There Is A Method to the Madness
This is a podcast where I will be discussing all aspects of physical fitness. I am an exercise physiologist and personal trainer and owner of Maxwell's Fitness Programs for the last 25 years. My passion is health and fitness and I am excited to share my views, some stories, interviews and much more with you.
There Is A Method to the Madness
The Science of Muscle Damage and Recovery
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Welcome to there is a Method to the Madness. My name is Rob Maxwell and I'm an exercise physiologist and personal trainer. I am the owner of Maxwell's Fitness Programs and I've been in business since 1994. The purpose of this podcast is to get to the real deal of what really works and, most importantly, why things work. Hence the name there is a method to the madness. Before I get to today's show, I want to thank Jonathan and Lynn Gildan of the Gildan Group at Realty Pros. They are committed to providing the highest level of customer service in home sales. Why don't you give them a shout and figure out what your home is worth? 386-451-2412. 386-451-2412.
Speaker 1:All right, let's talk about what happens when we work out. This is going to be a pretty physiological podcast and I think it's really necessary. You know this is the heart of the matter. There is a method to the madness. So I want to talk about what actually goes on, because when we know that, then we will know how to exercise appropriately. I've had a lot of questions about this recently and there's always stuff on social media and being bounced around in the channels that I listen to and watch about proper ways to train and what happens, and I end up scratching my head a lot, chuckling out loud a lot, because I'm like, if people like knew what went on in the body, they would have a better idea of how to train and what the goal of each workout really becomes. I don't expect the everyday person, the gym goer, to necessarily know that, but, like, I think, if more exercise professionals really knew, and look, they just don't. I mean only 20% of the trainers out there nationwide have any form of credentials to be telling people what to do. So look, unfortunately in my industry it's buyer beware. A lot of trainers flat out do not know the science, do not know the physiology, do not know the biology, don't know the biology, don't know their muscles, don't know the kinesiology, and so they end up just kind of throwing together a workout plan that has maybe worked for them or that they've seen other people do, or that they copy from somebody and look, I mean, you guys pay for more than that. I think. So, buyer beware.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about what goes on when we work out, when we stress ourselves. What we're really doing is, first off I'm going to talk about all the things that happen First off is we create microscopic muscle tears in the actual individual muscle fibers. So the muscle fibers make up the muscle belly. There are thousands of muscle fibers within a muscle belly and they make up the muscle belly, up the muscle belly. When we work out we create little microscopic tears within those fibers, so there is damage being done and we want that. We need a particular level of stress. So that's the first thing that happens.
Speaker 1:When we strength train and I should say strength train appropriately the next thing that happens is there's actual disruption of the little proteins in the fibers of the muscle, which are called actin and myosin. So actin and myosin slide across each other to actually create the muscular contraction. When they come together, that's what we call the shortening of the muscle or a contraction of the muscle. And when we work out, when we work out hard enough and for a beginner hard enough is simply picking up a weight. For an advanced person you have to get a lot closer to failure. But when that happens the actinomycin get damaged and thus they need repair. So that is the second thing that happens during a workout which requires rest and repair.
Speaker 1:The third thing that happens is there's actual inflammation that goes on within the muscle fibers and then within the muscle spindles and then within the muscle bellies themselves. So our body does that. Inflammation is our body's natural defense mechanism. Too much of it is a bad thing, not enough of it is not a good thing. Just the right amount is perfect. You're going to get inflammation when those two above things happen, all right. So you're going to get pro-inflammatory cells, like the neutrophils and the macrophages, to infiltrate the muscle and it's going to help bring about a muscle repair. All right. So that's what happens. So we need these things to occur or we are not going to grow. Now, the second part of this podcast is going to be later in the week, but there's going to be a part two. I'm going to talk about how we best bring this stuff about. All right, because we want this. We need to have a particular amount of stress to the muscles or they're not going to grow.
Speaker 1:I had a friend send me a text this morning. She had worked out in a different way for the first time in a while and she said I am sore and sent a, you know, muscle emoji thing. And you know, that is a good thing. A little side note when clients in the past, you know, I sort of say in a joking way. But if they'll come in and say, oh man, I'm really sore and in fairness, a lot of people don't realize that soreness is I mean, it's overall a good thing, it's not a necessary thing. I don't want you to feel like you have to be sore every workout because I work out really intense and I pretty much don't get sore. It's not because I'm better or anything like that, it's just I have adapted to it and we don't need that much soreness for those three things I just mentioned to occur. But when we're new to a movement or new to an activity or new to working out again or coming back, we are going to get sore. So I would joke with clients when they say I'm sore, I'd say oh man, I wish I was sore, because I want them to understand that it's not a bad thing.
