13 Best Recovery Methods for Athletes to Prevent Burnout

What's your next step after pushing your limits in training or competition? If you’re like many athletes, you probably want to get back at it as quickly as possible, but rushing into your next workout can undermine your efforts and set you up for injury. Instead, taking time to recover and using effective recovery methods for athletes can help you feel better and perform better before your next session. This blog details Best Recovery Tools for Athletes and how to recover faster, stay injury-free, and sustain peak performance without burnout.  

One effective way to recover faster and improve your mobility is through Pliability’s mobility app. With targeted routines to help you recover from workouts and injuries, the app can help you get back to peak performance faster and help you avoid future setbacks. 

Why is Recovery Important to Athletes?

Recovery helps athletes perform their best, avoid injuries, and stay healthy. Short-term recovery, active recovery or the “cool-down” phase, occurs in the hours immediately following exercise. Light activity during this time boosts blood flow and circulation, quickening overall recovery time and improving athletic performance.

Intense exercise causes muscle damage, depletes energy stores, and increases harmful byproducts like lactic acid. If you want to perform your best, you can’t afford to skip out on any part of recovery. 

Why Recovery is Important for Athletes

It’s simple, recovery is essential for your mental and physical game. And to be honest, how you recover is almost more important than the amount of weight lifted, the miles on your training log, or the number of calories burned because it has a near-immediate (and long-lasting) impact on your performance on the field. 

Recovery is more than taking a "do-absolutely-nothing" rest day and sitting on the couch for 12 hours while scrolling on your phone. You can sprinkle recovery into your workout routine, add it daily as part of a cool down, or schedule it into your weekly programming. Recovery occurs in the hours and days you aren’t going hard in the gym.

• Doing sprint repeats at the track.
• Putting in the long miles on the weekends 

The intentional time you take between these workouts, caring for your body and mind, makes up your recovery. 

What Recovery Does for Athletes

Implementing simple recovery strategies into your training and overall wellness routine allows your body and nervous system to repair and prepare for optimal performance. You don’t need an extensive three-hour daily routine. It’s more about being strategic with your:

• Rest
• Nutrition
• Hydration
• Sleep

Injury Prevention & Tissue Repair

This reduces your risk of injury and primes the body to prepare for competition. Trust me, getting injured and having to rehab an injury takes WAY longer than any preventative recovery routine. Recovery practices help the body adapt to both everyday and training stressors. It helps repair and regenerate the following:

• Muscles
• Tendons
• Ligaments
• Other body tissues

Rest for Optimal Performance

This helps you continue moving forward with life and our sport. Rest allows the body to work more efficiently as it:

• Optimizes protein synthesis
• Reduces muscle soreness
• Increases strength
• Regenerates energy stores

I want to point out how important recovery is for muscle repair. As an elite athlete, you're in a strength or training program and participating in game play. You need all of the muscle repair and tissue health you can get. 

If Recovery is That Important, Why Do Athletes Skip It?

Recovery routines don't give you the runner’s high, the endorphin rush, or the immediate gratification of high-intensity exercise and other exercise sessions, like bodybuilding. They almost feel too easy, making some athletes think they aren’t worth their time. Do you know that feeling when you run 10 miles or crush an all-out max lifting day in the gym? 

Yeah, foam rolling and mobility work don’t have that same effect, which makes it difficult for athletes to stay consistent and exposes them to what some may call "overtraining syndrome".

So What Happens When You Skip All the Recovery Stuff and Just Keep Going?

Most athletes think, “Why should I focus on recovery? I’m not hurt, I’m doing fine, and I’d rather spend my time working hard in the gym, getting faster and stronger.” That kind of thinking leads to overtraining and injury, derailing your training and frustration.

The Hidden Cost of Overexertion

In a society that prides itself on how many hours we work, how little sleep we get, and how hard our workouts are, it almost shames the athletes who put forth the effort to care for themselves. 

Without an emphasis on recovery in our training program, our bodies live in a constant state of distress with elevated cortisol levels (a stress hormone). We can function in this state for a while, but it can lead to athlete burnout and injury over time. 

