"draining fluid from your legs"

I've heard lots of coaches and athletes use self massage and leg elevation to "drain the fluid" from their legs after a hard workout to speed recovery. What fluid are they talking about? Sorry if this is kinda a dumb question, it's just something that's been in the back of my mind for a while and it's driving me crazy not to know. Googled it and a few sites said this "fluid" was byproducts, but I'm at a loss to know what that means too!
Anyone know :confused:
I guess it's not *that* important to find out, but it's been bugging me.

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Originally Posted by hellostarshine

I've heard lots of coaches and athletes use self massage and leg elevation to "drain the fluid" from their legs after a hard workout to speed recovery. What fluid are they talking about?

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Most edema is an accumulation of lymph fluid, which is usually just the non-cellular component of blood. It's mostly water, with electrolytes and other organic substances in solution. Unlike the circulatory system, which is driven by the pumping heart, the lymphatic system does not have a central pump. Lymph ducts have one-way gates in them so it all eventually returns back to your trunk, but it's easy for lymphatic fluid to accumulate in the extremities due to simple forces like gravity, compression from clothing, etc.

HTH! :)

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Originally Posted by Dianyla

HTH! :)

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????

HTH

????

"Hit the Hurts"? "Hone the Hams"?

Well, "Hope that Helps".... :rolleyes:

I can hardly imagine getting fluid buildup from a medium-length workout. Long runs, maybe. I get edemas from hiking or extended shopping orgies.

Hide the Hennessey

hellostarshine, I'm so glad you asked this question because after long riding (ie, many hours for several days), this is exactly what happens to me. Thanks very much for bringing up this subject. At least now I can begin to correct the problem.

For years now I've been jumping into an ice bath after my long rides/runs. My coach got me doing this, and it really does speed recovery. Since I have a pool now I just go stand in my unheated freezing cold pool. I try to stay in as long as possible, but can barely make it five minutes. It hurts. But it really helps with recovery. On the rare occasion that I don't have time to do it, I'm really sore the next day.

*wonders if she could stand even seconds in the river before crawling home*

2nd the ice baths...also, I swear by my rolling pin...works great on the calves and quads.

Muscle soreness and edema (the original query) are two entirely different matters.

Edema is an accumulation of extracellular fluid that Dianyla referred to. It's explained in detail here.

Soreness after exercise is due to an accumulation of lactic acid. That's when you get out the rolling pin.

Zen, so if you are rolling toward the lymph ducts (like up the leg, and toward the groin area), doesn't that help kind of flush both lymph goo (to use a technical term) to where it needs to go, and lactic acid out of the muscles at the same time?

That's a good question.
I had one year of anatomy & physiology, I only know enough to get myself into trouble :p
It sounds good in theory but I'm thinking maybe you'd still have to elevate your legs above your heart because if the valves/gates aren't working right you have to give them a gravity assist to open.

Wow, thanks for the replies. That's really interesting!

Next time I see people running around wtih rolling pins and talking about lymph goo, I'll know they're TE gals...

I've been using my grandmother's rolling pin for a while now. I have my mother's for baking situations.

Baking situations? :D
That's usually how it turns out when I try it too.

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Originally Posted by zencentury

Baking situations? :D
That's usually how it turns out when I try it too.

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Bwahahah!

Cooking is an art, baking is a science. :cool:

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Originally Posted by SouthernBelle

I've been using my grandmother's rolling pin for a while now. I have my mother's for baking situations.

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Originally Posted by Zencentury

Baking situations?
That's usually how it turns out when I try it too.

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LOL, isn't it always the grandmas who bake the perfect stuff? Maybe use your mother's for the lymph goo; maybe using your grandmother's will change the "situations" to actual baked goods! ;) :p

actually I can make a decent biscuit from scratch. But bisquick is easier.

So, If I do a handstand in the pool while rubbing my legs with granny's rolling pin, I should never have goo filled legs that hurt? :D:D:D

try explaining that one to the neighbors................

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Originally Posted by Flybye

So, If I do a handstand in the pool while rubbing my legs with granny's rolling pin, I should never have goo filled legs that hurt? :D:D:D

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Girl, if you can actually do that, the world is your oyster. ;)

Lactic acid buildup is a myth.

The length of the workout is pretty irrelevant to the issue of edema. It really depends on how hard you were working. The more strength involved (sprint intervals, lots of climbing, big gear tempo rides, etc.), the more likely there will be some feeling of leg swelling and fluid retention, at least in my experience, but it can also happen whenever my legs get really fatigued, when the muscles are tight and I'm not diligent about massage, or when I'm overtraining.

Self-massage (no rolling pin necessary) helps a lot, especially with cooling muscle rubs. Even better, get a professional massage to really get at the harder to reach hams and glutes.

I totally agree to the lactic acid is a myth!!!!!!!!!!