Speaker 1:Too many times the education isn't out there and people think soreness is a bad thing. Soreness isn't a bad thing, soreness isn't a great thing, soreness is just a thing All right. So now, what happens when we rest? So the first part is we have to break it down. We have to have those things occur. We need to have the microscopic tears. We need to have the disruption in the actin and the myosin, and we do need to have a certain amount of inflammation. That has to occur if we want to get better.
Speaker 1:I was just in here preparing for this podcast, and Ellen was out working with a client, and the client said something very positive client, hardworking client, said something to the effect of I should know, once this gets easier, it's going to get harder, and Alan said that's right, it's all about overload, and that is the truth. So we want this to occur. Ok, once it occurs, though, then we have to do what it takes for us to recover and get what we need. So what happens during the repair process is first, we have what is called MPS, and that is called muscle protein synthesis. So if the amino acids are present which is why it is important to eat something after a workout we don't need a ton of protein. Okay, I could do a whole podcast, and I have on this subject. We just need enough.
Speaker 1:Wayne Westcott did a study probably 20 years ago, and he found that 15 grams of protein after a workout is enough. I'll tell people 25 sometimes, just to make sure that's okay, but when people think they need 50 grams of protein, like you see on these ridiculous protein jugs that they're trying to sell you at GNC and all these other places and in the mail order magazines. You know 50 grams. I mean they just want you to use that up. So you buy another $60 gallon of protein, right? You don't need to actually use that. I'll use it because, to be honest with you, it's convenient and it tastes good. It adds a little bit to my nasty skim milk that I could, you know, drink right after a workout. But there's nothing magic about protein powder. It's convenient and whatever they use for flavoring makes the drink taste good. It's really that simple. But we do need protein after a workout, basically within an hour. But we don't need that much.
Speaker 1:Okay, because, as I said, the MPS, the muscle protein synthesis, will occur where the body uses the amino acids and the amino acids are the building blocks of protein. So when I say amino acids, that's what I mean. And they get into the system and they make those new muscle proteins that have been destroyed or damaged. Destroyed or damaged, and I'm sure you remember from 10 minutes ago what those proteins are actin and myosin of the muscle fiber. All right, the second thing that happens during recovery, hence active recovery you actually have to consume food is the first part, but the second part is satellite cell activation. Now, satellite cell and stem cells are synonymous with each other and basically what happens during recovery if we rest, if we eat, is these stem cells then proliferate and activate and contribute to muscle fiber regeneration. So without the rest process, without the food process, we don't get the satellite cell activation to help the muscle fibers regenerate. If the muscle fibers don't regenerate, like if all we're doing is tearing them down think about a rubber band that continues to get pulled and pulled and pulled Eventually it's going to break. All right, now we don't want that to happen. But even lesser extreme than that would be the fact that they're simply not going to grow. So that is what happens during the recovery process.
Speaker 1:The third thing that happens during the recovery process is mitochondrial biogenesis. So the mitochondria is the part of mostly a slow twitch but also fast twitch muscle fiber cell that uses oxygen in the muscle contraction. All right, and as we know well, maybe we don't know, I shouldn't say that that's very bad of me. We don't know, probably we don't know, but we only use oxygen during aerobic activity. So we're talking mostly about slow twitch muscle fibers here with myocondrial biogenesis, but mostly talking about strength training here. But we're also talking about, or I'm also talking about, when we do intense work anaerobically, aerobically, like bicycle sprints or running at the track, we're going to do damage to those muscle fibers too. And so during the repair process of the slow twitch muscle fibers, we're going to get some mitochondrial biogenesis of the slow twitch muscle fibers. We're going to get some mitochondrial biogenesis. Essentially, what that means is you're going to create more mitochondria within the cells of the slow twitch muscle fiber.
