How to speed up muscle recovery | Essential amino acids for muscle repair and protein synthesis
When you do exercise that you're not used to or hard training, your muscles will be damaged. Being able to fully recover from this damage is very important in order to perform at your best the next day and beyond. In this article, we'll take a look at what kind of damage your muscles suffer from daily exercise and what's important for quickly recovering from that damage!
How exercise damages muscles
In order to properly care for your muscles after exercise, it is first very important to know how your muscles move when you exercise.
Damage caused by muscle contraction – concentric and eccentric contractions
The movement of muscles that contract when lifting something is called "contraction." This contraction can be broadly divided into two types (Figure 2).
-Contraction in which the muscle contracts while exerting force (concentric contraction)
- Contraction that exerts force while lengthening the muscle (eccentric contraction)
"Concentric exercise" refers to exercises such as lifting weights or climbing stairs or hills. On the other hand, "eccentric exercise" refers to exercises such as lowering weights, descending stairs or hills, and turning around and sprinting.
While the sports and training that people choose to do vary from person to person, it has been found that "eccentric exercise," which stretches muscles, is particularly likely to cause muscle damage.
Figure 1
Muscle fiber disruption caused by eccentric exercise
Muscles are made up of bundles of long, thin cells called muscle fibers. These muscle fibers are neatly arranged, but if you continue to do "eccentric exercise" that is likely to damage your muscles and actually damage them, the rows of muscle fibers will become disorganized, as shown in Figure 2.1).
Muscle pain and loss of strength due to muscle damage
When muscles are damaged, they can cause muscle pain and loss of strength.2)Furthermore, muscle tension, swelling, and a reduced range of joint movement can occur. These various problems increase the risk of injury and have a negative impact on the acquisition of skills.
Figure 2
Furthermore, when muscles are damaged, inflammation (redness and swelling of a part of the body) occurs in the damaged area. When this happens, it becomes difficult for the carbohydrates (glycogen) stored in the muscles, which are a necessary energy source when exercising, to return to their original amount after being reduced by exercise.3)If you continue exercising every day, you will easily get tired. Muscle damage is thought to be one of the causes of problems.
Muscle damage leading to decreased performance
For athletes, a more pressing issue is that it is said that if muscles are damaged, it becomes difficult to perform at an ideal level.4)It has been shown to have a negative impact on technique as well.
Therefore, knowing how well your muscles recover from the damage they suffer is very important in order to be able to train as usual the next day and to perform at your ideal level in an important match or race.
1) Raastad T, et al. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2010; 42(1): 86-95
2) Shimomura Y, et al. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab. 2010; 20(3): 236-44
3) Costil DL, et al. J Appl Physiol 1990; 69(l): 46-50
4) Leite CMF, et al. Hum Mov Sci. 2019 Oct; 67: 102504
The time it takes for muscle fatigue and damage to recover and the effects of inflammation
It is said that if muscles are severely damaged, it can take several days to nearly two weeks for them to recover. Therefore, when training every day, it is important to always pay attention to keeping your muscles in the desired condition for the next day or for an actual event such as a match or race. To do this, you need to take careful care after training so that they can recover as quickly as possible. Next, let's take a closer look at the damage muscles receive and the changes that occur inside the body to help them recover afterwards.
Inflammatory response due to muscle damage
As explained before, when exercise damages muscles, inflammation occurs.5)(Figure 3). When muscles are damaged, inflammation occurs, causing further damage. Have you ever felt more pain or fatigue than usual after doing very hard exercise, training for a long time, or training that you are not used to? This could be inflammation occurring in your body.
Figure 3
For these reasons, if you train every day, it is important to make efforts and devise ways to avoid damaging your muscles, such as by combining training content that suits you. It is also important not to train too hard before an important match or race.
5) Peake J, et al. Exerc Immunol Rev. 2005; 11: 64-85
How muscle repair works – Protein and essential amino acids intake
When muscles are damaged, they are broken down, so new muscles need to be produced to replace the ones that have been damaged (Figure 4).
