before their next session. There is nothing wrong with using a massage because it helps someone relax. There is nothing wrong with using compression, sauna, foam rolling, or other modalities when they have a useful application.

But I don't want athletes to believe that these things are the foundation of recovery. They're tools that can be added to the process. They aren't the process itself.

Stop Looking for the Magic Recovery Tool

I think the better question is not, "What's the best recovery tool?" It's "What's limiting recovery right now?" That's a much harder question because it requires actually looking at the athlete.

How much are they sleeping?
Are they eating enough?
Are they hydrated?
How much training are they doing?
How hard are they training?
How much stress are they dealing with outside the gym?
Are they injured?
Are they trying to recover from something specific, or are they simply uncomfortable because they trained hard?

Once those questions are answered, then we can decide whether a particular recovery modality has a place.

That's how I think recovery should be approached. Not as a collection of products, but as a process of identifying the problem and addressing it.

Recovery Isn't a Hack

I've been around combat sports and strength and conditioning long enough to have watched the recovery conversation change quite a bit. Every few years, something new becomes the thing that athletes supposedly need to be doing. I'm sure that will continue. Some of the new tools will be useful. Some won't. Some will be useful in specific situations. Some will eventually disappear. That's fine. We don't need to reject new technology. We just need to understand what it actually does and where it fits.

Because recovery isn't something we can outsource to a machine. Training creates the stimulus. The body does the recovering.

Our job is to give it the resources and conditions it needs to do that job.

Sleep enough
Eat enough
Hydrate
Manage training load
Manage stress
Address injuries appropriately

And then, if there is a useful recovery tool that can help with a specific problem, use it.

But don't confuse the tool with the process. Recovery is more than a recovery tool.