Speaker 1:Not to get in the weeds here, but I do feel like I owe this to you. When you're training for both strength and endurance, this becomes kind of tough, because a strength training or an athlete that really is concerned mostly with hypertrophy doesn't necessarily want more mitochondrial biogenesis, because that's going to make the intermediate muscle fiber more aerobic and we don't necessarily want that. But that is going to occur when you do a lot of high, intense cardiovascular exercise, when you're doing a lot of sprinting on the bike, sprinting on the runs, things like that. That's going to occur and that's how those muscle fibers come back stronger and enable you to basically run your best 5k or whatever it is you're shooting for, or bringing back the miracle mile, as we're trying to do. If you want to improve your mile time, you better hope that your mitochondria is more efficient at that level.
Speaker 1:All right, now what do we really need muscle recovery for? So the first thing is we need the muscle cell to repair. That's. I've said it three times now. We need the muscle fiber itself to repair Until it has come back, which is why it's often stated you need between 24, 48 hours before you work out again, at least the same muscles. Now part two of this. I'm going to talk about that in much more depth, because it may be longer than 48 hours. This is where you need to learn to listen to your body, to figure out exactly what your frequency and volume and intensity needs to be. Actually, I shouldn't say intensity, because your intensity needs to be high at all times if you want those things to occur. But you, on a personal level, need to figure out are you best after 48 hours? Are you best after, say, 96 hours, four days? We don't know. I mean, that's where I try to train clients and trainees how to listen to their body, to figure it out, and oftentimes you can tell in the numbers if you're paying attention, by the way. All right. So we need muscle fiber repair.
Speaker 1:The next thing we need is glycogen store repletion. I mean, if you don't get all of the glycogen back in the muscle, if it's not replenished, I mean you can't do what you need to do. That is why I just roll my eyes and get so frustrated with the idiots online that are telling people how to eat and have them on low-carb diets. You cannot grow on a low-carb diet, I mean. The second thing we need is glycogen restoration, and if you don't have that, you're not going to be able to do what you need to do. So you need your muscle fibers to be at full load. We store up to 500 grams of glycogen in the body. That is 2,000 calories worth. We store 400 grams in the muscle. We store 100 grams in the liver. If you don't replenish with carbs and protein after you work out, you're not going to have your glycogen levels back up to par. You need to eat proper food to restore your glycogen. So that is what else is needed in recovery, all right.
Speaker 1:The third thing you need is hormonal regulation. So muscle fibers need to heal, glycogen needs to be restored and your hormonal regulation needs to occur. All right, so if you work out too much, if you burn the candle at both ends, you're going to create too much cortisol and that is the opposite of hormonal regulation. So how do we get hormonal regulation? We rest, we sleep, we need that deep sleep. Nobody knows for sure how many hours is best for you. All right, and I'm not going to sit here and enter this debate. I see too many bits of advice out there where people say, oh, eight hours, oh, that's not enough. 10 hours, oh, it's not enough. 12 hours I don't think anybody knows. The only person that knows, again, is the individual. We just know we need deep rest and we need deep sleep. And if we're not getting that, if we're burning the candle at both ends, we are not going to be our best physically. So we need to rest, which means take time off and away from the intense activity. We need to eat so our protein levels provide the amino acids for restoration 15 grams. We need enough carbohydrates so our glycogen levels get back up the store and we need to continue to eat healthy carbs throughout the day so they stay there. And we need to sleep for hormonal regulation. Now I'm going to talk a little bit about how we balance all this, all right.
Speaker 1:So, so, probably 40, 50 years ago, exercise physiologists started to get a little bit smarter, all right, and it mostly started in Germany and Russia. They were a little bit above us, you know, a little bit smarter than us when it came to training. Basically, they were just kicking the shit out of us in the Olympics, left and right, and, you know, we got tired of it. So we started kind of sending our scientists over there to figure out what was going on. And outside of the fact that they, well, you know, allegedly were using drugs before we were, but I don't know, that just may be us trying to, you know, say, somebody else does it. There's no question that people worldwide use, you know, anabolic steroids. But anyway, what they found was they were using Hans Selye's General Adaptation Syndrome model of stress. They started using his model, which is now the model that everybody uses for stress, and it is dead on, true, and it is dead on right.