Essential amino acids for protein synthesis
The cells that make up muscles contain a lot of proteins. The proteins that these cells contain in abundance are called actin and myosin, and are the proteins that work when muscles contract during exercise.
In order to recreate damaged muscle cells, it is absolutely necessary to produce new proteins that serve as the building blocks of those cells.
The proteins in our bodies are made up of 20 different amino acids. Amino acids can also be divided into two categories: "9 essential amino acids that cannot be produced in the body and must be obtained from food" and "11 non-essential amino acids that can be produced in the body." Of these, the 9 essential amino acids are useful for producing muscle proteins.
Leucine, an essential amino acid that switches on protein synthesis
It is known that amino acids are not simply used as building blocks for muscle protein. It is also known that there is a switch that triggers the production of new muscle protein.6)In particular, it is known that the amino acid that plays the role of turning on this switch is leucine, an essential amino acid.
Figure 4
For these reasons, proteins and amino acids that are rich in essential amino acids and leucine are useful for muscle recovery after exercise.
6) Ge Y, et al. Am J Physiol Cell Physiol 2009; 297: C1434–44
Supports muscle damage recovery with amino acids
After exercise, muscles are under a lot of stress, making them more susceptible to damage and fatigue.
Leucine, an essential amino acid, is a key component that supports recovery from the inside out. Leucine activates muscle building, smooths post-exercise recovery, and supports preparation for the next performance. We will introduce the effects of the "High Leucine Essential Amino Acid Mix," which applies this mechanism.
Accelerate muscle recovery and maintain performance
It is important to know the following points in order to help your muscles recover quickly and be in top condition for your next training session, match, or race.
- ・Eccentric exercise, which stretches muscles, is likely to cause muscle damage.
- ・If your muscles are damaged, it will be difficult to continue training the next day or perform at your best.
- It takes time for damaged muscles to recover.
- It is important to create new proteins to rebuild muscles.
- ・To build muscle protein, it is also good to use proteins and amino acids that are rich in essential amino acids and leucine.
Exercise and training are not something that you just do and then it's over. It is important to do it thoroughly while thinking carefully about what kind of care you should take afterwards to quickly restore your muscles to their original state. This leads to understanding your own body and demonstrating your ideal performance. Learn and utilize the correct knowledge, recover as quickly as possible from the damage caused by exercise, and demonstrate your ideal performance (Figure 5).
Figure 5
▼Click here for amino acids that solve this problem
"Essential amino acid mix with high leucine content" maintains muscle condition during exercise and also supports recovery from fatigue after exercise!
<Supervisor>Satoshi Fujita
Professor at Ritsumeikan University's College of Sport and Health Science. Completed his doctorate at the University of Southern California Graduate School in 2002. PhD (exercise physiology). Served as a lecturer in internal medicine at the University of Texas Medical School in 2006 and as a specially appointed assistant professor at the University of Tokyo Graduate School of Frontier Sciences in 2007. Has been at Ritsumeikan University since 2009. Received awards from the American Physiological Society (APS) and the American Society for Nutrition (ASN). Specializes in exercise physiology, particularly the metabolic response of skeletal muscle to exercise and nutritional intake. Supervised books include "Illustrated Guide to Protein: So Fascinating You'll Keep Sleeping" and co-authored "Sports Nutrition for Physical Education and Sports Instructors and Students."
■About Professor Fujita Satoshi's Laboratory
The laboratory of Professor Satoshi Fujita in the College of Sport and Health Science at Ritsumeikan University is investigating the effects of exercise and nutritional intake on body composition and sports performance. Using a comprehensive experimental approach, ranging from basic research examining muscle at the molecular level to clinical research targeting a wide range of ages and physical strengths, from children to the elderly, the laboratory continues to conduct research every day to build evidence of sports science that can be applied to the field of exercise instruction. Specific research topics include:
1) Examination of the effects of combining specific functional foods with exercise on lipid metabolism and skeletal muscle protein metabolism
2) Examination of long-term training and nutritional interventions aimed at sarcopenia (age-related muscle wasting)
3) Development of training methods aimed at improving the sports performance of junior athletes
Such as it will be mentioned.
http://www.fitness-lab.net