Introduction
DOMS, Stands for Daily Onset Muscle Soreness, and to explain it it is that soreness that you get in your muscle after a big session, a feeling a lot of people chase (Which we will get on to shortly). A lot of people ask us if there is anyway to avoid or even help recover from Daily Onset Muscle Soreness? Well in this article we are going to cover some tips and tricks to help recover and also prevent DOMS. Let us begin.
Stretch Before and After
One way to avoid and help ease DOMS is to Stretch. Stretching has many benefits but aiding recovery is the one we are going to look at here. Begin your workout with stretching (or a active warmup) or you can end it with stretching. Doesn’t take much, 3-6 minutes at the end of your work. Work from the bottom up stretching your muscles. You will notice that your recovery is quicker and DOMS are reduced.
Foam Rolling
Foam rolling is not so much a solution but a way to prevent DOMS. Foam rolling Is an easy way to massage and roll your muscle out at home, helping to keep them healthy. Looking after you muscles and rolling them out will help prevent DOMS. Foam Rollers can be purchased for cheap online and using our free Foam Rolling pack on the Sets & Reps app, you can roll out at home as many times as needed.
Keep Moving
Being active is a huge must. For example, After a leg day you may feel that sitting down will be the best way to recover, and in some cases it is, but getting up and moving will help just as much. If you find your legs are hurting, going for a short walk, this will help them loosen up and recover. Active recovery is very important, keeping the body moving and preventing it from ceasing up. Doesn’t take much, just 5 minutes every evening or morning of movement will help recover and prevent DOMS.
Sleep
As we have said before, Recovery is key (Read about it in this blog), and the perfect time to recover is during sleep. Sleep will not only help you get stronger, but also recover and prevent DOMS. As someone who use to live off very little sleep, I can confirm there isn’t a faster way to slow your progress than lack of sleep, I might write a whole post about this topic, but for now just remember, make sure you are getting sufficient sleep. It will help speed up your recovery massively.
DOMS Don’t Mean a Good Session
The tip that everyone needs to remember is that DOMS do not equal a great session. People have this notion that if you wake up the next day and you don’t ache then your workout must of been rubbish. This is not so! As long as you are making progress and increasing volume, you are having good workouts. You don’t always have to fry your muscles every session.
If you go steadier at the gym, your recovery time will be faster so when the next session comes round, you will be at full strength. How many times have you heard about people having to Skip a leg day because they are still recovering form the last one? As we said above, if you are making progress then your workouts are great. The best way to prevent DOMS is to not chase them in the first place.
Also if you are looking after yourself, and following some of the tips above, then you will recover quicker and won’t ache as much anyway. Look after your body and your body will look after you.
Outro
As you can see there are a few things that you can do to help recover from a workout and prevent DOMS pains. Do you have any tips that you use to recover quicker? Let us know over on our Instagram. We would love to hear them!
Remember if you are looking for the perfect workout companion then our workout application is perfect. Packed with workouts and features to help you reach your fitness goals. Download for free here.
Written by Kieran Blacker
Kieran is the CEO and Founder of Sets & Reps. He decided to make an application that helped people get a gym workout when not at the gym. He designed, Coded and built the application himself.
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