Recovery... AGAIN

* edit this ended up being a much longer post than anticipated I will re-post the different parts as their own article and will go more in depth on the different topics.


I know that I talk about it a lot ,and you have to bee getting tired of hearing it, but it seems like many people either don't listen, or the forget.

Here is the thing, at CrossFit Tulare, we do not just exercise, we train, there is a plan and this plan is executed at the gym throughout the year. If you miss days you miss parts of that plan, I understand that as working adults with busy lives and family and we cannot get in here 6 days a week. I plan for and take this into account when I am writing our program. However when you have to take unscheduled rest days, not because of life but because you have not recovered from a work out ( or work outs ) we have a problem.

So here are the three areas of recovery that you need to focus on

Rest: seriously the most important thing you can do to get better is to sleep. Napping is fine and if you have a sleep deficit it can very beneficial. However getting uninterrupted sleep during the night is very important to regulate your body and recover from your training. I put this first and most important simply because I know that no one gets enough, no one. Sleep is more important than nutrition and every thing that entails your body Cannot recovery adequately without rest.

Nutrition. There is a ton of stuff that falls into nutrition. Hydration, Calories, Macros, Quality, Timing, and Supplementation. I could write for weeks on all of these topics and I have covered them in depth before and will again. Here however I will just give the bullet points.

Hydration: I know for a fact you are not getting enough water. You want to know how i know, because it is so dang inconvenient to drink enough especially when you are trying to increase your water intake. You will have to Pee all the time in the beginning, it is annoying I understand. However just understand that every single process in the body will require water. Building muscle, losing fat both require your body to have water, making sure you body has enough energy stored before your work out, replenishing it during and after, all require H2O. Pumping enough blood to fuel muscle remove Lactic acid and rebuild, need water H2O and then some water. For most people in america water is better than steroids. I mean that literally. Unless you are already an elite level athlete water will probably get you farther than those pink pills.

Calories: you are not getting enough of these either. Especially if you are "eating clean" or trying to lose weight or even just "watching what you eat" . Most nutrition advice out there ( including some of my previous recommendations, even i make mistakes that I have to learn from) focuses on how little you should eat to maximize weight loss. This approach does not support training, impedes recovery and hinders long term weight loss and management, as well as just being unpleasant to go through. Your first step in figuring out how much to eat should be to find out how much you can pack onto your plate into your body and through out the day and not gain any weight. seriously you will be surprised especially if you are training hard 5 days a week while doing this. It will be a lot more than you 1500 or 2000 calorie a day diets, a lot more. Even as I have reduced the amount of CrossFit I do and switched more to weightlifting i can eat more than 3500 hundred calories a day and not gain a pound. In fact I have lost weight at 3500 kcal a day. This is important because focusing on how much you can eat and maintain will make you happier give you less stress and improve your performance in the gym which is how you will ultimately lose the fat any ways.


Macros: Most people have an idea of what i am talking about here . How much Protein Fat an Carbs should you eat through out the day.  In general my recommendation is more Fat and Protein than Carbohydrates, however I think that has been taken the wrong way in the gym. I do not thing Carbs are bad or dangerous or will automatically make you fat and we should all be on a ketogenic diet. When I talk about nutrition it is not that I think we eat to many carbs it is that we do not eat enough protein and fat and eat our carbohydrates at the wrong time( timing) and from the wrong sources( quality). So here is a quick run down of my recommendations
Protein: should make up 30-35% of your calories and you should aim for 1g per pound of body weight( or lean mass if you have that number and are trying to lose weight)
Fat: should make up any where from 35%-40% of your calories
Carbohydrate should be roughly equal to slightly less than your protein intake about 30% possibly as low as 25% depending on who you are.

This will require tracking and experimentation on your part. but it is the only way to reach you aesthetic goals, and then only way to make sure you are recovering enough to not take unscheduled rest days from our training plan.