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13 Best Recovery Methods for Athletes

Even the best athletes in the world can’t avoid recovery. After all, recovery helps them bounce back so quickly from intense physical activity. Recovery methods help reduce muscle soreness, repair damaged tissue, and restore energy levels. While there are various recovery techniques, not all of them are effective. Some methods will do little to help you recover, while others may even hinder your performance. Here are 13 recovery methods that work: 

1. The RICE Method

Have you heard of the RICE method? It stands for Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation. It is the go-to, doctor-suggested recovery technique to treat injuries and promote healing. The benefits of the R.I.C.E. method include the following:

• Rest: Immobilization prevents further injury and gives the body time to recover.
• Ice: Cold reduces pain by numbing the affected area. 
• Compression: Pressure keeps swelling under control. 
• Elevation: Keeping the injured body part above the heart reduces swelling and the associated pain and discomfort. 

2. Active Recovery

It is unclear whether an active recovery between training sessions or following competition in various sports is beneficial. No detrimental effects on performance have been reported following an active recovery compared to a passive recovery between training sessions, and a small amount of literature has reported enhanced performance. 

Lactate vs. Performance Recovery

Nevertheless, many researchers use lactate removal as their primary indicator of recovery. This may not be a valid indicator of enhanced recovery and the ability to repeat performance at a previous level. A recent study investigated the effects of a swim recovery session on subsequent running performance and reported an increase in performance compared to passive recovery. 

Swim Recovery Benefits Measured

Well-trained triathletes completed a high-intensity running session followed 10 h later by either a swim session or passive recovery. Twenty-four hours following the initial running session, a time-to-fatigue run test was performed. The swim trial resulted in subjects running for 830 s, compared to the passive trial, in which subjects ran for 728 s. 

Lactate Clearance

This improvement may have been due to water's hydrostatic benefits, which are thought to increase venous return, blood flow, and/or active recovery per se. The influence of the intensity of active recovery on the clearance of blood lactate has also been investigated. Different running intensities during active recovery were compared to passive recovery, and it was reported that lactate was lower following higher intensities than lower intensities. 

Active Recovery and Lactate Threshold

Maximum lactate clearance occurred during active recovery at intensities close to lactate threshold. It should be noted that maximal lactate concentrations were low in this study, and subjects were only moderately trained. Active recovery can be a great way to help you recover between intense training sessions and competitions. 

3. Self-Myofascial Release & Foam Rolling

Let’s face it, you've tried it, discovered it hurts, and then stopped implementing this recovery technique. The real reason why self-myofascial release and foam rolling hurts is that your body needs it. Surrounding all of your muscles is a band of connective tissue called “fascia.” Loosening your fascia allows your muscles to glide smoothly and correctly. 

Foam Rollers and Percussion Massagers

When your fascia is tight and inflexible, your muscles have difficulty moving in the correct form, resulting in injuries. Using foam rollers and percussion massagers, you can beat up that tough sticky fascia and get your body moving correctly. For foam rollers, we suggest the Brazyn. There are two firmness levels to find the perfect fit for your body. 

It is also 100% portable and can fold into a thin layer, making it ideal for the gym (talk about a win)!

4. Meditation / Yoga

Minimizing stress through meditation and yoga is a phenomenal way to improve brain health and well-being. Get away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life and calm your mind for 5-10 minutes daily. Some of our favorite techniques are mindful walks and yoga. A mindful walk is an easy way to help restore your focus and retain energy. 

It's very easy, too! All you need to do is walk and be aware of your surroundings. Pay attention to the smells, the wind on your face, and the noises in the background. Just stay present, and you will feel a lot better. 

5. Implementing Healthy Lifestyle Habits

Maintaining healthy lifestyle habits will not only make you a better athlete but also make you a better person. We like to live life thinking, “be the best that YOU can be”. This applies to all aspects of life:

• Work hard to be the best husband/wife
• Brother/sister
• The best cook you can be
• The hardest worker YOU can be 

Stop comparing yourself to others and consistently hold yourself to the highest standards possible. 

6. Hydrotherapy

Water immersion or hydrotherapy has been a popular recovery option for many years. Several options are used to aid performance recovery. Most commonly, athletes perform cold-water immersion, contrast-water therapy, or hot-water immersion. 

To date, research has examined these water immersion strategies reasonably well. The choice of strategy should be based on what the athletes are trying to recover from and for. 

Cold Water Immersion 

Cold-water immersion typically involves either full-body (excluding head) or limb-only immersion in water temperatures ranging between 40 °F (5 °C) and 68 °F (20 °C) for up to 20 minutes. This may be performed either continuously or intermittently. The main aim of CWI is to reduce body tissue temperatures and blood flow, which leads to:

• Reduced swelling
• Inflammation
• Cardiovascular strain
• Pain

These physiological changes enhance recovery by reducing hyperthermia-mediated fatigue, swelling, and inflammation associated with delayed-onset muscle soreness, and improving autonomic nervous system function. Currently, there is no gold standard or optimal combination of:

• Water temperature
• Depth
• Duration
• Mode of immersion for CWI

The choice of protocol for CWI should vary depending on the athlete and what the athlete is recovering from. It has been observed that temperatures between 52 °F (11 °C) and 59 °F (15 °C) for 11 to 15 minutes are optimal for reducing muscle soreness. 

