# How to Recover Quickly from IRONMAN & 70.3 | Ep 497

An episode of [Oxygenaddict Triathlon Podcast](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/951501034), 10 Jul 2024, 18 min.

Audio: https://anchor.fm/s/ea99f7d8/podcast/play/89022210/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2024-6-9%2F382837030-44100-2-c54d8c04065f1.mp3

In this episode, Coach Rob Wilby dives deep into effective recovery strategies post-triathlon, whether it's a 70.3 or Ironman. With the racing season in full swing, it’s crucial to understand how to recover properly to get back into training quickly. Rob covers immediate post-race recovery, what to do in the days following the race, and how to structure a recovery week. Learn about the importance of nutrition, cold water immersion, ice packs, and compression leggings. He also discusses the significance of rest, the best types of post-race activities, and tips on nutrition and sleep to aid recovery. Tune in to learn how to minimize muscle soreness and delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS), ensuring a smooth transition back to regular training. * * * * * * * * SPONSORS * * * * * * * * Like what you heard in this show? Join hundreds of other age group triathletes making the most of their limited training time, training with Team OxygenAddict! http://team.oxygenaddict.com - The most comprehensive triathlon coaching program for busy age groupers. Join the Team Oxygenaddict waiting list and be the first to find out when a space becomes available: https://team.oxygenaddict.com/waiting-list * * * * * * * * * * * * precisionfuelandhydration.com Precision Fuel & Hydration help athletes personalise their hydration and fuelling strategies for training and racing. Use the free Fuel & Hydration Planner to get a personalised race nutrition plan for your next event. And then book a free 20-minute video consultation with a member of the PF&H Athlete Support Team to refine your strategy. Listeners get 15% off their first order of fuel and electrolytes with Precision Fuel & Hydration. Simply use this link and the discount will be auto-applied at the checkout. * * * * * * * * * * * * Watch on youtube Listen on Spotify Listen on Apple Podcasts

## Transcript

[0:03] Hello and welcome to the Oxygenating Podcast.
[0:05] We're brought to you every week by our sponsors, Precision Fuel
[0:08] and hydration.com. You can personalise your
[0:11] fuelling and hydration strategy so you perform your best with
[0:14] 15% off your first order of electrolytes and carbohydrate
[0:18] fuel. Decode Oxygen 24 at Precision
[0:21] Fuel and hydration.com. Welcome to the show, everybody.
[0:24] I'm your host, coach Rob Wilby, and every week we bring you an
[0:28] episode of this podcast to help motivate and inspire you for
[0:31] your triathlon goals for this season.
[0:33] Listen, a couple of quick things you could do for us before we
[0:36] jump into today's episode. If you do like this episode,
[0:39] please consider following us on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
[0:44] And also, if you're watching on YouTube, if you could like and
[0:46] subscribe, that would really help out the growth of the show.
[0:50] It helps the show get shown to more people by the algorithm on
[0:54] on the podcast players and on YouTube.
[0:55] So we'd really, really appreciate that.
[0:58] And secondly, if you're looking for help and advice with your
[1:00] triathlon training, please consider getting in touch with
[1:03] us. You can read all about what we
[1:05] offer at teamoxygenaddict.com and then you can e-mail us at
[1:08] help@oxygenaddict.com or there's a link in the show notes to book
[1:13] a call with me or one of the coaching team.
[1:15] We can discuss how we can best help you out with your triathlon
[1:19] goals for this season. On this episode we're going to
[1:22] be talking about how to recover from your triathlon, from your
[1:25] 70.3, from your Iron Man. It's a question we get an awful
[1:29] lot from the athletes we coach, and it's questions that have
[1:32] been coming in as well from listeners recently.
[1:34] We're right into the thick of the racing season at the moment
[1:38] and we spent an awful lot of time on the show talking about
[1:40] how to train and how to prepare for the race.
[1:43] But lots of people want to know what's the best way to recover
[1:46] from the race afterwards usually so that we can ease back into
[1:50] training as quickly as we possibly can get preparing for
[1:53] the next event. So there's a few things I'm
[1:56] going to talk about today. I'm going to talk about how to
[1:58] recover straight after the race and the hours after the race.