Quality: This is usually where I start with nutrition advice for new members because I find it to be the most important and also begins to take care of many issues with out over complicating things. Essentially this boils down to eliminating overly processed foods ( think of the things that come in boxes or bags and fizz when you open them ) and focusing on quality (free range. grass fed, wild caught) meat and vegetables all cooked at home in good fats ( olive oil/ grass fed butter)

The first 3 steps should be learnt and used by everyone to some degree or another, these next two are powerfull tools to add if you have the time, money, desire, and are able to maintain the first 3.

Timing: This is about what times of your day you eat certain foods and even about how often you eat. in general I like the first meal of the day ( which really should be before noon) to be mostly Fat and Protein dinner should be balanced between Carbohydrate, protein, and fat, with the rest of your Carbohydrates centered around your work out ( pre and post) and fat should be avoided immediately post work out. focusing on these guidelines and your own schedule and body will help determine how often you eat through out the day. These are not rules but guide lines and will need tweaking based on your goals and body.

Supplementation: This is the most costly, most individual, and smallest part of nutrition. Yet many people want to focus all their energy here. Master everything before this before you worry about supplementation with two notable exceptions. Every one whether or not you do anything else or even exercise at all should take a Multi-vitamin and Fish oil. Most of us are limited to some degree by the types of food we eat and eventually fall into eating the same things most of the time. Because of this a multi-vitamin is a good insurance policy helping us get a decent dose of some essential vitamins and minerals. Fish oil contains great sources of healthy fats and serves as a powerful anti inflammatory both of which help our body function more efficiently.

After those two I generally recommend only a few supplements;

Caffeine: want a pre work out? Then start here with a cup of coffee ( black). Besides the many health benefits shown with moderate caffeine intake, it can serve to give us an extra push through a really hard training session or cycle.

Whey Protein: First it can help us reach our protein goals for the day. Second after work outs is a prime time to fuel the body with some Carbohydrate and protein, however immediately post work out it can be hard to eat real food and enough of it to get the job done. A protein shake will be easier on the stomach and much quicker to digest getting the nutrient to the muscles that much quicker.

BCAA: Branched Chain Amino Acids these are the building blocks of Protein and they act through different pathways in the body, getting a blend that includes Essential Amino Acids is a great addition to a diet that is operating on all cylinders already

HMB: A relatively new supplement ( as far as the science I have read goes) that is supported by more than a few studies and seems especially suited for athletes beginning a new sport and crossfit. It will greatly benefit your recovery allowing you to train more and harder.

Creatine: One of the few supplements taken by the general population that is actually supported by science. Though it works in different ways than people generally think it is a great supplement to help with recovery and help improve performance.

The final piece to the recovery puzzle is Pre-hab/ Re-Hab.

Because of the nature of training we are at an increased risk of injury. Any one who tells you other wise is wither lying or not working you hard enough. This topic deserves its own post as well but in general I liken it to driving a car. The speed limit on the 99 is 70MPH and yet most people drive somewhere between 75-80MPH. Does that Cause wrecks? No, but it certainly increases your risk of one. Some wrecks are not even your fault you were obeying the laws, and doing the right thing when someone else hits you and causes and accident. Some wrecks are not really wrecks must more of fenderbenders and others are life altering events. Training is exactly the same way. Sometimes we are speeding some times were are obeying the speed limit some times were driving in town and other times on the freeway. Certain types of training will get us to a goal faster but carry more risk, but the only way to eliminate risk is to stop trying to reach our goal.

Now we can help defer some risk even when we are speeding by driving the right kind of car and taking care of it. Ensure the breaks are good the tires aligned and everything else functioning properly. In terms of training you may not be able to change the care you drive, it could be older with a ton of miles on it or brand new and top of the line. What you can do is take excellent care of whatever type of car( body)  you have. This is where Pre Hab comes in. Pre habilitation is just taking care of the body to prevent injury. It includes most of what we talked about already and includes cool downs, mobility, stretching, and active recovery on some of our rest days. Rehabilitation is what we do when we take care of an injury we have already sustained. Proper preparation will minimize the impact of any injury but they are unavoidable at some point in your career. Rehab includes every thing from Prehab as well as corrective exercises to bring the any muscle weakness caused by injury back up with the rest f the body and to help with preventing a future injury.