5 steps to a great recovery from a long race

Any of you feel like this the day after your race

You can imagine in the last 25 years I have tried everything under the sun to help my legs and body recover from the rigors of a tough day out in the sun. Not only is your back sore, but so is your lower back, maybe your neck, one or two toes are sore and then the shoulders and legs.


What I have learnt from years of damaging myself is that the most forgotten parts of the damaged body are the major organs, like the lungs, heart and kidneys. So lets look at ways to get you back to your strong self.


So, recovery is a very important part of your season and if you dont do it right it will come back to haunt you. I did 2 half IM on back to back weekends, it completely destroyed my season. I mean I recovered, but I could get my body to lift it up a notch which was required when it came to an Olympic distance race. My personal experience tells me that 3 to 4 weeks of recovery is the right amount, depending on how old you are. As you get older or the more years you have in your legs, the less hours you need to put in to get results, but the longer you need to recover. Now remember recovery isnt only relaxing it involves repair and rebuild. This means spending time to repair the damage and then time to get you back up to speed. Its specific to everyone, the last time I checked non of us share a body. So you need to test this and tweak it and re do it (this is why it takes years to get good) and once you find a program that works for you, keep it and follow it religiously.


Good you ready to go?


Lets look at immediate recovery, the first 2 weeks.

1. Supplement with antioxidants:
1. Using organic food supplements will improve the quality of the nutrients you are getting in and this is important when you have put your body under huge stress. Your body has a huge overload of free radicals and only the best that nature has to offer will help you get back to 100% in the least stress free way.
2. Now consider this VERY IMPORTANT POINT: When you have raced and put your bosy under such huge stress, your body is busy trying to clean out all the free radical waste right, consuming a non organic vitamin is not the bright solution since these need to be processed through the major organs adding even bigger stress to your body, hence recovery takes longer.
3. Organic food supplements are digested like food and this all takes place in the stomach and is absorb much faster into the blood stream. Hence you get a faster nutritional upload and your body can then repair the damaged muscles and cells quicker.
4. Consum lots of Vitamin C: Lastly we want to prevent getting ill. Of course if you are serious about your body then you will use the best quality available, but sickness after a long race is very possible and here is why. Research has shown that when you breathe heavily for such long periods of time, the back of your throat actually becomes a little raw and this opens you up to infection. Vitamin C will help flush the infectious monsters right out of your body.
2. Drink plenty water
1. Water will help to flush out all the free radicals and waste and help clean out the major organs
2. Drink purified water: Yes I know you are told that your water is the best in the world and clean, but it is not. refer to my article on water purification. YOU MUST NOT DRINK CHLORINE, please dont kid yourself and believe everything you hear from your local government about how clean the water is. Do some research yourself.
3. Purified water also makes sure the essential minerals and salts stay in the water. These are essential to your recovery and cell function, which is to take in the good and pass out the bad.
3. Eat: 
1. Yes eat plenty of fruits and veggies
2. Make nice frozen fruit smoothies
3. Make nice veggie drinks or fruit and veggie drinks
4. If you are a meat lover, then eat some meat, potatoes.....definitely my favourite
4. Increase blood flow to your muscles: There are several ways to do this, but it must be done in a gentle way so as to promote the flow of blood to damaged areas. the blood rich in nutrients from your organic supplements and water you are drinking will be able to reach all the damaged muscle fibers.
1. Gentle massage helps warm up your muscles and encourages blood flow to the area
2. Go for a walk, walk in nature, walk at the sea (if you live there). Try do anything that is away from your bike and running shoes.
3. A light cycle will also get blood flowing, I would suggest a stationary bike where you can sit and read a magazine or good book and not a cycling group where you will get caught up in the testosterone bubble and go all out
4. Swim:  a gentle swim will also encourage blood flow and in this case to all your muscles. Cycling is limited to the legs while swimming will get all the muscles warmed up and without the gravity
5. Dont run: This is my personal preference, because it is weight bearing and because you might still be feeling mentally high form the race and get carried away.
5. Clear your mind: I have you ever seen you favourite sports team pull off a huge upset win and then the next week play complete rubbish and lose to the team near the bottom of the table. Well this is due to having had to step up their game and it usually is a huge mental effort. A huge motivational effort.
1. As per point 3 above, going for a walk is a great relaxer, not so relaxing if you still have sore toes
2. Go to the beach and get rid of that ridiculous tan you got on the weekend
1. Take plenty of fluids and nice fresh fruit along to keep your athletic appetite happy.
3. LASTLY....................Sleep, get plenty of sleep. Remember you are not training so you can sleep in and get a couple of extra hours. 

