Lets talk about soreness for a bit—specifically that soreness you sometimes feel 24-36 hours after a workout.
Did you know that it’s such a common phenomenon that it has a name? If not, you do now!
A name for discomfort
It’s called DOMS, an acronym for Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness. And contrary to popular belief, experiencing it doesn’t necessarily mean that your most recent workout was either hard or effective. Instead, it occurs whenever you’ve done something different than what your body has been used to doing.
That’s right, that sharp discomfort that stabs your legs, arms, abs, chest, or back muscles when you laugh, get up from your chair, or push yourself out of bed is simply an indication that you did something different during the previous day’s activity.
- Are you used to lifting heavy weights for few reps but did a lighter, higher-rep session?
- Do you typically lift weights but randomly went to a spin class? Or even a yoga or stretching class?
- Are you normally a swimming fanatic but instead went for a run because the pool was closed?
- Did you do the opposite of anything above or simply exercise for the first time in a long while?
In any of these cases (and more) you likely experienced DOMS the following day. And if you were dehydrated or ate or slept poorly it was probably worse—that is, more painful and for a longer duration—than if you had hydrated, ate, and slept well after the session.
When we adapt… and when we don’t
Though you might not have previously known the term DOMS, you’ve likely observed another characteristics of it: the soreness is less intense and eventually disappears altogether the more frequently you do workouts similar to the one that caused the DOMS in the first place.
That happens because another physiological principle—the SAID principle—is at work.
SAID, an acronym for Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demands, is a fancy way of saying that our bodies adapt over the course of weeks, months, and years to the exact conditions we impose upon them.
In other words, performing similar, yet slightly varying workouts allows our bodies to adapt and produces the progress that we’re after. On the other hand, constantly varying workouts leads to frequent DOMS and, eventually, to either burnout & possible injury or less intense workouts & minimal progress.
This doesn’t mean that variety is bad or that DOMS should or even can be completely avoided. It does mean that we need both a base of consistency and a smattering of variety in order to keep training interesting and to experience noticeable results.
I’ll elaborate on that “same, but different” concept in a future email. For now…
Putting it into practice
Because misconceptions around exercise-induced soreness are fairly common, spend a couple minutes examining your own perspective of it. Having a greater understanding of your exercise belief system can help you to more willingly make changes, if changes might be necessary, or to have a greater appreciation for your current training experiences, if not.
Here are a few questions to get you started:
- How often do you typically experience DOMS?
- Have you observed that DOMS affects whether you train or how intensely you train?
- Have you been under the impression that DOMS was related to a workout’s difficulty or effectiveness?
- What might your specific contributing factors to DOMS be? (e.g. too much exercise variety, poor nutrition, infrequent training)