Recovery Modalities – How to Recover Faster
The body usually recovers from peripheral neuromuscular fatigue with rest. There could also be other potential fatigue factors in training since the intensity can be such that there is an accumulation of lactic acid. Fatigue could also be related to external factors such as the sources of stress an athlete faces. Recovery techniques should address both physiological and psychological recovery and serve also as an injury prevention strategy. Therefore, since both major potential fatigue factors can be dealt with just with rest, I will address the recovery process at a larger scale and use strategies that will promote injury prevention, physiological and physical recovery.
Essential Recovery Means
Cold Therapy
How to Deal with Potential Stress Factors
Previously, I’ve explained the concept of recovery and regeneration and how important it is. In this article, I want to talk about stress and how it limits recovery and regeneration. I identified many potential stress factors for softball players and listed a few strategies for each that could help limit the negative effect of these sources of stress. Too much stress will result in decreased performance, decreased rate of improvement, increased fatigue and potentially overtraining. Controlling stress is very important.
Training Camps
Three Pillars of Head Training
In every sport, levels of performance are always increasing. This can be explained by better overall training.
In softball, skills training methods are better than ever especially with the arrival of new technologies and teaching tools (computers, video, etc.). Physical training has also greatly evolved going from being rudimentary in the late 1980’s to being cutting-edge and really advance today. Both skills training and physical training will keep getting better but I believed that they have both reached levels where improvements will be minors from now on.
Introduction to Recovery and Regeneration
A major issue in high performance sport is being able to train very hard, which elicits a deficit in performance capacity, and to recover from training which elicits an increase in performance capacity. Eventually through many cycles of training, recovery, and adaptation, high performance in competition is possible. Major issues with training very hard include management of the recovery from training so that the athlete can train very hard again soon enough to have a positive influence on the physical state.
In softball, we train frequently to increase power and strength. However, the process of increasing efficiency depends to a large extent on our ability to overcome fatigue and recover and regenerate after each training session. Therefore, just as one plans and follows a training regimen – one must prepare and follow a plan of recovery and regeneration as well.
To be sure, there are many factors, which affect recovery, but when all is said and done, it’s either one or the other. An athlete’s capacity for improvement is dependent upon how recovery is managed from daily training and competitions.
Win one for the Gipper
One of the biggest clichés in sports-themed movies (other than the training montage and the part where it looks like all is lost for our heroes) is the pre-game speech before the Big Game. Ever since Knute Rockne, All-American, exhorted his Notre Dame football team to “win just one for the Gipper,” Hollywood has been showing coaches getting their teams “up” with a rousing, inspirational speech full of heart, pathos, and good feelings all around.
That may work in Hollywood, and it may even work in football. But in softball, pumping up the adrenaline and getting player emotions to peak levels isn’t such a good idea. Here’s why.
What To Do About “That One Stupid Inning”
It happens to every coach and every team sooner or later. One little mistake – a missed pop-up, a dropped third strike that results in a baserunnner, a booted ground ball that’s followed by a bad throw – and suddenly there you are, right in the middle of one of those innings.
You know the ones I’m talking about. The ones where runners seem to be going around the bases willy-nilly to the point where you can almost hear the circus music playing. The ones that seem like they will never end.
Overcoming a Slump
Sooner or later it happens to every hitter – the dreaded “S” word. A slump. And suddenly that hitter who was Ms. Reliable in the beginning of the season is now Ms. Nervous As All Get-Out at the plate. Not to mention Ms. Ineffective.
Busting out of a slump can be difficult. But it can be done without having to wait for the law of averages to catch up. Here are a few suggestions on how to help your hitters break the downward spiral and get themselves back on track.
Recovering from Failure
Whoever came up with the game of fastpitch softball as we know it today must have been either a masochist (if he also played) or a sadist (if he was a coach). How else can you explain all the failure that is built into our game?
Take hitting for example. There’s a name for a hitter who fails seven out of 10 times: an all-star. Because failing seven out of 10 times means you succeed three out of 10 for a .300 batting average.
Focus on the Process, Not the Outcome
In any sport, there is a great deal of emphasis placed on the outcome. The overall desired outcome, of course, is winning. But in fastpitch softball, there are plenty of other outcomes that lead to that final one.
For pitchers, successful outcomes include not walking any hitters, getting the strikeout, setting the batters down in order, getting that ground ball when you need it, and so forth. For hitters, successful outcomes range from not striking out to hitting the game-winning walk-off home run. For fielders it’s making the routine catch, making the spectacular catch, throwing out the runner trying to steal second etc.
It All Start with Believing
The mind is a very powerful device. It’s capable of accomplishing all sorts of incredible things – things that would not otherwise be possible.
It sounds wonderful in theory. Yet that power cuts both ways. It’s like the old saw says – whether you think you can or you can’t, you are correct.
