Applications of Muscle Stimulation for Athletes
Accelerating Muscle Recovery
If you haven’t used a stimulator yet, start with muscle recovery treatments first!
Especially after an intense workout, place the electrodes on the most strained muscle. Numerous studies confirm that muscle stimulation reduces metabolite levels—and thus muscle fatigue and stiffness—more effectively than any other cooldown method.
Initiating muscle stimulation within 90 minutes after exercise can increase blood circulation by up to 300%, speeding the removal of waste products from the muscle. Most metabolites are broken down in the liver, so the sooner they arrive there, the quicker muscle stiffness and fatigue subside. Recovery time shortens, and the risk of muscle cramps is reduced.
Improved circulation not only aids waste removal but also helps replenish energy stores in the muscle.
A muscle treated correctly after training will feel significantly fresher and more rested for the next session, allowing for more effective performance.
Healing Muscle Injuries
Muscle stimulation was originally a medical, hospital treatment used to restore diseased muscles. In the case of sports injuries, it’s important for you to return to training as soon as possible.
Muscle stimulation does not move the joint, so you can begin muscle-preserving treatments for tendons, ligaments, joint capsules, and cartilage as early as the day after injury!
After a muscle injury, you need to wait a few days for bruising to subside. But 3–4 days after the injury, you can already use it. It increases blood and lymph circulation, delivering the nutrients needed for healing to the injury site. This accelerates the repair of muscle fibers.
Regaining Muscle Strength
After a fracture, cartilage surgery, ligament surgery, etc., you’re condemned to a long period of bed rest. The longer the forced break, the more muscle strength and mass you lose despite your hard training. In just two to three weeks off, you can lose roughly six months of training gains.
Since stimulation does not move the joints, you can begin muscle-preserving and strength-recovering exercises just a few days after surgery. By the time joint movement is allowed, your muscles will already be prepared. In other words, you can bring your comeback forward by weeks!
During rehabilitation, combining physiotherapy exercises with stimulation can further accelerate recovery. Stimulation can be applied simultaneously with voluntary movement, which helps “retrain” neuromuscular functions.
Developing “Lagging” Muscles
Many people find that no matter how much they train a particular muscle the traditional way, it just won’t develop. However, with electrical muscle stimulation, you can “target” even a single muscle, and decide which aspect of muscle capability you want to “tweak.” You can isolate and “fine-tune” endurance, aerobic capacity, increase muscle strength and explosiveness, or even build muscle mass. Attention! The effect only occurs in the muscles being treated!
Gaining “Workout Time”
Most athletes train alongside family, work, or studies and don’t have enough workout time. Those with office-based or sedentary jobs can “gain workout time” with muscle stimulation. Passive muscle stimulation while sitting is extra training for the muscles—just like doing one more session!
Of course, you should treat only the muscles most important for your sport. For runners or cyclists, the thigh muscles; for swimmers, the latissimus dorsi that provides propulsion, etc.
You can target the treatment: if you’re a sprinter, you need to increase strength and explosiveness. In endurance sports, muscle endurance and aerobic-anaerobic capacity are crucial, so set the impulses accordingly.
Avoiding Setbacks
Imagine this situation: you’re doing weighted squats in a strength session and the next day your knee hurts like it’s signaling an alarm. You think, “Oh… it’s from yesterday. No big deal, I’ll push through.” You follow the plan again. The next day the pain is still there, and it even feels like a sharp twinge. Yet you train again. This goes on for two or three weeks until you realize it’s an overuse injury that needs rest. Inflammation won’t go away if you keep stressing it. But if you take 2-3 weeks off, you lose three to four months of hard work, and you can’t ramp up again during the season.
This is when the muscle stimulator comes in. While you rest the joint (i.e., avoid traditional movements that load your knee), you can maintain your leg muscles with stimulation!!!! In other words, even if you don’t run or cycle for two weeks, your thigh muscles won’t atrophy! Once your knee heals and you resume training, you can pick up right where you left off.
Another similar scenario is mainly of interest to high-level athletes. For someone preparing for a competition with two daily workouts, a trip to a distant event can be a serious problem. On a 30+ hour flight, muscles stiffen, and at this level even a two-day break is noticeable. In such cases, the muscle stimulator is an invaluable asset. It fits in your pocket, you can use it on the plane, and it fully maintains your most important muscles. Upon arrival at the destination, there will be no trace of muscle fatigue.
Muscle Stimulation – Simplified
In this video, Dr. Zsolt Zátrok demonstrates how simple muscle stimulation can be.
