20 Sep TC Marathon Runners Recovery Special! Lets Recover Together!
The Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon Finish Line is in Sight!
You have been putting in the work, training early before the sun rises, pounding the pavement constantly to train your body to perform your best on race day! It is no small feat, so first off you should be proud of yourself for taking the leap to 1) Sign up for the race 2) Put in the time training. What about your Recovery though? What steps are you taking to ensure you are not at risk of injury and delayed onset muscle soreness?
Many times throughout my marathon training, things have seemed pretty difficult and tested my will to fight through. In the beginning, the first couple weeks to a month of so felt great. I have often hit a wall where adding miles and keeping my pace have seemed harder than I had hoped. Pushing our bodies to add miles, increase our pace, add in some hill sprints, it is no easy task. Feel proud of the work you have put in. Now, as we trudge along our bodies get sore…. Ankles, feet, knees, lower back, you name it. Running consistently for many takes a toll on our bodies, piling up inflammation in our joints and causing delayed onset muscle soreness in our legs making simple tasks like standing up from our chair difficult. That DOES NOT NEED TO HAPPEN! Lets talk a little bit about how Cryotherapy can help!
In this video I chat a bit about the way cryotherapy helps the body to recover. Check it out, and read on below to learn more.
Have you hit the point where you wake up in the morning to run, and the first few miles is just about you loosening up and fighting through soreness to get to a point where you can just run? That is INFLAMMATION! Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS) is from microtears in our muscle tissue, causing inflammation which makes muscles feel tight and downright painful. How about your knees? Hips? Ankles? Feet? For me, its my ankles and feet. Inflammation piles up in our joints and connective tissues (ligaments/tendons/fascia) from the repetitious use from running. It can cause some serious joint discomfort, and make running difficult to even consider. How can cryotherapy help you ask? Lets break it down.
Cryotherapy has a couple of scientifically proven main actions on the body;
- Increase Circulation of oxygen & Nutrient rich blood flow throughout the body
- Boost levels of Anti-inflammatory proteins (cold shock proteins/cytokines)
Whole body cryotherapy, a treatment that is anywhere from 2-3 minutes at -220 and lower alerts the cold shock response in the body. The human body has this natural response built in and can be a great asset for overall health and wellness. How is it different than the ice baths that I used to do between football 2-a-days? Good question. Its all about an extremely rapid drop in skin temperature from the extremely cold dry air in a cryotherapy machine. Cold water immersion like an ice bath can help increase blood flow to an extent, and did help a bit with my soreness between practices but it is not as effective and so much less tolerable than Cryotherapy. Our skin has emergency receptors that are alerted when a rapid drop in skin temperature takes place. By rapid I mean within 2-3 minutes, and the skin needs to drop 30 degrees in that short period of time to alert the desired response. This is not possible in a 45 degree ice bath, or even a 32 degree soak for 15 minutes.
The immediate drop in skin temperature alerts the body to an emergency, its a bio hack or trick we are playing on the body to make it think it needs to protect its vital organs. The first step it takes is to send blood from our skin to our core to protect those organs (vasoconstriction) and while the blood pools there it picks up oxygen & nutrients which makes it extremely rich. As the body senses an emergency, it releases everybody’s’ favorite ENDORPHINS! These mood boosting, feel good chemicals flood the system, making us feel great mentally and physically as they also act as our body’s natural painkillers. As we step out after the treatment is complete, our blood vessels throughout the body vasodilate or expand rushing all of that oxygen & nutrient rich blood to the extremities. This causes a flushing of inflammation and toxins while providing all of our soft tissue and connective tissue with all they need to repair and recover. This is a huge piece of the cryotherapy for recovery puzzle! BLOOD FLOW! Anytime we increase positive blood flow, our body benefits in so many ways aside from just recovering from running.
Now lets talk about how Cryo helps with Inflammation. Our bodies create inflammation due to so many things; diet, exercise/training/inflammatory conditions/environment, the list goes on and on. Tony Robbins once described the human inflammatory response as “setting off a nuclear bomb to kill a cockroach” meaning that it is way more than necessary. The initial action or intention of our inflammatory response is to initiate healing, but it goes way beyond that and causes some problems such as swelling, soreness, aches & pains, and more. Cryotherapy was created in 1978 by a Rheumatologist because it is the extinguisher for our inflammatory system fire! By alerting the cold shock response in the human body we boost cold shock proteins or anti-inflammatory cytokines in our blood stream to reduce existing inflammation, and this also helps to keep it from piling up as we continue to train or RUN! So, long story short… regular use of cryotherapy throughout the running process can reduce inflammation in the body and also keep it from causing DOMS and sore joints from our runs throughout the week. That’s HUGE! That is exactly why one of the first groups to use cryotherapy in the United States was the Nike Oregon Project and Race teams. As we continue to run, our body tries to do its “inflammatory Nuclear Bomb” but because we use cryotherapy we keep it under control and keep our muscles loose, reducing the risk of injury and nagging problems in our joints.
NormaTec Compression Therapy is another service endurance athletes of all levels use to help recovery after long runs, heavy leg days, and fluid retention in our legs. I have a few awesome articles linked here that show research studies about how compression therapy can help reduce pain & increase range of motion and flexibility. Click either of those links for more!
Time to Take your recovery to the NEXT LEVEL!
Want to try it? We can help. My favorite combo that I discuss in this video is the Squeeze & Freeze. NormaTec Compression Therapy + Whole Body Cryotherapy is the best way to help your legs recovery quickly and effectively. For 2019 Medtronic Twin Cities runners of any distance, you can try this combo anytime between September 20th to October 12th for post race recovery as well for ONLY $25! ($75 value). All you need is a bib number or registration email to prove your participation, our Halo Cryotherapy team will take care of the rest. By appointment only, as they will fill up fast!
Call us at the numbers below to get started-
Minneapolis location – 612-787-2796 – 3615 W. 50th St. Minneapolis MN 55410
Golden Valley Location – 763-276-9452 – 7722 Highway 55 Golden Valley MN 55427
We are so excited to be a part of your race day success, and will be there to cheer you on! Keep going, don’t give up, and recover as hard as you train with us at Halo Cryotherapy. Thank you so much for inspiring us to get out and run/move/be active.
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