CWI Protocol Variability and Individual Factors

There is less scientific evidence to suggest an optimal protocol for using CWI to reduce thermal strain or improve autonomic system function. Another factor to consider when determining the CWI protocol to use is the athletes' physical characteristics, since it has been shown that body composition, sex, age, and ethnicity all affect the physiological responses to CWI. 

Less intense protocols (e.g., warmer water temperatures or shorter durations) are recommended for athletes with low body fat and muscle mass. Those who are also likely to require less intense protocols than the average adult male athlete include:

• Female
• Youth
• Masters athletes

CWI is best used in hot environments to aid recovery from thermoregulatory fatigue. It also provides a precooling advantage if subsequent performance is required on the same day. 

Cold Water Immersion

Cold water immersion is also effective for managing muscle soreness and damage, as evidenced by studies examining circulating creatine kinase, which is often used as an indirect marker of muscle damage. 

Research has shown that CWI significantly enhanced the recovery of squat jump and isometric force and significantly reduced creatine kinase concentration compared to a passive control condition 48 hours after muscle-damaging exercise. 

CWI Benefits for Team Sport Recovery

It has been found that CWI improved sprint speed recovery and attenuated creatine kinase efflux compared to a control condition during a simulated team sport tournament. Therefore, the regular use of CWI in-season or during tournaments is recommended to aid recovery of DOMS and general soreness. 

Hot Water Immersion 

Hot water immersion typically involves full-body (excluding head) or limb-only immersion in water temperatures above 96 °F (36 °C). It is usually performed in one continuous immersion and often involves using underwater jets to massage the muscles. When used for recovery purposes, the main aim of HWI is relaxation and easing muscle tension. 

Blood Flow and Recovery

Physiologically, HWI leads to increases in body temperature and blood flow. This increase in blood flow is thought to improve the removal of metabolic waste and increase nutrient delivery to and from the cells. 

These physiological responses are believed to aid healing and the recovery of neuromuscular performance; nevertheless, this is theoretical, and future research is required to prove this theory. 

Minimal research supports using HWI for performance recovery; therefore, it is challenging to recommend optimal protocols. Similar to findings for CWI, the maximum duration suggested from research is approximately 20 minutes. Despite the lack of scientific evidence to support the benefits of HWI, anecdotally, it remains a popular recovery method. 

Athletes often prefer HWI over CWI because it is more comfortable and relaxing. HWI can aid psychological recovery since it provides relaxation benefits. It may also be helpful on rest days and before the massage to relax tight muscles. 

Nevertheless, HWI should be applied with caution when soft tissue injuries are suspected because the increased blood flow may theoretically exacerbate:

• Swelling
• Bruising
• Inflammation

Likewise, HWI is not recommended when athletes are in a hyperthymic state postexercise since the warm water will likely maintain elevated body temperatures, prolonging thermoregulatory stress. 

7. Optimal Nutrition 

As most athletes and fitness enthusiasts know, nutrition cannot be overlooked! It helps fuel their body to execute well and improve their performance. But did you know that food is also essential for recovery?  It’s true! Growing bodies need the proper nutrition to repair muscles, build strong bones, and maintain healthy joints. 

Calcium and Vitamin D

These nutrients are critical for building strong, healthy bones and reducing the risk of stress fractures. They can be found in:

• Dairy products
• Leafy greens
• Fortified cereals
• Fatty fish 

Protein

Lean meats, eggs, nuts, legumes, and Greek yogurt are excellent protein sources. Protein plays a significant role in repairing muscle micro-tears caused by physical activity and promoting muscle recovery and growth. 

Hydration

Staying hydrated keeps joints lubricated, prevents muscle cramps, and supports overall recovery. Water is essential, but electrolytes can help replenish what’s lost after intense workouts. 

8. Compression Garments

Many recovery strategies for elite athletes are based on medical equipment or therapies used in patient populations. Compression clothing is one such strategy, which has been traditionally used to treat various lymphatic and circulatory conditions. Compression garments are thought to improve venous return by applying graduated compression to the limbs from proximal to distal. 

