“My whole body just feels super stiff.” We hear this from clients on a regular basis, and the number of stiffness-related complaints on the training floor tends to increase exponentially when we’ve been in a strength block for several weeks.
Why do you get stiff from heavy lifting?
The goal of a strength block is to increase the amount of force your muscles are able to produce. Doing so requires the development of significant tension in the muscles directly responsible for that movement. For example, in order to increase your strength on a squat, your quadriceps muscles develop a significant amount of tension in order to move progressively heavier weights. Often overlooked, however, is the fact that when you squat, your quadriceps aren’t the only tissues under tension. The connective tissue surrounding your knees, hips and ankles are directly loaded during a squat. Your spinal erectors, the muscles running parallel to your spine along your back, must increase their tension in order to keep you upright under load. Even your abdominal muscles will increase their tone as your squat gets heavier. Due to the widespread impact of a heavily-loaded multi-joint exercise, it comes as no surprise that you’ll notice the sensation of stiffness in areas that may not have been the intended target for the exercise.
It’s not a bad thing to develop tension across multiple muscle groups or even joint and connective tissues, so long as you’re being smart about progressing loads slowly over time. It’s incredibly common to feel sore and stiff in your lower back following heavy squats or deadlifts, as an example. That said, you should not feel like your body has gone through an MMA fight following your sessions at Paragon. Recovering from your sessions is extremely important, and you can find a detailed breakdown of some popular recovery modalities here.
An underappreciated recovery tool just so happens to be something we’ve already included in your programming: aerobic exercise. We have a significant amount of research supporting the idea that performing cardio following intense bouts of strength training can have a significant positive impact on muscle soreness, range of motion, as well as your ability to come into your next workout feeling fresh and prepared.
The logic here is straight forward: In order to lift heavy weights, your muscles must develop significant tension which eventually restricts blood flow into and out of the muscles, connective tissues, and joints. This means that less blood and nutrients are being delivered to the working muscles over time. Fewer waste products, believed to be related to the feeling of soreness and pain, are able to be removed from the working tissues when the loads are heavy.
On the flip side, cardiovascular activity, particularly anything performed in a cyclic manner (ie: bike, rower, walking/running), requires that muscles relax. Picture yourself trying to run under the same amount of tension you’d create in order to perform your heaviest squat. You’re not running anywhere under those circumstances. By adding cardio to the end of your workout, you’re restoring blood flow and nutrient supply to the working muscles, while also improving waste product removal. This leads to less soreness and better recovery metrics such as sleep and stress.
If the commonly-cited benefits of cardio such as heart health, blood glucose control and cognitive function aren’t appealing enough for you to engage with cardio at the end of your workouts, consider the benefits of reduced muscle soreness and stiffness as your reason to buy in.
