Cooldowns: How important?

I'm a high school coach in the same boat. I've given up trying to explain the importance. Instead, I do it with them and halfway through the cool down we stop for a few minutes while I give our post-meet talk. That way they have to do it. They still don't like it but I seem to have squashed the rebellion. But we don't do a 5k cool down. We only go about a mile.

Active recovery (i.e. cooldowns) helps the body remove Lactic acid that has accumulated in the body during a hard workout or race much faster than complete rest. About 70% of the lactic acid produced during intense exercise is used as fuel by the heart (and muscles) and expired in the form of CO2 and some form of light exercise speeds this process up and leads to a much quicker recovery. In other words... they should do it.

Hey fellas, take off your panties! Go watch football practice and take some notes.

There is very little research to support the use of cool-down runs for the purpose of recovery. If you are using them to add mileage, great.

The removal of lactic acid is a farce. A few minutes after hitting 16 mmols, all lactic acid is gone. Often cool down runs after races simply add to muscle damage.

Running after races and work outs is a great way to add to training volume at the beginning or middle of a season.

anyway who has ever done a hard workout or ran a hard race should know that cool downs are gonna help loosen up your legs a bunch so they aren't tight and/or sore the next day. cool downs = very important

The idea that cooldowns are needed to remove lactate from the body is bogus. While one might do active recovery between 400s, your body will remove lactate in 60 minutes or less no matter what you do.

David Costill has pointed out that cooldowns generally are debateable, and that doing a cooldown after a hard effort further reduces glycogen levels (which have to be rebuilt before the next hard effort). Thus, during periods of intense training, cooldowns can actually make recovery WORSE.

I'll have people run a couple of laps at a decent clip if they've been running at 95-100% MHR to reduce strain on the heart, but that's it. Pack up, get out, and get warm, so you don't get sick, which I've found to be far more important than a cooldown--it's just junk mileage anyway.

studies might show that, but for me that is about as far from the truth as possible. Not saying these studies are wrong, but as an earlier poster said, if I don't do a cooldown the next day I will feel way worse. From my personal experience when I can force myself to at least shuffle for 15-20 minutes after a workout/race I feel so much better.No scientific research, but from 12 years of training. Also, I have trained with some very elite runners (I am not one of those) and they all do cooldowns afterwards.

Coach D wrote:

The idea that cooldowns are needed to remove lactate from the body is bogus. While one might do active recovery between 400s, your body will remove lactate in 60 minutes or less no matter what you do.

David Costill has pointed out that cooldowns generally are debateable, and that doing a cooldown after a hard effort further reduces glycogen levels (which have to be rebuilt before the next hard effort). Thus, during periods of intense training, cooldowns can actually make recovery WORSE.

I'll have people run a couple of laps at a decent clip if they've been running at 95-100% MHR to reduce strain on the heart, but that's it. Pack up, get out, and get warm, so you don't get sick, which I've found to be far more important than a cooldown--it's just junk mileage anyway.

Been to meets where a 1500 elite racers were doing a bunch (like 10) of 150s like an hour after for a wormdown.

I actually feel worse if I do a long cool down. More tired the next day, seems to make the whole training session harder. A lot of the time I have trouble completing it and it feels harder than the first few reps. Maybe it is too close to the end of the workout but I'm not going to stand in the cold for 10 minutes just to wait until I'm more recovered to do a cool down.

Anyway, I still do one, but a short one, which seems to have the balance right for me.

yo wrote:

anyway who has ever done a hard workout or ran a hard race should know that cool downs are gonna help loosen up your legs a bunch so they aren't tight and/or sore the next day. cool downs = very important

After very hard workouts and hard races, I always did cool downs. I am not saying whether they are good or bad, but I remember just shuffling along feeling worse and worse on the cool downs. After two miles my body would just feel trashed. No loosening up of the legs. I'm not convinced they were beneficial for me. A good ice water treatment might have been better soon after the workout instead of a cooldown.

The major benefit is to prevent pooling of blood in the muscles. Ironically, you can wind up with poor blood flow to the heart or brain if you abruptly stop hard exercise.

I doubt this is a big risk for kids, but for older people it is a concern because it puts vulnerable ones at risk of heart attack.

I know that researchers no longer support the idea of flushing lactic acid and other waste products as benefit of cooldown. But from my own experience, an easy cooldown always makes me feel better. A long one is often better than a short one.

I also find a cooldown relaxes me after a hard session. I've heard some people say it helps flush out hormones like adrenaline, etc. but I don't know if there's any proof of this.

Does anyone just never do a cooldown? Even after the hardest sessions? Not saying that method is wrong. It just seems really foreign to me.

After 40 years of handling middle distance and distance runners, my feelings are as follows.

Post workout cooldown runs are to a some extent important but in many cases different from ideas commonly expressed. I always told my athletes we will never leave the workout or enter the locker room in a tired or drained state of mind. The "cooldown" must mirror the warmup. In otherwords the distances get shorter and and the efforts less strenuous, in other words slower. I want them to finish the workout FEELING GOOD ABOUT THEMSELVES.

EVEN MORE IMPORTANT-during interval work we employ 20-20's. After the interval, immediately go into a 20 step jog followed by a 20 step walk inhaling thru the nose and filling the lungs to capacity. The oxygen intake snaps them back almost instantly with about four or five sets of 20-20's.

Feel free to email me or call (631) 643-6696 with questions or concerns.

Bump.

Cooldowns are highly overrated just like stretching

Train hard, race hard, rest, repeat

I finish every run with at least 1/4 mile of walking.

Regardless of the intesity of the race or workout, when I'm done running- I'm done running.

While I believe it has some physiological benefit, I required it of my HS & college teams due to the fact that it is a great discipline tool. Jogging when physically tired and mentally whipped is a great mind conditioner and a perfect time to work on form issues. I sold it that way to them as well.

I have done very easy jogging or fast walking to a heart rate of 120 or less for about 10 minutes. After a hard session, it is very difficult to go much faster than a walk and exceed 120hrate.

I have found that after this I do feel like I am not quite as wasted from the effort. A run at typical aerobic pace for a cool down is very different, especially after a hard session because I would find my heart rate way above threshold, so I've come to the conclusion that a real cool down is a basis for recovery and walking or jogging very slowly seems to help from my experience.

Does anyone have any links to studies conducted for this? I am sure there must be a body of scientific knowledge beyond just all of our conjecture and personal bias, which can be misleading. If there is evidence that "cool downs" don't do anything for recovery, why do it? I would change my strategy and use the 10 minutes to do something more useful.

Mr.Berkowski,your ideas regarding filing the lungs and nose with air are totally without scientifc merit. and by the way, where did you come up with the idea that the cool down, which also has no concrete empirical evidence to suggest that it is beneficial must mirror the warm up? Bogus. Just blab blab blab.how could you never enter a locker room tired or drained? If you put in a tough session you'd better be tired and hardly able to move