Whats the most effective recovery strategy from after a run?

Fatigue in sport has become a topic of interest among athletes, coaches and sport scientists because it affects athletic performance across a wide range of sports. Sports related fatigue can be defined as a decline of muscle force or an exercise induced impairment of performance. (Knicker, 2011).

Scientists recruited 46 healthy male recreational runners taking part in the same half marathon event and assigned them to four groups of equal ability, which either had sports massage, cold water immersion (ice baths), active recovery or passive rest within 15 minutes after the event.

The sports massage group had a 20 minutes post event sports massage focusing on the legs. The cold water immersion group sat in cold baths where the temperature was maintained at fifteen degrees centrigrade plus/minus 1 degree. While participants in the passive rest group sat at rest on a bench. While those in the active recovery group jogged at 60% of their anaerobic threshold for all 15 minutes.

24 hours before the half marathon, immediately after the intervention and then 24 hours after the race jump height, muscle soreness, perceived recovery and stress were measured. The results show the sports massage and cold water immersion had no effect on objective markers of fatigue such as changes in muscle and the blood but they did have a significant effect ont he subjective fatigue measures, including perceived recover and muscle soreness. These interventions were more effective than passive rest while active recovery had no physical advantage and a negative effect on perceived recovery.

Reference

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0207313

Can vitamin D reduce the risk of a severe asthma attack?
An international team of researchers looked into this if vitamin D can reduce the risk of a severe asthma attack. They analysed seven trails that included 435 children and two others that included 658 adults all of whom had mild-to-moderate asthma. According to the study, Vitamin D halves (from 6% to 3%) the risk of a severe attack requiring hospital treatment. None of the people who took a Vitamin D supplement suffered any adverse reactions. So taking supplements or getting out in the sunshine during the summer months, could become an important part of asthma treatment. What was unclear from the study what how many of the people taking part were already deficient in Vitamin D. Reference AR Martineau, CJ Cates, M Urashima et al, 2016, Does vitamin D prevent asthma attacks or improve control of asthma symptoms or both?, Cochrane Database System Review See >> http://www.cochrane.org/CD011511/AIRWAYS_vitamin-d-prevent-asthma-attacks
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What aids chronic knee pain?
According to Arthristis research Uk, many of the 4.5 million people in the Uk with osteoarthritis of the knee, suffer with chronic knee pain. This includes my dad, so this piece of research caught my attention. A group of researchers from Standord University working with counterparts in China conducted a review of 19 randomised control trials to examine whether accupuncture was effective for knee pain. They considered both the visual analogue scale (VAS) of measuring knee pain and Western Ontario and McMaster Universitities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC). They concluded that accupuncture can be effective in relieving chronic knee pain 12 weeks after treatments. Reference Zhang Q, Yue J, Golianu B, et al Updated systematic review and meta-analysis of acupuncture for chronic knee pain. Acupuncture in Medicine 2017;35:392-403.
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The Impact of Sitting All Day – Part 5
In this series of articles on the impact of sitting all day I have looked at the impact on muscles (in part 1) the general impact on the [...]
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