5 strategies to improve your performance and recover faster.

The way we eat and sleep is paramount to how our bodies’ recover. Whether you are a recreational athlete or just starting out on your fitness journey, it’s important to learn great recovery habits that will give you longterm results so that you don’t plateau or worse, end up injuring yourself.

Below we’ll break down some tips you can implement right away for faster sports recovery and improved body composition.

#1. Aim to get in 7-8 hours of sleep every night.

I hate to break it to you but if you think an average of 6 hours’ sleep every night followed by 3 hours of endurance training and heavy lifting several times a week is going to give you the results you’re after, you couldn’t be more wrong.

If you want to learn more about how the recovery process works, read this blog.

What is a stressor and how does it affect weight loss.

Our body’s natural circadian rhythm is responsible for various biological functions including how it releases hormones, immunity and tissue repair, appetite and hunger, energy and alertness.

Now imagine over training without giving the body time to recover.

#2. Plan your carbs around your training sessions.

You may have heard of the terms peri-workout or pre-, intra-, and post- workout carbs. These refer to the optimal times you can eat your carbs for better performance.

Our bodies prefer carbs as its primary source of energy, especially during high intensity workouts. Our muscles need glycogen as fuel for long and intense workouts. Deplete it from glycogen and it will start mining for it elsewhere. This is possible for the body to do, but the result is likely to be a slower process.

If you goal is move faster and with greater power, carbs should be your primary choice.

To learn more about macros and sports performance visit the blog What are macronutrients and why do they matter for sports performance.

Loading your carbs right before, during and after your session can help to promote recovery.

The amount of carbs each athlete needs is dependent on various factors including their size, intensity of the workout and the length of the workout just to name a few.

As a general guideline, you want fast releasing carbohydrates 1-2 hours after training to keep you replenish your glycogen fuel so you can recovery well enough for your next training session the day after.

During training any liquid form of carbohydrates like juice, dextrose or electrolyte will suffice.

If you want to learn more about what each macro does and how you can use it to maximise your training read this blog here.

#3. Eat your fats away from your training session.

Many people make the mistake of assuming that a “recovery meal” after their training session is the same thing as a calorie dense meal. Not exactly.

Although there is absolutely nothing wrong with eating whatever you want after a great training session, if we are strictly talking about sports performance and recovery, you might want to hone in on some of the macros.

We talked earlier about the importance of carbohydrates and why it’s necessary for sports performance, now let’s look at fats and how that can affect the absorption of carbs.

Fats are a great source of energy, in fact the most dense form of energy, but its slow. This is why for spots performance, you’re better off focusing on carb intake.

Fats also have a nasty habit of slowing down carb absorption so if you want to recover faster or refill your glycogen tank, then eat your fats away from your training session.

Aim to eat fatty meals about 2-4 hours away from your training windows so that your body can absorb the carbs from your meals before and after your training session.

#4 Break your protein up equally throughout the day.

Protein breakdown is a relatively short process. We break it down and it gets recycled back up in a process that is called protein turnover.

Our bodies don’t store much of it so unlike fats and carbs that you can manipulate around your training sessions to work in your favour, you are better off dividing your protein and distributing it equally across the day.

For example if your protein needs are 180g per day and you eat 5 times a day, aim to eat up to 35g of protein for each meal.

#5. Practice mobility.

It goes without saying that if you want to maintain healthy joints for years to come, you should keep them supple.

The yoga teacher in me wants to tell everyone to stretch. I can’t help it. It’s in my DNA.

Whether you want to call it mobility or yoga, it doesn’t matter, move your body in a way that allows it to increase it’s range of movement.*

Stretching doesn’t have to be boring. If you find yoga and/mobility too slow, use it to practice some other bodyweight movements that are a little more challenging.

If you have practiced yoga before you’ll know that yoga can be very intense and challenging, depending on what you want to get out of it.

Here’s one fun arm balance you can try whilst stretching your hips and lower back.

Practice these 5 tips and you’ll be on your way to increasing your personal best scores again. Remember, its about training smarter, not training harder.

*If you have any injuries please seek advice from a specialist.