I always struggle with recovery because I think I can “gut out” a bad day. Using some metric such as HRV helps quantitatively. BTW it took me a while to figure out the app that uses the iPhone camera (and I am sure there is more than one). I found the app developed by Dr. Altini called HRV4Training which is $9.99 on the Apple App Store. I am going to give it a try…thanks for another good article!
My FitBit is absolutely terrible about predicting my recovery. I work based on feeling, ignoring the readyness score, but I'm going to try the HRV app out of interest and see how it compares.
Sounds like you're doing it right! I advocate trying stuff, seeing how it aligns with your experience, then learning from it—use what's useful, drop what isn't!
As usual you write a post on something I’m thinking about. I am getting over RSV. In the past year+ I’ve taken rest days but nothing extended. I took last week off with no guilt. Did some yoga yesterday, a tough body weight workout tonight and going to try to get in a really short ruck around the block. I listened to my body saying “time to shut it down”.
3. I need to mix up stuff, like use rucks or runs to break up any kind of resistance training. But man legs these days are taking longer to bounce back. And whether it’s a placebo affect or not I find glucosamine and magnesium work for me. But at the end of the day I need about 24 hours to be able to go medium to hard. It’s a feel thing.
I use my Garmin Fenix extensively to assess recovery. As noted in the post, heart rate and HRV are key indicators that I use. Stress is a “made-up” metric that incorporates both heart rate and HRV. Over the years, I’ve found that combining both subjective and objective measures works best. For example, my stress levels are higher when I travel even though I don’t feel stress consciously. Ever since my injury earlier in January, my stress levels have been above average until just recently. I interpret this to mean that my body is recovering (consistent with my subjective experience). So, I think an important facet here is baseline. If you use these wearables over a long time, they are good at capturing anomalies and trends that can usefully inform your decisions.
I always struggle with recovery because I think I can “gut out” a bad day. Using some metric such as HRV helps quantitatively. BTW it took me a while to figure out the app that uses the iPhone camera (and I am sure there is more than one). I found the app developed by Dr. Altini called HRV4Training which is $9.99 on the Apple App Store. I am going to give it a try…thanks for another good article!
My FitBit is absolutely terrible about predicting my recovery. I work based on feeling, ignoring the readyness score, but I'm going to try the HRV app out of interest and see how it compares.
Sounds like you're doing it right! I advocate trying stuff, seeing how it aligns with your experience, then learning from it—use what's useful, drop what isn't!
Keep up the good work.
As usual you write a post on something I’m thinking about. I am getting over RSV. In the past year+ I’ve taken rest days but nothing extended. I took last week off with no guilt. Did some yoga yesterday, a tough body weight workout tonight and going to try to get in a really short ruck around the block. I listened to my body saying “time to shut it down”.
Great stuff. This is what I’ve learned about recovery: can’t do two-a-days anymore. I can do consecutive full-body KB sessions but no more than
3. I need to mix up stuff, like use rucks or runs to break up any kind of resistance training. But man legs these days are taking longer to bounce back. And whether it’s a placebo affect or not I find glucosamine and magnesium work for me. But at the end of the day I need about 24 hours to be able to go medium to hard. It’s a feel thing.
I use my Garmin Fenix extensively to assess recovery. As noted in the post, heart rate and HRV are key indicators that I use. Stress is a “made-up” metric that incorporates both heart rate and HRV. Over the years, I’ve found that combining both subjective and objective measures works best. For example, my stress levels are higher when I travel even though I don’t feel stress consciously. Ever since my injury earlier in January, my stress levels have been above average until just recently. I interpret this to mean that my body is recovering (consistent with my subjective experience). So, I think an important facet here is baseline. If you use these wearables over a long time, they are good at capturing anomalies and trends that can usefully inform your decisions.