Recovery, recovery, recovery

On a list of the top principals a fighter should train with, recovery is often missed. A lot. I know I missed it when I started my heavy training cycle a few years ago, training 3+ hours a night and at lunch as well. Daily, with maybe a day of rest. That was probably the dumbest idea I ever had.

Training that much kept my immune system low, so I got sick a lot. It also messed with my body's natural recovery mechanisms and prevented muscle growth/fat loss. It kept me stressed and was just bad as a whole.

Point one: Don't overtrain, it is highly counterproductive.

So, as we all know, aside from the occasional drink here/there, I don't drink anymore. My body has become incredibly efficient and anything more than that occasional drink throws me out of whack and slows down my recovery. I get sluggish and heavy and well, in training I just can't have that.

The same goes for certain foods. I can't do lots of pasta anymore, nor can I really do fast food. It either makes me sick, goes right out the other end or makes me heavy and sluggish.

Point two: nutrition is key to recovery. It'll help your body grow, fix itself and become stronger, faster and more powerful.

Sleep, often undervalued, overlooked and few people get enough of it. I used to be an insomniac and back when I was training too heavily (read: overtraining), I would max at three or four hours of sleep a night. That worked against me, like everything else at that point. They say eight hours of sleep a night, but the body needs around seven. The number eight came to cover falling asleep and waking up throughout the night. I find that so long as I get at least six and a half to seven hours of sleep, I'm able to handle whatever comes my way. Any less and I rely on caffeine and N.O. Xplode to take me through a workout, and shouldn't have to. I hate relying on supplements to make my body do what it should be able to handle on its own, so I've been adjusting my schedule to make sure I get that sleep.

This is the last major adjustment I've been working on to help my recovery peak so that when it is heavy training time for my matches, I'll be ready. The good habits will be there, so there'll be less to deal with, which always helps.

Point three: sleep. Get plenty of it, you'll need it!

So a question for my loyal readers: what have you tried that helped your recovery time between training/events/matches? On the flip side, what have you found adversely affects your recovery time? I think an open dialogue about these things could benefit everyone; I know it'll be nice to see what other people have learned from!