Speaker 1:And if we want to get the best out of our workouts, if we want to get the best out of ourselves physically, we need to understand far more about this than we do old Joe Schmoe's how to get big routine on Instagram. We need to really understand this much better. Basically, there are three stages to his adaptation syndrome. Stage one is the alarm stage. That's when we are introduced to any stress. That is when we go through fight or flight, the alarm stage. Picking up a weight that's an alarm stage. Continuing the set, that's an alarm stage. Looking at the clock and realizing we're five minutes late to our appointment, that's the alarm stage. So with stress and I have to stress, no pun intended, that we need stress to grow If we don't have enough stress, we're not going to grow. So when I say grow, I mean go through hypertrophy, get stronger. We need an appropriate level of stress or we're not going to grow. So essentially, we need the alarm stage to happen.
Speaker 1:We the stress persists, for example, if we do enough repetitions on the chest press, if we do enough push-ups, if we do enough squats. So if the stress persists when we rest, our body will then normalize and bring about homeostasis. Then normalize and bring about homeostasis. It will make the adjustments necessary to create homeostasis to the next new level, as long as those other things I already mentioned are provided for recovery. If we do those things, we will get through the resistance stage, and that is a good thing. That's a great thing. That's great in every area. If we study enough, but not too much, we will increase those motor neurons in the brain. We will increase circulation, we will get smarter per se, we will become more educated that's great. We need stress to get better at everything. We will go through the resistance stage. Our body will do what it needs to do, we'll reach a new, higher level of homeostasis and we will be stronger, all right.
Speaker 1:So the Germans and the Russians figured this out and made what they call periodization programs to where they're trying to figure out the perfect amount of stress and rest, and they came up with all these really complex designs, which are good. I mean, they are good. I'm not like making fun of them, they're good and we still use them to this day, but that's how they use this general adaptation syndrome to come up with something for the physical world. They came up with periodization, and it is a good thing. Basically, a lot of it is train hard for three weeks, take a week off, those types of things, all right. So a lot of the block or brick models came from this. All right.
Speaker 1:Now I need to stress at this point after stage two stop. That's the hardest part for people. We don't want to get to stage three. That is the exhaustion stage. If we keep pushing past that point where homeostasis is going to occur, we are going to get exhausted. That means we stress the muscle fibers too far. That means that we've depleted our glycogen too much. That means that we've stressed our muscle fibers so far. We've caused so much disruption between the actinomycin that we have too much inflammation and instead of a normal 24 hours for it to kind of work its way out, or you get some assistance and get a great massage from Ellen to help get rid of some of that inflammation after a workout, whatever. But if you push it too far, you've taken three or four days now to get over it. You start working out again. You haven't got all the inflammation out. Bing bang, boom. You are overtrained. So if we push past or into the exhaustion stage, stage three we're going to deplete all of our reserves. Not only is our progress going to stop, but we're also going to go backwards. And there are some studies that show that if you get physiologically overtrained, it could take up to six months to recover, and that is not a good thing, all right.
Speaker 1:So, speaking of stress and recovery, selye went on to explain that there are essentially three types of stress, but the most important thing of this, let me just name them new stress, which is neutral stress. I mean, I used to joke with my students when I taught them it's like what the hell is a neutral stress? I mean, who knows? And I don't even know, honestly, if Selye he's credited to that, but I kind of think they brought that term in later. He definitely talked about the second one, which is distress. So distress is not a good thing, all right.
Speaker 1:Distress means you're driving down the road, you know you're cruising along at your normal cruising speed of 86 miles an hour and boom, you hear the siren. You see the light Right, fight or flight Start kicking off. Adrenaline starts kicking, your heart rate goes up. You think of every excuse in the world. You're going to try to calm this officer into not giving you a ticket. That's distress, all right. Now, eustress E-U-S-T-R-E-S-S is a positive stress. So that's like strength training. Or you got a new job, or you got a promotion which requires more responsibility. You became pregnant, you're going to have a kid, you're getting married these are all good things, but they are stress.
Speaker 1:What Selye pointed out is stress is stress is stress. So professional athletes don't have to do anything else but train. That is a total win for them. They're not doing anything else. So sometimes I see these you know athletes that are following these Ironman for triathlon, people for endurance people, professional workout programs, and they're like working full time. It's like dude, they're not working full-time, that's their job. They can handle 20 hours a week of training because they're not working 40 hours a week on top of it. That is their job. So you are not going to have number one. You probably don't have the genetics to be at that level, but sometimes it's. People forget that for one and they also forget that they're working a full-time job. So you're not going to have the same, say, performance of those professional athletes doing those kind of hours. It's impossible to do both. So stress is stress is stress.
