This YouTube video explains delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS)—microscopic muscle fiber damage after novel or intense resistance exercise—and why excessive soreness can impair subsequent training (reduced muscle activation and up to ~50% loss of force capacity in affected muscles). It reviews evidence-based strategies to reduce soreness and speed recovery: avoid routine ice baths and static stretching if your priority is growth (they may hinder strength/muscle recovery); use foam rolling/self-myofascial release (~10 minutes focused on worked muscles) to reduce soreness and improve next-session performance; perform low-intensity active recovery or cooldowns (5–10 minutes) involving the worked muscles; supplement with high-quality omega-3s (~1–3 g/day) to reduce soreness and potentially improve anabolic signaling; and ease into new programs to limit excessive soreness. The video also notes that acute pre-workout caffeine (~400 mg) reduced soreness in studies but is impractical daily, and mentions taurine, L-citrulline, and L-glutamine as supplements with some positive findings. Practical links and a written summary are provided in the description.
The soreness you feel a day or two after a workout is something you're all probably familiar with. This feeling, known as delayed onset muscle soreness or doms, is thought to be caused by microscopic tears in your muscle fibers that occur from resistance training or just a novel stimulus. In general, and aside from just being generally uncomfortable, particularly with leg soreness, too much soreness can also negatively impact your training if it carries over into your next workouts. Studies show that training a muscle while it's still sore can reduce the activation of the desired muscle, reduce the force capacity of the muscle by up to 50%, and negatively interfere with the recovery process. Therefore, it's vital that you take the necessary steps in order to minimize post workout soreness and speed up the muscle recovery process. And although two common suggestions are to take ice baths or stretch after your workout, this actually isn't the best advice to take. Although ice baths may slightly help with muscle soreness, they've also been shown to hinder muscle growth and strength by interfering with the muscle recovery process. And as for static stretching, multiple studies from the Journal of Sports Medicine have indicated that it actually doesn't help with muscle soreness and may interfere with the recovery process as well. Therefore, both of these wouldn't be the ideal solution for those who want to prioritize muscle growth and strength. So what exactly can you do? Well, aside from the general recommendations of intaking adequate protein and getting enough sleep, there's a few extra steps you can take, which is exactly what I'll cover in this video. Self myofascial release, most commonly done in the form of foam rolling, has become increasingly popular in recent years. Aside from its positive effect on improving mobility, it seems to also be an effective way of reducing muscle soreness. And although research is still lacking, of the four available studies that have directly analyzed the effect of foam rolling on muscle soreness, three of them showed a positive effect on reducing muscle soreness and enhancing muscle recovery. And this reduction in muscle soreness seemed to enhance the workout performance of the subjects in their next workouts. So how exactly can you apply this? Well, I'd suggest foam rolling after your workout for around 10 minutes or so, and stick to the muscles you work that day, especially the ones that tend to experience the most soreness. You can also do the foam rolling a few hours after your workout if that's more convenient for you. As for how to properly foam roll, I'll save that topic for another video. For now, just focus on not going over a muscle too quickly and for really tight areas and keep the pressure on it until you feel it release. And if you're looking to purchase a foam roller, I'll leave a few links to some of my personal suggestions in the description box down below. Another thing you can do to reduce muscle soreness is incorporate active recovery, which includes cooldowns, low intensity exercise, and so on. Again, not many studies have looked into this, but the few studies that have found that active recovery either performed immediately after a workout or within the days following the workout, or reduced muscle soreness more than when no active recovery was used. So in order to implement this, I suggest performing five to 10 minutes of active recovery or cool down after your workout. Especially for leg workouts, this can be done after your formal and if you're going to do that as well. But the most important part when it comes to active recovery is to use a low intensity exercise that involves the muscles you worked. For example, low intensity cycling would be ideal after a leg day, whereas something like rowing or swimming would be ideal deal after an upper body day or arm day. Now, although there's several supplements out there that claim to enhance muscle recovery and reduce muscle soreness, the truth is research is relatively inconclusive when it comes to this. However, the research behind Omega 3s is promising. Not only have Omega 3s been recently shown to improve anabolic signaling, which may improve muscle repair and growth, but multiple other studies have shown that supplementation of around 1 to 3 grams per day of Omega 3s significantly reduces muscle soreness following resistance training exercise. So taking a few High quality omega 3 fish oil pills daily and increasing your fish intake can be another viable way of reducing muscle soreness and improving overall recovery. And as for other supplements, ingesting caffeine prior to your workout has been shown in two recent studies to significantly reduce post workout muscle soreness. However, the catch is that both studies used a dosage of around 400 milligrams of caffeine, which is the equivalent of a around four cups of coffee. Simply meaning that it's just not feasible for someone to implement this protocol on a daily basis. But with that being said, some other supplements that have for the most part shown a positive effect on muscle soreness and may be of interest to some of you are Taurine, L Citrulline and L. Glutamine. As I've mentioned in my other muscle soreness video, easing your way into a program is the one thing you can do that will have the biggest effect on reducing your muscle soreness. If you're a beginner or detrained or just starting a new exercise routine the best thing for you to do is to take a few weeks to ease into your program, meaning that you should work at volumes and intensities that are lower than you normally would in order to prevent excessive soreness from occurring. So to sum up the video in order to minimize muscle soreness and enhance muscle recovery, foam roll after your workout for 10 minutes or so with a focus on the muscles you work that day. Perform active recovery after your foam rolling as well or the day after your workout, again, the focus being on the muscles that you worked. Increase your omega 3 intake to roughly 1 to 3 grams per day from high quality sources and finally ease into your program by gradually building up the volume and intensity of your workouts.
That's pretty much it for the video guys. Thank you so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed it and found it useful as always. I've posted a written summary of this video on my website builtwithscience.com so for those interested in reading it, I'll leave a link to it in the description box down below. I'd also really appreciate it if you guys gave me a follow follow on Instagram and Facebook as well, where I try to post a lot of informative content on a more regular basis. So I'll leave links to both of those in the description box down below as well. And I'm currently trying to plan my videos for the next couple months, so let me know in the comments what kind of content you'd like to see going forward. I'm definitely going to cover some science based nutrition videos for muscle growth and fat loss, but let me know if there's anything else you think the majority of you would find interesting. I think maybe also doing a science based body weight workout series would be pretty interesting, but let me know if that's something you guys would find useful. Anyways, as always, show your support for this video by giving it a like leaving a comment down below and subscribing to my channel if you haven't already. I really appreciate all your support guys and I'll see you next time.