The external pressure created may reduce the intramuscular space available for swelling and promote stable alignment of muscle fibres, attenuating the inflammatory response and reducing muscle soreness. 

Reduced Soreness and Potential Performance Gains

Recreational runners wearing compression garments have been examined during and after intermittent and continuous running. The authors found a reduction in delayed onset muscle soreness 24 h after wearing compression garments during a continuous exercise task. 

While not statistically significant, participants in the compression trial tended to complete the 10 km faster than those not wearing compression garments. 

Impact on Perceived Soreness

Subjects wore commercially available graduated compression stockings, with the compression highest at the ankle and reduced by 70% to the top of the stocking, which ended below the knee. Recently, a reduction in the perception of muscle soreness was reported after wearing compression garments during sprinting and bounding exercise and for 24 h after exercise. 

While there is currently minimal research into compression garments and recovery for endurance athletes, the small amount of data suggests that they may have some small benefits and do not impede recovery. 

9. Massage

Massage is a widely used recovery strategy among athletes. Still, apart from the perceived benefits of massage on muscle soreness, few reports have demonstrated positive effects on repeated exercise performance. Increased blood flow is a primary mechanism that improves recovery, thus enhancing the clearance of metabolic waste products. 

Limited Physiological Recovery Benefits

Many studies reported no increase in blood flow or lactate removal during massage. Indeed, in a recent study, massage impaired blood flow and lactate removal. Massage was superior to passive recovery in maintaining cycle performance separated by 24 hours. Still, active recovery and cold water immersion provided more significant benefits than massage. 

Potential Power Output Enhancement with Massage

In contrast to these findings, when massage was performed between the two bouts, the second bout's total power output was enhanced compared to the control. It should be noted that no other recovery strategies were performed, and as such, it is difficult to make recommendations for massage over other forms of recovery. 

Psychological Benefits and Injury Prevention of Massage

Several reviews of massage's effects have concluded that while massage improves psychological aspects of recovery, most evidence does not support massage as a modality to enhance functional performance recovery. Nevertheless, as massage may have potential benefits for injury prevention and management, it should still be incorporated in an athlete’s training program for reasons other than recovery. 

10. Photobiomodulation

Also known as red-light therapy, photobiomodulation involves therapeutic exposure to red and near-infrared light. This therapy targets the mitochondria, the cell's energy producers, to boost energy and reduce stress. This can lead to increased energy during exercise and faster recovery afterwards. It can also result in better quality of sleep and reduced inflammation. 

11. Saltwater Float Tank

Also known as restricted environmental stimulation technique (REST), float therapy uses a shallow pool of high-density Epsom salt to create a sense of full-body weightlessness. Floating counteracts the effects of gravity, promoting deep relaxation and easing muscle and joint tension. 

The float tank's sensory deprivation helps calm the mind and enhance mental focus. Float therapy is a great way to supplement your mindfulness and meditation practices by giving yourself regular dedicated time to quiet the body and mind and focus on the breath. 

12. Sleep Optimization

Sleep is considered the foundation of the recovery pyramid due to its importance for athlete performance and wellbeing. Sleep deprivation has been shown to have adverse effects on:

• Performance
• Mood state
• Metabolism
• Immune and cognitive function

Research in elite athletes suggests that their sleep quality, quantity, or both are often less than optimal and that improvement in sleep is warranted in many athletes. 

Training, Stress, and Technology

Training, competition times, travel, stress and anxiety may contribute to poor sleep in athletes. Nevertheless, appropriate education and behavior change strategies are often needed to minimize the influence of social media or video games on sleep. The intensity of training may also influence sleep; while sleep would be expected to improve during intensified training due to an increased need, evidence suggests this does not occur. 

Other factors such as caffeine consumption, muscle soreness, injury, jet lag, and travel (i.e., sleeping in foreign environments) are anecdotally reported to hurt an athlete’s sleep if not managed appropriately. 

Positive Impact on Athlete Performance

Only a few studies have investigated the effects of sleep extension in athletes; still, based on the available information, it is suggested that a minimum of one week of increased sleep duration improves a range of performance metrics in athletes. 

13. Stretching

Although stretching is anecdotally one of the most used recovery strategies, the literature examining the effects of stretching as a recovery method is sparse. In a team sport, athletes the effects of 7 min of static stretching following a football game were assessed. Stretching was less effective than CWT or a combined recovery for improving the subject’s perceived recovery. 

Two separate reviews of recovery methods concluded that stretching was not beneficial as a recovery modality. It is important to note that to date, there have not been any detrimental effects on performance associated with post-exercise stretching.

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