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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-13-2015, 11:46 PM
Just wondering if anyone else has a body part (or parts) that tend to recover slower than the rest, and if its an issue with training fast twitch fibers or not. For me, I can barely walk or run two-three days after squatting and deadlifting. Recently put them together on the same day so that I can squeeze in a circuit leg workout before I do them again the following week.
For forearms I do a lot of fencing in complement to weightlifting, and they're very sore mostly by the wrist tip of the flexors/extensors near the hand and at the elbow bone on the inside (forget if its called golfers or tennis elbow). Because we 'grip' every time we lift weights the forearms are secondarily used, any advice for faster recovery? I was thinking of going to get a massage once a week and start taking glutamine and BCAA's.
I cook a lot of meat eggs and veggies which is why I don't really take supplements. Well hell maybe I don't know what I'm doing but this is just a trend I've noticed over the past year. I'd like to hear what some of you think.
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-14-2015, 12:26 AM
The main things are the basics. Whey protein no more then 30 mins after workouts the quicker the better. Dont mix it with milk, just water and whey protein. Buy a car polisher, they are 20 bucks at most car parts stores, there are videos on youtube on how to use them as a massager, they are more powerful than any massager you can buy in stores. Long hot showers or hot tub sessions. No Ibuprofen or Alieve or any anti-inflammatory drugs. 500mg of aspirin no more then once a week is it. Once the muscles are nourished and recovering at around the 18 hour mark I start passive dehydration to pull the water out of my muscles. Basically I dont drink any fluids that day and do no workouts and only get the water that is in food(no fruits) some veggies are ok, meat is ok. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesnt. For the worst cases of DOMS(delayed onset muscle soreness) if I dont have relief after 3 days and its really bad 5mg of codeine will work just dont be stupid and make a habit out of it, no more then once every 4 months. Learning how to cope with pain is good thing, to a certain extent.
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-14-2015, 04:20 AM
Rest and nutrition.
I've been training for half my life and still can't walk the day after the day after leg days.
No pain no gain
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-14-2015, 09:33 AM
What exactly are you doing in your leg workout?
It might be a simple case of you doing too much volume too soon. Reduce it until your recovery capacity catches up, then build up the volume sloooowly.
Don't blow your load every workout, keep some in the tank.
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-14-2015, 12:48 PM
Thanks, I can deal with the pain, but regardless of that, I'm trying to diametrically increase my forum and thigh size so that I can handle larger weights eventually. Thats why I want those two body parts to recover faster, everything else is good to go after 2 days, except forearms and thighs. I have noticed that 10 minutes of intense bicycling cardio the day after squats/deads can help loosen up the lactic acid that may still be in the legs, and easy the recovery until you're ready to squat again.
I do a standard 8 sets of 8 for front squats, nothing too heavy, I don't do back squats anymore since I stopped powerlifting heavy.
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-14-2015, 01:20 PM
30g of a high quality whey isolate is what works best 30 mins or less after exercise. The whey is fast absorbing and readily used to start the repair and rebuilding of muscles. Milk has casein in it which is a slow digesting protein. For recovery a person does not want anything getting in the way of that 30grams of whey protein.
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-14-2015, 08:07 PM
So no milk then? Interesting idea, I used to do that, but what about milk and protein before bed? To enact the slow digesting enzymes and recover during sleep
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-15-2015, 05:10 PM
I can't speak much for forearms, but for legs I like to do the following:
Take pre-workout as usual leg day, but add a few L-Arganaine pills..
Whey protein right after workout, shower, keep hot (firm believer in value of cold showers, but I want to keep as much blood in the legs as I can for a few hours afterwards on legday).
Get home (I shower at the gym, places are fuckin gross), eat 1-2 small dark chocolate hersey's while heating up food (slams the insulin, opens the muscles - think meat lockers) then eat RED meat if possible. A steak, or Salmon (a lot if Salmon), along with a half cup of oatmeal (keeps the muscles open and hydrated for 2-4 hours). Plus some greens for absorption.. nutriceuticals.
After that, I take an anti-inflammatory for knees (mine are shot), so 1-2 Aleve or preferably 2-4 Cissus Pills (au naturale). A few hours later, 1-2 heaping teaspoons of free form L-Glutamine (amt. dependant on how hard I lifted .. how heavy I went), and hour or two after that, 25-50 grams of Casein Protein to feed at night.
Light stretch time permitting before bed.
Next AM 12+ OZ water, 50g whey protein, then breakfast.. etc.
Over next 2-5 days, as you should be sore if you hit 'em hard, judiciously eat plenty of many different types of protein to maximize Amino Acids profile, and L-Glutamine here and there. And mad stretching.
The Glutamine I didn't bother with as much, unless I was hitting legs twice a week. Eventually if you hit legs twice a week, they will begin to recovery faster on their own naturally. In fact, I've always considered body-building, and power lifting to be a bottom up growth. Like a tree grows from it's trunk, you put on big leg strength and muscle, comparatively, the mental ambiguity to overcome heavy upper body lifts comes naturally. I don't lift legs that hard anymore, but a few years ago
Oh yea, re. forearms.. the hand bent back stretch (great for carpal tunnel as well), but ease into doing that one slowly, and massage pin pointed striations in your forearms with your hands, deep, to the bone. << Had to do that after an arm wrestling injury, it helped a lot. It will hurt, but working out those stringy knots is crucial for cooked forearms in the long term.
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-18-2015, 04:18 PM
Thanks, that massage really works. Have you tried the ArmAid tool?
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-18-2015, 07:09 PM
^ I didn't post the ArmAid video since I haven't tried it myself, but Antranik is usually reliable source of knowledge and I've heard others recommend it as well.
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Faster Recovery for Forearms and Legs?
09-20-2015, 10:46 AM
# If you mean deadlift as a back workout then don't do squats and deadlifts on the same day. Even when you don't lift heavy [or to failure]. Try to have 2 days of complete rest between deadlift and squat workout.
# Stretch after every workout
# Rest/sleep more if possible