[2:01] I'm going to talk about what to do in the days after the race.
[2:05] And then we're going to talk about how to structure a week of
[2:08] recovery training, if you like to give yourself the best chance
[2:12] getting back into a smooth training flow and talk about how
[2:15] long that should take. O first U let's talk about what
[2:18] you can do straight after the race.
[2:21] I think the place to start here is to identify what the
[2:25] challenge is going to be and the best way to overcome that.
[2:28] And so the big challenge for triathletes is we're going to
[2:31] end U very sore in the two 3-4 days after the race usually
[2:37] because hard running is the thing that causes the most
[2:40] muscular soreness and a hard running off on legs that are
[2:45] already very fatigued from biking is an incredibly good way
[2:49] to get really sore legs. So a lot of you will have heard
[2:52] of the phrase DOMS, DOMS it stands for delayed onset muscle
[2:57] soreness. And usually this shows U 24 to
[3:00] 48 hours after doing a hard session.
[3:04] O typically you'll only experience this if you do a very
[3:07] heavyweight session and it tends to show U And most people say
[3:11] they feel OK the day after going in the gym and lifting heavy
[3:13] weights. And then it's the day after that
[3:15] all of a sudden their arms start to wake, the shoulders start to
[3:19] wake. And for the the sort of 24
[3:22] through to 72 hour period, it can be incredibly sore and
[3:25] difficult to do anything. Running hard in a race and
[3:29] especially running hard off the bike in a race is the only thing
[3:34] I've found that really sort of replicates that soreness that
[3:37] people get. And especially those of you who
[3:39] are racing 70.3 or Iron Man. And especially if the race goes
[3:44] really well and you get to run really hard at the end of the
[3:49] run, you'll find that this will typically create an awful lot of
[3:53] muscle soreness afterwards. O what we're looking for here is
[3:56] ways that we can minimise that soreness to get you back into
[4:00] training as quickly as possible. So I think that's defined the
[4:02] problem it's, it's having really sore, typically really sore
[4:07] quads, sometimes really sore glutes as well.
[4:10] Limits your ability to even walk up and down stairs, let alone
[4:15] think about going for a run. Usually you're all right doing a
[4:18] gentle bike ride, but you're still in some significant
[4:20] discomfort. So let's talk about the ways we
[4:23] can minimise it. The first thing is accept that
[4:26] you've got muscle damage after the race and do the things that
[4:29] you can do to help speed up the recovery from that process.
[4:32] O the things we've seen that are really going to help having some
[4:37] kind of nutrition relatively quickly after the race.
[4:41] So between 30 minutes to 90 minutes after the race finishes,
[4:45] that's high in protein. The challenge here is you're not
[4:48] always going to feel like being able to take something in and
[4:51] those situations, especially after a, you know, a very hard
[4:55] or very hot or both kind of event.
[4:58] But typically a recovery shake with lots of protein in or even
[5:02] chocolate milk at a push can be the best thing that you can have
[5:05] in that sort of 30 minutes to 90 minutes after race finishes
[5:09] window. If you can stomach it, the
[5:11] protein really helps your body start to recover in terms of
[5:15] repair and muscular damage. And it also, you'll find it
[5:19] helps you just generally feel better quicker and bounce back
[5:23] from in fact, sessions in general, not just races.
[5:26] So if you can get that recovery shaken relatively quickly after
[5:29] the event, that will really help.
[5:31] The next thing I think will really help if you're at a race
[5:34] venue where the finish line is close to where the start was and
[5:37] the swim is still there. If you can get your legs into
[5:40] cold water for five to 10 minutes after or relatively
[5:44] quickly after finishing the race, you'll find that really
[5:48] helps reduce the amount of sounds that you get as well.
[5:50] So just go in and sitting in the lake after the race is finished.
[5:54] The water was relatively cool. Can definitely, definitely help.
[5:58] The next tip is going to take some preparation, but it is
[6:01] doable if you can have ice packs with you, whether you can have
[6:04] them in some kind of cooler in your car or other vehicle that
[6:06] you've got. Getting ice packs on your quads
[6:09] within an hour of finishing can also really, really help.
