When you’re seeking fitness results, it can be tempting to simply focus on your workouts instead of devoting time to recovery. But experts emphasize the importance of prioritizing restoration both after your workouts and on your rest days.
“The better and the faster you can recover from your workouts, the harder and [more frequent] you can train — and the more progress you can ultimately make toward your fitness goals,” says Danny King, Master Trainer and director of performance and recovery at Life Time. “When we feel better, we can move better. And there are all sorts of recovery strategies we can use to help our muscles heal and grow, including things like stretching, myofascial release from foam rolling or massage, or compression therapy.”
Many Life Time athletic country clubs dedicate an entire area of the workout floor to recovery, featuring several tools members can use to feel better and recuperate from tough workouts.
“I highly encourage my clients to try out these tools after a workout, on a rest day, or even just when they have some extra time,” says Colin Milan, Dynamic Personal Trainer at Life Time Highland Park in St. Paul, Minn. “It can help your body feel better, which can help your mind feel better too. If you need help with the tools, any of our Dynamic Personal Trainers will be glad to assist you.”
We asked King and Milan to outline the most popular tools available in this area of the club and their benefits as well as demonstrate how to use them.
Normatec Compression Therapy
Normatec compression sleeves or “boots” use a patented compression technology to enhance circulation, speed up recovery, and reduce soreness. They work by using dynamically controlled air pressure to massage your muscles and move fluid.
“This mirrors the body’s natural process of pumping blood and moving fluid away from and back toward the targeted area,” says King. “The repetitive compression continuously inflates and deflates to move inflammation, lactic acid, and metabolic waste out of your legs so they can recover faster. The compression also acts as a self-massage, which can feel good on tired or sore muscles.”
How to Work it Into Your Routine
King recommends using Normatec immediately post-workout or on your rest days. “Compression therapy can help you recover from your workouts faster so you feel better and can get back to it on your next session,” he says. “I like to grab a shake from the LifeCafe, sit down with the Normatec, and take a few minutes to unwind after my workout.
“If you had a tough leg day or a long run, this is a particularly great way to speed up your recovery,” he adds. “I also recommend coming in to the club on your rest day to take advantage of this recovery amenity.”
How to Use Normatec Compression Therapy
- Sit down on the lounge chair. Take off your shoes and secure the boots comfortably over your legs. Zip the zipper up to your hips.
- Each boot has a connecting hose. Connect each hose to the pressure system.
- Using the control pad, choose your level of pressure and time duration. King recommends starting the pressure level between two and four. At Life Time, the time is set in 15-minute increments.
- The boots will start compressing your lower body, starting at the feet and ankles and moving up toward your hips.
- Sit back and relax for 15 minutes.
CryoLounge
As a convenient alternative to cold plunge or cryotherapy, CryoLounge chairs offer targeted dry hot and cold therapy. This allows you to control your experience and decide which areas of the body to apply cold and which to use heat to ease soreness or aches and pains.
“The CryoLounge has two tanks of water — one hot and one cold — and it moves the water underneath the chair to apply heat or cold to specific segments of the body,” King explains. “Using the control pad, you can choose which areas of your body receive [hot] or cold. There is also a compression massage feature for your lower legs.
“This is another tool to help keep fluid moving within the body,” says King. “When we apply cold therapy, it can help reduce inflammation, reduce swelling, and draw blood away from the area. When we apply heat, it helps bring new blood back in and relax the muscles.”
How to Work it Into Your Routine
If you’re feeling achy or sore, King recommends using the CryoLounge after a workout or on a rest day.
“We see a lot of people who are feeling stiff or sore come in to use the Cryolounge,” says King. “Going through a few cycles of cold and heat tends to help loosen things up and promote recovery.”
How to Use CryoLounge
- Start by lying back on the CryoLounge chair. The control pad is on your right.
- Tap on the screen to select up to four cold zones to target sore muscles and adjust the temperature Use heat zones on the rest of your body to maintain a comfortable temperature overall.
- Wrap the auxiliary pad around hard-to-reach areas like ankles, knees, wrists, or shoulders.
- Using the contrast feature, you can switch the cold and heat zones when ready.
- Sit back and relax for 15 minutes.
HydroMassage Lounge Chair
A HydroMassage session offers a way to relax and relieve muscle tension. This dry (fully clothed) massage chair uses high-pressure jets of hot water that move up and down the body to massage muscles, increase circulation, and promote overall well-being.
“There are so many general benefits of massage — reducing tension, improving circulation, and more. The HydroMassage machines are a great way to get a quick dose of those benefits,” says King. “It’s another way to get blood flowing to reduce soreness, and it’s also super relaxing. It may even help you notice where you carry extra tension, and you can take that information to a massage therapist at LifeSpa who can help bring you further relief.”
How to Work it Into Your Routine
HydroMassage is a great tool to use post-workout or on a rest day, according to King.
“When we finish a moderate- to high-intensity workout, our bodies are often in that sympathetic or fight-or-flight state, and we want to move into the parasympathetic or rest-and-digest state,” he explains. “Using the HydroMassage is a great way to calm down your body.
“If I’m working with clients, I encourage them to come to the club on their rest days,” King adds. “Relax on the HydroMassage and then hop on a treadmill to get some active recovery movement in.”
How to Use HydroMassage
- Have a seat on the HydroMassage lounge chair; you will see a screen to your right with a start button. Press start, and the water pressure will begin to massage your backside, moving up and down your body.
- The pressure starts at level one. Press the up arrow to increase the pressure as desired.
- Adjust the speed and range of the water jets — how fast they move up and down your body and what area they focus on — as desired.
- Sit back and relax for 15 minutes.
Note: Amenities available vary by club location.
