What is DOMS & 5 Ways to Get Rid of it

In this article, I’m going to show you everything you need to know about DOMS, and most importantly how to get rid of it !

“DOMS” Meaning – What is it?

Anyone who’s done any kind of hard exercise will know the feeling. You wake up the next day and just think “nope.” 

The muscles you’ve worked out feel heavy and stiff. You’re even aching in muscles you didn’t know you had !

This phenomenon is known as DOMS, Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness, and it shouldn’t scare you.

It is muscle soreness that doesn’t appear directly after your workout, but is “delayed” for a while.

The kind of pain you experience during and immediately after a workout is called AMS (Acute Muscle Soreness).

However, DOMS is usually at its worst 24-48 hours after exercising.

DOMS is nature’s way of “rewarding” you for the hard work you’ve put into your workout.

When you do a workout, you likely want to get stronger as a result. To achieve this reward, DOMS is necessary.

During DOMS, your muscles are in the process of repairing themselves. When finished repairing, you’ll be a stronger person than before the workout.

How does DOMS work?

When you move, various muscles in your body are in a constant process of expanding and contracting.

Your body adapts very well to your muscles’ needs. So, your muscles are generally accustomed to whatever you subject them to on a regular basis.

If you do a lot of walking on a regular basis, you probably won’t notice much of an ache at the end of every day.

However, if you spend most of your time sitting down, and then suddenly go hiking one day, you’ll definitely feel it the following day.

This is because you’ve subjected your muscles to more stress than they are used to. In order to become more efficient at whatever it is that caused this stress, the muscle fibres will breakdown in order to repair stronger. 

The high-stress exercise causes temporary breakdown of the muscle fibres. This is called microtrauma, and the subsequent repair of the muscle is known has hypertrophy.

During the high stress exercise you’ll have something called Acute Muscle Soreness (AMS), and after exercising, your muscles need time, rest and nutrition in order to heal effectively.

It is in this period of rest and recovery that DOMS, Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness occurs. DOMS is a side effect of your muscles rebuilding.

The Repeated-Bout Effect

The interesting thing about DOMS is that you can’t get it twice in a row.

Research has shown that once you perform an exercise that gives you DOMS, if you do the same exercise again soon after, DOMS will not occur.

This phenomenon is known as the Repeated-Bout Effect.

I’ve personally found this to be true throughout my years of training.

If I do a heavy workout on some muscles I haven’t used in a while, I will be aching like crazy the next day.

However, if I workout the same muscles a week later, I won’t be achy at all.

For this reason, I find DOMS is a great way to keep a track of muscles that need attention.

If you train regularly, getting DOMS is a good thing, because it means the muscles you just used have been unused for a while.

Getting DOMS will give you fresh ideas on how to mix up your workouts.

How to Get Rid of DOMS (5 Ways)

Unfortunately, stretching and warming up are not effective ways to prevent DOMS. 

Don’t worry though. 

Here’s how prevent it, and how to get rid of DOMS if you do get it.

1. Prepare with Low Intensity

This is the easiest way to prevent DOMS from happening in the first place. It relies on the Repeated-Bout Effect, discussed above.

You can’t get DOMS twice in a row from the same exercise if it’s performed soon after.

So, here’s a clever hack to avoid DOMS.

Let’s say you’ve got a hike coming up in 2 weeks, and you’ve barely had any exercise in the past month. You know your legs are going to be killing you the day after.

What you do is you go for a few gentle hikes before hand, gradually increasing their intensity. This will get your leg muscles used to the movements you’ll be putting them through in the main hiking event.

Your leg muscles will gradually repair and recover, and when it comes to your main hiking event, you’ll be much less likely to get DOMS.

If you do get DOMS, it won’t be as severe as if you had just done the hike unprepared.

2. Workout Again

The alternative to Method 1 is to simply do a workout, get DOMS, and then do the same workout again.

Because of the Repeated-Bout Effect, if you do the same workout again a a few days later, you wont get DOMS a second time. 

However, I wouldn’t recommend this method of training. 

DOMS generally isn’t that uncomfortable, and if you repeat the same exercise over and over just to avoid some aching, you’ll cause other issues such as muscle imbalances.

You want to make sure your exercise program is well rounded, and incorporates as many muscle groups as possible.

3. Cold Water Therapy

If you do get DOMS, one way to reduce the discomfort is cold water therapy.

There are a couple of ways you can do this:

Cold showers / bath

Stepping in a cold shower or cold bath has many health benefits, one of which is a way to lose weight without dieting or exercise.

However, cold water can also help with muscle recovery.

Studies have shown that a 

To have a cold shower or cold bath, there’s no trick apart from simply doing it. 

There will be discomfort, caused by your body’s natural reaction to cold. It’s good to keep in mind that your initial reaction will be to gasp.

This is actually what causes most deaths when people fall into freezing water (gasping and inhaling water).

Keep that in mind when you have your shower or bath, and anticipate the gasping reflex. Try and breathe through the cold sensation and relax as much as possible.

Your DOMS should subside somewhat afterwards.

Contrast showers

Contrast showers are where you alternate between warm and cold water.

The cold water sends blood towards your core, and the warm water sends blood to your skin’s surface. 

This works incredibly well to improve circulation, and deliver vital nutrients to all of your muscles.

Because of this, taking contrast showers is one of the most effective ways to reduce DOMS, meaning you’ll be able to do your next workout even sooner !

4. Foam Rolling

Another great way to combat DOMS is to do something called foam rolling.

This requires a piece of equipment called a foam roller. They are relatively cheap, and can be bought easily on Amazon.

A foam roller is a firm cylindrical piece of equipment, made of foam (surprise). Some of them have nodules and some of them are smooth.

The aim with foam rolling is to “massage” yourself. You place the muscle that you want to massage on the roller, and roll back ad forth. Usually, you want to apply pressure to the muscle with your bodyweight, as you roll.

You can alter the pressure you’re applying by changing up your angle.

This rolling back and forth will alleviate knots and tension in your muscles.

You can use it on muscles that are suffering from DOMS. The muscles will feel less painful afterwards, and the soreness from DOMS should be relieved.

There’s one thing to keep in mind about foam rolling, however.

It hurts.

Even without DOMS, foam rolling is painful, but only while you are rolling. When you stop, you’ll feel a pleasant relief in the muscle that was rolled.

Foam rolling a muscle with DOMS means the exercise will be even more painful than usual. However, afterwards you should have significant relief with your DOMS.

Here’s a great guide to foam rolling, complete with video demonstration.

5. Eat Properly

The final tip is to eat well.

Bearing in mind that DOMS is a side effect of recovery, it makes sense to eat so that your body can recover as quickly as possible.

Although eating a load of calories will most probably help, if you don’t want to put on a load of weight every time you want to cure DOMS, you can eat smart instead.

With regard to muscle building, you want to focus on high protein foods, such as meat and fish. To accompany your protein, you want as many different vitamins as possible.

Different vitamins have different functions when it comes to aiding muscle recovery. 

The best approach is to eat a variety of vitamins. You can do this visually. Simply eat as many different colours of fruit and vegetables as possible.

Combining this approach will help you combat DOMS very effectively.

To summarise, eat generous portions of meat of fish, accompanied with as many different colours of fruit and vegetables as possible.

Conclusion

This article set out teach you what DOMS means & how to get rid of DOMS.

If you found it because you’re currently holding your aching muscles, I hope that you can put a few of these tips to use to alleviate your pain !

You should also now know how to prevent it occurring next time.

I hope the tips here have helped you, and let me know your favourite tip in the comments below ??