[6:13] And this is where if you've got supporters, husbands, wives,
[6:15] partners who are there with you, if they can have this ready in
[6:19] some kind of little mobile cooler, If you can have a couple
[6:22] of ice packs you can put on your quads.
[6:25] I've only managed to experience this once personally, but it
[6:27] made a massive difference to how quickly I recovered after the
[6:30] race. And the next thing that I'd
[6:32] encourage you to do is to get a really high quality pair of
[6:36] compression legends and get them on as soon as possible.
[6:40] If you can do the eye so you can do the colder water first,
[6:42] great. Get them on as soon as possible.
[6:45] Wear them for the rest of the day.
[6:47] So wear them when you're at the race site, wear them when you're
[6:49] driving home, wear them in the hotel, wear them overnight if
[6:52] you can significantly is going to reduce how sore you feel the
[6:57] next day. And honestly, I don't know the
[6:59] science behind this. I know there's lots of marketing
[7:01] behind compression gear, but anecdotally from my own
[7:04] experience and and that of our athletes, having those
[7:07] compression leggings on really quickly after finishing the race
[7:10] can really make a difference. And here we can be talking the
[7:13] difference of one or maybe even two days sooner that you can get
[7:17] back to training. So it really is worth making
[7:20] that effort. OK, so that's what you can do
[7:24] straight after the race and then the hours immediately after the
[7:27] race. Part 2 of this is in the days
[7:30] after the race. So from one to three days after
[7:33] the race itself, mostly the most important thing that you can
[7:37] keep in your head here is the most important part of this is
[7:41] doing whatever is going to support recovery.
[7:44] O If that means resting, fine. If that means doing a gentle
[7:48] recovery ride, fine. If that means doing a gentle
[7:51] swim, fine. It's different sessions for
[7:54] different people, but the key is to not try to get back into
[7:58] actual training too soon. You have to give your body that
[8:02] three to four day window of recovery.
[8:04] Now, in some athletes, we usually find, if I were to say
[8:07] as a general rule, they'll have a rest day today after the race
[8:10] and then they'll do either a recovery ride or a recovery swim
[8:14] for the next two or three days afterwards.
[8:16] Typically a recovery ride looks like 30 minutes or less at 50%
[8:22] of FTP or less. So really gentle spinning and a
[8:25] very small slow gear. You're not looking to get out of
[8:28] breath, you're just looking to move your legs around.
[8:31] That's going to promote blood flow, which in itself is going
[8:33] to promote healing. Some swimmers, people who are
[8:37] from a swimming background, find that a recovery swim really
[8:40] helps them recover from at hard session like this.
[8:44] The challenge for a lot of age group is is if you're not from a
[8:47] swimming background, any kind of swimming at all tends to have an
[8:51] aerobic cost to it. So if you're the kind of swimmer
[8:54] for whom swimming comes quite difficult, I'd I'd advise you to
[8:57] stay away from that recovery swim.
[9:00] Do your recovery sessions on the bike.
[9:02] But if you're a confident swimmer, if you're a strong
[9:04] swimmer, if you can comfortably choose the pace you swim at and
[9:08] you can swim really slowly, you might find that it's like a
[9:11] gentle all over bad body massage and that you recover quicker
[9:14] because you've taken part in doing that.
[9:17] O again, it's horses for courses.
[9:20] Do the sessions that are going to help you recover the most.
[9:23] The one thing I'll advise you to stay away from until at least
[9:27] four days after the race is doing any kind of running at
[9:30] all. I've always strongly disagreed
[9:33] with anyone who said there's any such thing as a recovery run.
[9:37] I just don't think there is. And especially in the context of
[9:40] running after a triathlon, we've got muscle damage.
[9:43] Running is not going to help that heal, so it should be
[9:46] avoided. And usually with our athletes,
[9:48] I'll say definitely stay off running until all the soreness
[9:51] is gone. And definitely at the very least
[9:54] stay after running until four days after the race as well.