Speaker 1:When somebody works full time and trains hard, that's going to be far harder for them to reach the performances that maybe they want to meet expectation-wise than the person who doesn't have to work or doesn't have to take care of their kids, which is work, or doesn't have to do this or that. Like if somebody is living and there's nothing wrong with that I'm not being judgmental but if somebody is living that privileged lifestyle of they got a lot of time on their hands and they can train all day long, they can go to the gym because they don't have a lot of other responsibilities, well, they're going to recover faster, they're going to be able to do that. But if you're working full-time, don't feel, or are committed full-time, don't feel like you have to do that and that's going to be part two of this. You don't have to do so much to get the benefits and remember that's going to be counterproductive because, as Selji taught us, remember that's going to be counterproductive.
Speaker 1:Because, as Selji taught us, stress is stress is stress. If you're working full time, that's stress. And then you go home and God, if you have kids, please spend time with them. Don't go out and do a I know this sounds judgmental, but I see it too often Don't go out and do a 30 mile bike ride and your kid hasn't eaten dinner. It's like we have stress and responsibilities to meet and so we have to understand that if you are fully committed somewhere else you need to learn how to modify these workouts. You shouldn't be following the pros anyway. Number one they have all the time in the world. Number two you don't ask a racehorse how they got fast. You don't even know if they're training properly for them, let alone for you. Okay, so stress is stress is stress.
Speaker 1:The final thing I'm going to say about this is also a lot of times with elite and pro athletes is unfortunately they're taking drugs. Now sometimes you know it's legal. I mean steroids didn't become illegal until 1991. So you know, when people make all these you know gripes about Major League Baseball and people like that, it's like, okay, but it wasn't illegal, you know, until 1991. I'm not saying it's good. I don't think it's good.
Speaker 1:I absolutely know people who have been on steroids and it has killed them. I know people personally. I know others that have been on them and they've gotten very. I know people personally. I know others that have been on them and they've gotten very, very sick and we've seen it happen with people. Maybe we don't know, or at least I don't know. I've seen it with professional athletes where it definitely has caused health consequences.
Speaker 1:So I am by no means an advocate of steroids. I think it's actually ridiculous, if you want my opinion. But I will say this the athletes take them. That can get away with it, because they work. What they do is they speed up recovery. That is what steroids do.
Speaker 1:Remember the whole hormonal regulation thing I talked about. That happens when you sleep and restore. Well, steroids take care of that for you, right? I mean, they are hormones, that's what they are testosterone, so they help you restore. That way, they speed up recovery. They get rid of inflammation. Remember the inflammation thing I talked about. After we work out, we have a lot of inflammation to repair the muscle damage and to repair the disruption in the actin and the myosin protein filaments. Well, guess what Steroids repair. So people that are taking anabolic steroids or growth hormones of any kind are going to repair. They can train every day. They can train hard every day.
Speaker 1:That's the other thing that you don't know what these professional athletes are doing. They're talking about their workouts. The bodybuilders are writing their workouts in Muscle and Fitness magazine, or that used to be the magazine. I don't know if it occurs anymore. Maybe it's in Men's Health now. Some of these professionals are talking about their workouts. Okay, you don't know if they're not taking steroids and if they're a professional or elite, most likely they are All right.
Speaker 1:So that's what steroids do. It is not good. With everything in life. There's no free lunch. Might help them work out, it might help them recover or it absolutely does help them recover, but it comes with a kick-ass side effect of health consequences in most people.
Speaker 1:All right, so please listen to part two that will be coming up later in this week and I'm going to talk about how to exactly find that balance between enough, not enough and too much. All right, so please tune in, please hit automatic download and, look, do me a favor, text this to at least one person. I would appreciate it. Thank you for listening to today's program. I ask you to please follow the show wherever you get your podcasts and please select automatic download, because that really helps the show. Now I want to thank Overhead Door of Daytona Beach, the area's premier garage door company. They have the best product. They have the best service. I personally vouch for Jeff and Zach Hawk, the owners. They are great people with a great company. If you have any garage door needs, please give them a shout at 386-222-3165.
