O "Cindy" DOMS (Lactic Acid Myth Buster)

It will be 2 weeks ago today that I did "Cindy."  For those of you that don't know what "Cindy" is; she is a CrossFit benchmark workout.  The benchmark workouts are workouts used to gage your progress in your training.  This is the first time I had ever taken her on and she is definitely harder than she sounds.

"Cindy"

20min *AMRAP

5 pull ups

10 push ups

15 air squats

18 Rounds + 11 air squats
(Totals: 95 pull ups, 190 push ups, 281 air squats)

Now looking at this workout it doesn't look all that bad because it is all bodyweight work (referring to the use of no extra weight), but 20 whole minutes of that moving as fast as you can, I was like a continuously dripping water fountain of sweat.  I knew that 20 minutes of this was going to be brutal so I decided to pace myself, especially through the squats.  

I didn't even expect to be sore the next day, but little did I know my quads were sore for about 2-3 days and my chest muscles were sore from all the push ups for about 4 days (it even hurt to do pass throughs with the PVC pipe)!  I couldn't believe how long I could feel it after that simple workout.  It's usually the ones that seem so simple that get you the most.

So where does the DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness) and lactic acid piece come in?

Lactic Acid on DOMS

(Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness)

Since I can remember, and even myself, used to preach that it was lactic acid that made our muscle sore after a workout.  If it wasn't for majoring in Exercise Science, I today might not know the difference.  And to this day, some college teachers still preach lactic acid is what makes us sore.  DOMS, delayed onset muscle soreness, is the soreness we feel 1-2 days after we workout.  Why we hurt so much walking down the stairs the next day after we did all those lunges and squats for the first time and even worse the second day!

So here is the science behind it all...

~Lactic Acid~

Yes, the body does produce lactic acid!  The production of lactic acid is then changed to hydrogen ions and this has a huge effect our body's muscles.  Increases in hydrogen in the muscle results in two things: 1) reduces the muscles ability to produce ATP (provides the body with energy) which inhibits enzymes involved in anaerobic and aerobic exercise; 2) they compete with calcium ions for binding sites, hindering the contraction process of the muscles.

The belief that lactic acid causes the body to be sore 24-48 hours post workout has been studied.  Lactic acid produced in the body during active muscular high intensity exercise, is removed rapidly following exercise and return to resting levels.  Upon reading that last sentence some of you may now realize that lactic acid is constantly in our system, and that excess build up during exercise is gone within 40 minutes of completing the workout. 

Any lactic acid that is produced by the body is then recycled after workout and used for energy later.  But this is what causes our muscle to fatigue during a workout.

The soreness in our muscles actually comes strenuous muscular contractions which cause from the microscopic injury  we cause to our muscle fibers, membrane damage and connective tissue.  This makes our muscles cause inflammation and edema (swelling).  This breakdown causes our body to produce enzyme that breakdown things even more in out body causing the soreness.

This shows that the lengthening contraction (eccentric) has a
greater force then the concentric (shortening).  Eccentric
contractions are a more controlled movement.

In Other Words...

Our body does not become sore from the lactic acid that our body produces from our high intensity workouts.  It comes from the microscopic tears we cause to our muscle whether it be by lifting heavier weights, sprinting a little faster several times, or doing a lot of repetitions of an exercise, and focusing strictly on one body part...quads, arms, etc.  It is more of the eccentric (lengthening) contraction of our muscles that causes soreness than the concentric (shortening) contraction.  Our muscles aren't used to this type of exercise so they have to rebuild themselves in order to create muscle memory for the next time we decide to take on the same type of exercise/workout.  You may have noticed that you are more sore the second day than the first.  This is because our bodies are producing enzymes and hormones in order to repair those muscles.

Ain't that the truth!

*Exercise Physiology: Theory and Application to Fitness and Performance "Muscle Soreness (p. 234, 462-463) 7th Edition

*Exercise Physiology: Theory and Application to Fitness and Performance "The Winning Edge 4.1, Exercise Physiology Applied to Sports:Does Lactic Acid Cause Muscle Soreness?" (p 59)