In my next article I will look at the weeks 3 and 4 of recovery.

Happy eating, sleeping and recovering and well done on your race, next time you will be better.

I hope I have been able to help you in some way.

Yours in sport

coachBEZ

Organic supplementation: Yes its the way to go!!

I suppose there are many scenarios on what is organic and what is not. I am not going to get into the details of it but here are my thoughts on the subject and why.


I choose organic (not in-process organic) supplementation over pharmaceutical grade, because of 2 reasons.

1. Well its fake and my body can't live on fake fatty acids
1. Imagine you consume fatty acids that are not organic / as nature intended and they are transported by your bodies nutritional system to the cell wall. The old fatty acids that make up your cell walls are being replaced by new fatty acids, but because these ones are not organic. What does this mean, well it means that the cell walls dont filter out the nutrients they need to allow into and out of the cells and therefore your cells dont function properly and dont perform their job properly. The cell can also lose structure. Now when the cell gets replaced, your body makes a new copy of that cell and in this case it will be a cell that is not of proper structure. Can you imagine if this happens to thousands of cells everyday over a 20 year period?
2. It has been recently proven again, that not only are plant based nutrients good for you, but actual plant matter has huge benefits. The purpose of this article is not to go into detail about that, I am not technical. My purpose is to provide you with perspective. 
2. Organic farming follows strict processes and they are subject to stringent review on their farming practices.

How do I choose a supplement?

Here are  10 points I would consider when choosing an organic supplement company

1. How long have they been in existence how long have they been doing organic
1. Have they only started creating organic supplements now since the health and wellness trend started in 2010. I would say this is not a good sign, they were never really concerned about your health then were they?
2. My supplement manufacturer has been producing organic supplements for 75 years. This tells me it has always been about nutrition and not about the money making.
2. Do they own the farms that grow the ingredients and Are those farms certified organic (it takes 10 years)
1. Did yo know it takes 10 years for a farm to be certified organic
2. Do their neighbouring famers practice organic methods so there is no run off of pesticides into or onto their land
3. My manufacturer pays his neighbours to practice organic farming methods
3. Does your company lead the world in research on new sources of nutrients
1. My supplier has a centre for optimal health where professors are invite to complete research and publish their findings
4. Consider if your manufacturer has patents for their organic formulations.
1. Mine has over 30
5. Is your manufacturer associated with key universities around the world
6. Pick a supplement company that takes time to find the best micro climate in the world for growing each specific plant, then determine the time of year, month, week and day it is producing its highest quality nutrient and then only harvesting it
1. No not picking it while its not ripe and letting it ripen it off the tree
2. No not freezing it for a year then artificially ripening it.
3. I mean picking it as nature intended and eating as nature intended
7. Will you manufacturer let you take a walk through their manufacturing plant as a visitor to see how they do it
8. Do they practice clean manufacturing processes.
1. For example, do they take apart and clean their machinery after each production run
9. Are their products and processes so good they have other companies buying products from them
10. Would your company offer you a money back guarantee (no questions asked) if you dont think it is better than the supplement you are currently using.
1. This sounds ridiculous doesnt it right.............Jeepers I think so, but hey if they do this and have a history steeped in quality and they are still around. It means they not only talk the talk, their products walk the walk

Go do your research, dont be lazy. Yes its fine to ask a few people, but in the end ask yourself good questions about the product, I mean it is your health we are talking about right.

AND finally, to those of you not supplementing or not using organic and call this all a hype, I say this:

Wouldnt it be a tragedy, that in 30 years time, you havent supplemented with the best and doctors and researchers turn around and say, we were wrong, organic supplements are essential.

yours in health and wellness

coachBEZ

Where do nutrients come from?

I have been introduced to a whole new way of looking at nutrients for your body, I think you guys might find this very interesting

The natural, protective substances found in plants that also give them their unique color are called phytonutrients (or "plant nutrients"). To get the full range of health benefits associated with plant nutrients, you should eat a rainbow of color every day.

Follow the color tabs below for information about the fruits and vegetables associated with each color, the key phytonutrients they contain and their individual health benefits.

Let me know if this was informative or helpful, I have more thoughts on this, so watch this space.