[9:57] So typically after a Sunday race, we won't have athletes run
[10:00] until at the very earliest Thursday and usually on a
[10:04] Friday. And even then it's a very short
[10:06] run. It's a 20 to 30 minute, very
[10:09] easy paced jog just to see if your legs are starting to come
[10:12] around again. Now that's the kind of recovery
[10:16] window I think that you're going to need to get back to real kind
[10:20] of training. We'll talk a little bit more
[10:22] about this when we talk about structuring your recovery week.
[10:25] But we're looking in that four to five day window.
[10:28] So what else can we do in that four to five day window that's
[10:31] going to promote recovery and promote healing?
[10:33] Well, the first thing is I'd advise you to keep those
[10:36] recovery leggings on as much as you possibly can during the 3-4
[10:41] days after the race. Sleep in them if you can.
[10:43] It's really going to make a difference to reducing the DOMS.
[10:47] If you can avoid big walks in the days after the race, I think
[10:50] that'll really help. There's nothing worse than then
[10:53] doing a big Ironman event and then the day after the event,
[10:56] your whole family who've understandably been with you all
[11:00] the way to this event, they want to go and do stuff.
[11:02] You're you're away in a different place.
[11:04] Let's go to Disneyland. Let's go and walk around a theme
[11:06] park. There's nothing worse for you as
[11:09] the athlete. So try and stay off your feet as
[11:11] much as you possibly can. That's not advice that's going
[11:13] to make me very popular with your families, I'm afraid.
[11:15] But that's the reality of trying to recover quicker.
[11:18] Stay off your legs and avoid big walks if you possibly can.
[11:22] Let's have you plan an A into the day.
[11:24] If you're lucky enough to work at home, getting yourself to
[11:28] 1:00 or 2:00 in the afternoon, getting into bed, getting your
[11:31] mask on, and having 15 to 20 minutes of a power nap can work
[11:35] wonders. If you're not lucky enough to do
[11:37] that, plan to get yourself into bed at least an hour earlier
[11:41] than usual, and aim for at least one, and ideally 2 extra hours
[11:46] of sleep in the three to four days after your event.
[11:49] And that's really going to be the time that your body rests
[11:53] and refreshes and recharges and heals.
[11:56] And outside of that, really think about the nutrition, the
[11:59] food that you're eating is going to be the building blocks of
[12:02] your body recovering. So although you might feel like
[12:05] bloated pizza and McDonald's, think about the things that are
[12:08] going to help your body heal. So lots of fresh veggies and
[12:12] salad, lots of fresh fruit, lots of lean protein.
[12:16] If you can use those three or four day window to really help
[12:19] your body recover as best as it possibly can, it's going to
[12:22] recover even quicker. And definitely avoid alcohol in
[12:25] those three or four days after the race.
[12:27] So those are the tips I'd give you in the three to four days
[12:30] after the race to help you recover.
[12:33] Now the last part of this podcast is talking about your
[12:36] recovery week and outer structure.
[12:38] It O typically in my recovery week, I give to our athletes
[12:41] after the trained, I'll say day one after the race, take a total
[12:45] rest day. Just try and get back to being
[12:48] feeling normal. Day 2, day three and day four
[12:52] are going to be either a short 30 minute recovery ride or a
[12:57] short 30 minute recovery swim. And I'll alternate those with
[13:01] athletes. Typically I'd say most of our
[13:03] athletes use the bike more than the pool to recover.
[13:06] Probably at say 75% use the bike for recovery more than the pool.
[13:11] And then when we're getting towards the Friday of the week
[13:15] is when I think we'll try our first run if all of our soreness
[13:18] is gone. So just a 20 minute epace 91 run
[13:22] walk feeling really easy just to check that all that soreness has
[13:26] totally gone. But again, the caveat here is we
[13:29] don't try that unless all the soreness is gone.
[13:32] We're going to have no running at all until it's all gone.
[13:35] Now, all things being equal, most people will have recovered
[13:40] from a race by the Saturday following the race, for
[13:42] everything up to and including 70.3 distance will gently
[13:47] reintroduce endurance sessions then, so we'll have a longer
[13:51] ride and a longer run at the weekend.
[13:53] Typically it will be sort of 90 minutes of riding and 45 minutes
[13:57] of running as a typical recovery week, but people who were racing
[14:01] again in the relatively near future might have longer
[14:03] sessions than that. The caveat here is if you've
[14:07] raced Iron Man, I'd advise you to plan a two week recovery
[14:11] block and again the first week in the second week going to be
[14:15] structured very, very similarly to each other, except we won't
[14:18] have those longer endurance sessions at the weekend.
