Training & Testing 327 Cortis C et al. Eﬀects of Post-Exercise Recovery Interventions on Physiological … Int J Sports Med 2010; 31: 327–335 accepted after revision January 10, 2010 Bibliography DOI http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1055/s-0030-1248242 Published online: February 23, 2010 Int J Sports Med 2010; 31: 327–335 © Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart · New York ISSN 0172-4622 Correspondence Prof. L. Capranica IUSM, Department of Human Movement and Sport Sciences P.za L. De Bosis, 15 00135 Rome Italy Tel.: + 39/6 36 733 207 Fax: + 39/6 36 733 330 laura.capranica@iusm.it Key words ● ▶ active recovery ● ▶ passive recovery ● ▶ near-infrared spectroscopy ● ▶ oxygen consumption ● ▶ countermovement jump Eﬀects of Post-Exercise Recovery Interventions on Physiological, Psychological, and Performance Parameters and supine rest, showers, massages, saunas and electrostimulation; or 2) active warm-down, which includes low-intensity exercises (i. e., jog- ging, cycling, technical exercises, chalistenics, stretching, and water exercises). In particular, studies that have compared the eﬀects of diﬀer- ent recovery modes generally have used passive recovery in a seated position as a control group [22, 30, 48, 49]. Conversely, electrostimulation aiming to facilitate the recovery process by increasing blood ﬂow and metabolite washout of muscles [3, 22, 30] has been studied in a supine position [48, 49]. Finally, active water exercises are recommended to enhance stretching and recovery from musculoskeletal fatigue, improve heat dissipation [16], increase physiological and psychological indices of relaxation [37], and decrease spinal loading [15]. Several authors tested the hypothesis that active recovery would lead to a better maintenance of exercise performance in subsequent bouts of exercise performed during a single experimental session [11, 12, 13, 17, 19, 21, 22, 24, 30, 32, 45]. Introduction ▼ Physical exercise is a remarkable stressor for the physiological and psychological aspects of the individual and monitoring recovery is important to identify the appropriate individual’s training loads to maximize performance, especially when training regimens include multiple daily ses- sions. Actually, the morning session might com- promise the working capacity of athletes during the following afternoon training when perform- ance decrements, and physiological and psycho- logical disturbances might occur. In fact, research has shown that a protocol including two consec- utive graded incremental exercise tests per- formed with a 4 h rest interval could be a good indicator of the recovery capacity of the athlete and of his/her ability to perform the second bout of exercise normally [34, 35]. To facilitate the recovery process, diﬀerent post- exercise recovery modes have been suggested, broadly classiﬁed into two categories [6, 28]: 1) passive recovery, which involves upright, sitting, Authors C. Cortis 1 , A. Tessitore 1 , E. D’ Artibale 1 , R. Meeusen 2 , L. Capranica 1 Aﬃliations 1 University of Rome Foro Italico, Department of Human Movement and Sport Sciences, Rome, Italy 2 Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Human Physiology & Sports Medicine, Brussels, Belgium Abstract ▼ At present, there is no consensus on the eﬀec- tiveness of post-exercise recovery interventions on subsequent daily performances. The purpose of this study was to compare the eﬀectiveness of 20 min low-intensity water exercises, supine electrostimulation, and passive (sitting rest) recovery modalities on physiological (oxygen consumption, blood lactate concentration, and percentage of hemoglobin saturation in the muscles), psychological (subjective ratings of perceived exertion, muscle pain, and feeling of recovery), and performance (countermovement, bouncing jumping) parameters. During three experimental sessions, 8 men (age: 21.9 ± 1.3 yrs; height: 175.8 ± 10.7 cm; body mass: 71.2 ± 9.8 kg; VO 2max : 57.9 ± 5.1 ml . kg . min − 1 ) performed a morning and an afternoon submaximal running test. The recovery interventions were randomly administered after the ﬁrst morning tests. Activ- ity and dietary intake were replicated on each occasion. ANOVA for repeated measures (p < 0.05) showed no diﬀerence between the morning and afternoon physiological (ratios: range 0.90–1.18) and performance parameters (ratios: range 0.80–1.24), demonstrating that post-exercise recovery interventions do not provide signiﬁcant beneﬁcial eﬀects over a limited time period. Con- versely, subjects perceived water exercises (60 %) and electrostimulation (40 %) as the most eﬀec- tive interventions, indicating that these recovery strategies might improve the subjective feelings of wellbeing of the individual. Downloaded by: ISTITUTO UNIVERSITARIO SCIENZE MOTORIE. Copyrighted material.