My thoughts on Health and Wellness in todays world

I would like to clear the air on the subject of Health and Wellness from my view point. Of course this is what I know from experience as a sports person and triathlete for 25 years and what I have discovered through my own investigations. I welcome your comments.

You see in my understanding taking supplements seems to be put into two categories;

1. People who are serious athletes and need to take a protein or a special supplement to recover & perform better
2. People who are dieting or have a health deficiency.

Now my argument or point is this, most people take a multi-vitamin and tell me that this is enough. I say it is not enough. Now most peoples answer to me is,Yes Coach its not me, but I eat healthy as well, and I get my daily recommended levels in. 

Well heres the point, the point of supplementation is to help your body have sufficient nutrients to deal with the stresses (funny how today it is stresses and not just stress) of life and function correctly. Stresses come in the form of work, drink and exercise, if you are not doing this then you will develop a disease or illness related to the deficiency of that vitamin or mineral. so for example 100 years ago sailors suffered from Scurvy from a lack of Vitamin C in their diet. So therefore today we have a recommended daily allowance of Vitamin C, which purpose is to guide you to not develop scurvy.

So if the RDA for Vitamin C, is to prevent you getting scurvy and is based on a person living a pretty normal life and is not suffering from stresses and exercise, then wouldnt you think you need to up your intake?

There are two ways to improve your uptake of Vitmains and Minerals

1. Eat better 
2. Increase your supplementation

So lets look at these 2 quickly:

1. Eat Better

• 20 years ago our foods contained 5 times more nutrients than they do today, so if you are telling me you eat your 3 - 5 servings of fruit and veg a day, then I am telling you you are not getting enough.
• And lets be honest, who here really eats 3- 5 servings of fruit and veg with our lifestyles. Yes very very few
• So the alternatives are
• Increase the amount of fruit and veg you eat ( Yeah right!) or 
• Go to point number 2

2. Increase your supplementation

Increasing your supplementation is a much better option in todays climate. Life runs at quite a pace, so it is easier to take a supplement than to now eat 7 - 10 serving of fruit and veg a day. This now comes the second debate. What supplement to take?

I am a 100% all for organic supplementation for two reasons. 

1. Synthetic supplementation is 16 times less effective than organic. So would you like to eat a plastic apple or a real apple?
2. The quality of the supplement is also very important and shows in the amount of waste that comes out of your body. You can see this by when you drink Vitamin C, if you take an organic Vitamin C you see less waste. I mean wouldnt you want to get more bang for your buck. Yes organic supplements seem more expensive compared to the cheap rubbish you can get on the market, but ask yourself how much goes straight through your body without getting absorbed or used.

In my next article I will go into more detail regarding this topic, so send me your questions and I will make sure they are addressed.

Have a great day

coachBEZ

The origins of the 4 week taper.

Swim start in Nice

When I started triathlon there wasnt a wealth of information around about the sport, especially living in South Africa where we were cut off from the rest of the world. But one day I got to watch this race on TV, called the Nice international triathlon, race commentator Phil Ligget. I watched in amazement as this guy Mark Allen, won the race for the 8th time. He raced it 8 times and won it 8 times (eventually 10 out 10). So I decided to find out how he trains and what he does and the most noteable training tip I ever found was how he tapered for a long distance race. That day I understood why the rest you plan is more important than the training.

Meeting the big man in Monaco. That's me on the left

Mark Allen is the only person I know of today who uses this formula, I have tested it myself and know it to work not only for sport but in life too.

Basically it takes your body two weeks to recover from a period of sustained stress(exercise or work) and then another 2 weeks for you to build up the stength again.

So you know how you have travelled to a big race and you get there a couple of days before the race and feel so lethargic, tired, no speed, hardly make it up the stairs. Well this is your body going into recovery mode. R&R. Rest and recovery.

So in order to capitalize on this, Mark Allen started tapering 4 weeks before a huge race by cutting his mileage in half every week and increasing the quality and of course resting and eating well.

Obviously there are other factors like food, sleep and being a full time triathlete that can affect your personal approach to this, so go try it and tweak it, thats how Mark got it right. also remember if you are an amateur and are working a 9-5, you should really consider long taper periods since you got work stress to deal with as well.

If you want to find out more about Mark Allen and his approach I would check out two books.

Prof. Tim Noakes - The Lore of Running

Tony Svensson - Total Triathlon almanac

Cheers for now 

CoachBez