Rest and Recovery: Serious business for endurance athletes!

by: Maggie Jividen

Rest and Recovery: Serious business for endurance athletes!

When I first imagined running a half marathon, I thought a lot about running: the miles, the pain of training, the fear of injury, the boredom of long runs, and how fast I wanted to be able to run. What I didn’t realize then was that recovery is just as important as running itself! More miles isn’t better if you aren’t recovering well enough from them. Kick back, relax, and let’s chat a little bit about how to make sure your fitness is improving by recovering enough.

Catch some quality zzzs.

You get into bed at 10:00 pm every night, but you spend 2 hours scrolling through social media feeds. Or maybe you know that you’re not getting into bed at the right time, commonly realizing you’ve only gotten four or five hours of sleep. Sleep is when our bodies most efficiently recover by rebuilding muscle, so distance runners need plenty of it! You may find that your typical amount of sleep is not enough during heavier training cycles.

Focusing on sleep hygiene doesn’t need to be complicated. Some ground rules you may consider for yourself during a dedicated training cycle include avoiding blue light near bedtime (most phones can now block blue light during set hours), making a no-phone-or-books-in-bed rule, cutting caffeine by 4 pm, and making sure you have a set time to go to sleep. Making your bedroom a good place to sleep is important too: cool sheets, blackout curtains, and fresh pillowcases can help as well.

Foam rollers and other tools that hurt so good.

Massages are expensive and while they’re excellent relaxation, not everyone can afford them or has the time. Enter the foam roller: the semi-painful answer to all of those knots and your tight calves. There’s also the Addaday massage stick, percussion massage guns like the TriggerPoint, and many other massage tools that you can learn to use to relax your muscles after a run. Building a 15 minute post-run massage into your routine can leave you with much fresher legs the next time you head out the door.

For the hardest efforts or when you just want a little extra TLC, check out our NormaTec boots. They use air compartments to massage your legs, utilizing compression to increase blood flow. The specific pattern the boots use flushes waste build up from cells, reducing the impacts of delayed-onset muscle soreness. I love reading a book and sitting in these the day after a good set of hill repeats. We offer 30 minute sessions at Fleet Feet Syracuse, but provide your own book!

Take a down week!

If you take a look at most training plans made by certified coaches, you’ll notice that even in heavy mileage plans, the total training volume decreases every 3rd to 4th week. This isn’t a mistake or a coincidence. Even if your end goal is to increase your weekly mileage, taking “cutback” weeks is essential to making sure you recover. Your body will take this time to repair tissue and build muscle, and the “fresh legs” feeling you earn makes sure that you don’t feel burnt out and stay confident in your training.

Part of this isn’t only decreasing mileage every third or fourth week, but also keeping your easy runs easy. If you run your base runs too fast, your body has to recover from the added stress. By running easy, you’ll be fresher for your hard workouts and you can run them faster and build fitness more effectively!

Eat good food and plenty of it.

Commonly, distance runners find it difficult to eat after a hard effort. This is actually the most important time to eat, to refill glycogen stores. Focus on finding a good and appetizing way to eat carbs and protein post-workout, whether it’s the classic recovery protein shake + banana or a bowl of overnight oats. It’s most effective to eat this snack within 30 minutes of the workout, so try to set it as a habit.

General nutrition is important for runners as well. While I’m not an expert on nutrition, I know it’s important not to skimp on calories and carbs during training. Neglecting to eat enough will cause poorer quality workouts, headaches, and can even lead you down the avenue of overtraining. There are great runner specific cookbooks out there like Run Fast. Cook Fast. Eat Slow. and Rise and Run by elite marathoner and mother Shalane Flanagan and chef Elyse Kopecky. Trying new recipes is not only a great way to get more nutrition, but it’s also a hearty meal or snack to look forward to after a training session.

Keep it fun.

Even pro-athletes have fun: have you seen Molly Seidel’s costumed and super fast Turkey Trots?! She ran a 34:33 10K while dressed up as a turkey. Choosing between training hard and having fun is a false dichotomy! You can run 55 miles a week and sing 80s tunes on your long run, wear tutus on a killer hill workout, and celebrate with cake for a teammate’s first 20 mile run. If you have a particularly hard workout, try to avoid stressful topics the rest of the day and maybe indulge in some Parks and Recreation or your favorite comedian. Stress can make recovery longer and harder and after all... It’s just running!