[14:21] It's all about recovery and it's not unusual.
[14:24] If you're listening to this after your first time man, it's
[14:26] not unusual to not feel like training at all for two weeks.
[14:30] Plus, after doing your Iron Man, lots of people don't want to do
[14:34] anything at all. And despite having been at peak
[14:37] fitness for their Iron Man, they find that a week later to try
[14:40] and do a gentle ride or a gentle run and they just feel awful and
[14:44] they're really tired and they have to stop.
[14:46] I'm here to tell you that's completely normal.
[14:49] You haven't lost all of that fitness.
[14:51] It just takes a 14 day recovery window, usually after an Iron
[14:55] Man for you to be able to bounce back and get back to the point
[14:58] where you can start thinking about training.
[15:01] Now obviously I'm trying to give generalised advice for a big
[15:04] population here. And sure, if you are a very much
[15:08] more experienced Iron Man or you've done lots of races or
[15:12] you're very fast athlete, you might find that you recover much
[15:15] faster than this. And we'll all read stories in
[15:17] the Press of pros who have in some instances you know they've
[15:21] raced back-to-back weekends. Ironman.
[15:23] Incredibly unusual, but it does happen.
[15:27] I would take that as the exception rather than the rule.
[15:30] And I would say for most age groups listening, two weeks of
[15:33] recovery or two weeks of really not doing very much other than
[15:37] thinking about, wow, I just did an Ironman is the minimum you
[15:41] need to be thinking about before you even think about doing any
[15:44] kind of training at all after that.
[15:45] So if it is more than two weeks before you return to it, I'd
[15:49] advise you to take the time that your body and your mind need
[15:52] before you try and get back into training.
[15:54] And if that means saying, you know what, I'm just not ready to
[15:56] go back into training yet, then that's completely fine.
[16:00] We go back to first principles here.
[16:02] The purpose of the recovery block, however long it is, is to
[16:05] make sure you've recovered from your session, recovered from
[16:08] your race, and you're actually ready to go back into training
[16:12] again. And if your body doesn't feel
[16:14] like it, or even your mind doesn't feel like it, that's OK,
[16:17] Take a bit more recovery time. Let's make sure you're properly
[16:20] ready to get back into training before you do that again.
[16:24] OK? Then that brings us to the end
[16:27] of this week's episode. So here are some discount codes
[16:29] and deals for you. I've got Precision Fuel and
[16:32] hydration.com. Use the code Oxygen 24 for 15%
[16:35] off your first electrolyte order.
[16:37] And over at teamoxygenaddict.com I think we've got the most
[16:41] comprehensive triathlon coaching programme for busy age groupers.
[16:45] If you've enjoyed what you've heard today and the advice has
[16:47] helped you out, well, great stuff.
[16:49] I hope that's helped put some of your fears at rest.
[16:51] And I know from some of the calls we've had, it's helping
[16:55] raise the right questions in the minds of people as to whether
[16:59] their current coaching relationship is working for
[17:01] them. If you're looking for a change
[17:03] or if you're looking for high quality, proven coaching for
[17:06] Ironman or 70.3 track on this year, you can just check out the
[17:09] details of our coaching packages on our website at
[17:12] teamoxygenaddict.com. And then if you're interested,
[17:16] there's a link in the show notes below.
[17:17] You can join our waiting list and you'll be notified if the
[17:20] slot becomes available. And at that point you'll have a
[17:23] chance to book a call with us and see if you'd be a good fit
[17:26] for joining the team. So although we don't have slots
[17:29] available at the moment, we'll make those call appointments
[17:32] available to people as and when we do have athletes who and
[17:36] their coaching packages during the season if and when that
[17:39] happens. So remember there's links in the
[17:41] show notes so you don't have to remember them.
[17:43] Till next week. Have a great safe training and
[17:46] racing week. I'm coach Rob Wilby and you've
[17:48] been listening to the Oxygen Addict podcast.
[17:51] See ya.

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