Lactic acid is only present for about 45 seconds as you first start riding. After that you are in aerobic mode. You would have to be going superfast up supermountains to have a lot of lactic acid. Soreness is microscopic tears in the muscle tissue from overuse. That is how bodybuilders "bulk up". They make those tears in the muscle and as it heals they get bigger. Of course eating helps....

Kim

"The understanding now is that muscle cells convert glucose or glycogen to lactic acid. The lactic acid is taken up and used as a fuel by mitochondria, the energy factories in muscle cells.

Mitochondria even have a special transporter protein to move the substance into them, Dr. Brooks found. Intense training makes a difference, he said, because it can make double the mitochondrial mass. "

From a NY Times article by Gina Kolata

Exactly. It is fuel.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/fitness.p...ctic_frederick

Wait, so LT training is a myth, too??? I understand how lactic acid is re-converted into fuel, but I thought there was still a consensus that the lactate threshold is real and not limited to "going superfast up supermountains" (for one thing, that characterization is an externalized one that suggests that different people don't have different levels of aerobic conditioning and only the most highly conditioned athletes can approach their LT)?

I don't really have the biochem background to completely understand this stuff, but I've been following the news stories with interest. Last I did any searches on delayed-onset muscle soreness (a year or two ago) there really wasn't a consensus about what causes it. Sure, it makes sense that overloading the muscles in eccentric contraction would create micro-tears, which would in turn cause soreness and eventual hypertrophy. But I'm not sure how repetitive motion under a light load would tear a muscle, or why doing it for four hours would tear it any more or less than doing it for one hour. (in the same way that it doesn't create microfractures in a bone - you can cycle all day and not increase your bone density, e.g., and you can spin all day and increase your muscle tone but not muscle size)

(and by "spinning" I mean the common meaning not the trademarked one - i.e. high RPM low load)

I don't think that's what the article was saying.

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Lactate is: 1) a valuable energy source within working muscle, non-working muscle, and the heart, 2) quantitatively the most important contributor to the making of glucose in the liver, and 3) subject to training- induced improvements in its use as a fuel.

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I think LT training is important because there would be a point at which you are no longer efficiently using it as fuel.

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The ability to use lactate as fuel, particularly within the muscle itself, varies with the trained characteristics of aerobic muscle fibers, specifically via endurance training[5].

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So I think LT training is a separate animal from saying that too much lactic acid leads to soreness. The way I understand it is that soreness is related to the amount of stress put on the muscles and hydration and recovery.

I think that for me to work on my Lactic acid threshhold I could conceivably get to or over my MHR. So much cycling training is done at 70% MHR. This is a range for most people where they build up their efficiency of aerobic exercise. that's why it is important to do the build a base workouts when you start. It helps the mitochondria become more efficient at their job.

I know in running, Lactic Threshold is a different animal or so I"m told by some runner friends.

Kim

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Originally Posted by cyclechick2008

that's why it is important to do the build a base workouts when you start. It helps the mitochondria become more efficient at their job.

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As far as I know (which isn't very far) lactose fermentation involves the number of mitochondria (mitochondrial mass) increasing with training, not an individual mitochondria becoming more efficient.

I did some research on pubmed regarding what "base building" does to you. There's much more going on, like import proteins rising in muscle cells / mitochondria,and the liver producing more apolipoprotein (carrier protein for fatty acids) etc, etc.

I am confused about lactate being used as fuel.
I was taught lactic acid is not very efficient as fuel in the muscle during exercise. The way I read the abstract (quoted below) is that some is used as fuel, but also lactate is only removed within the cells during recovery, when they have plenty of oxygen - but this does not produce a lot of energy compared to glycolysis (aerobic metabolism produces 19x more energy than anaerobic per mole of glucose).
There is a cycle in the liver to convert lactate back to glucose (which, however, requires energy).

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Brooks GA. The lactate shuttle during exercise and recovery. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 1986 Jun;18(3):360-8. Review
Most (75%+) of the lactate formed during sustained, steady-rate exercise is removed by oxidation during exercise, and only a minor fraction (approximately 20%) is converted to glucose. Significant lactate extraction occurs during net lactate release from active skeletal muscle; the total lactate extraction approximates half the net chemical release. Of the lactate which appears in blood, most of this will be removed and combusted by oxidative (muscle) fibers in the active bed and the heart. The "shuttling" of oxidizable substrate in the form of lactate from areas of high glycogenolytic rate to areas of high cellular respiration through the interstitium and vasculature appears to represent an important means by which substrate is distributed, metabolic "waste" is removed, and the functions of various tissues are coordinated during exercise. During recovery from sustained exhausting exercise, most of the lactate accumulated during exercise will continue to be removed by direct oxidation. However, as the muscle respiratory rate declines in recovery, lactate becomes the preferred substrate for hepatic gluconeogenesis. Practically all of the newly formed liver glucose will be released into the circulation to serve as a precursor for cardiac and skeletal muscle glycogen repletion. Liver glycogen depots will not be restored, and muscle glycogen will not be completely restored until refeeding. This is because the diversion of lactate carbon to oxidation during exercise and recovery represents an irreversible loss of gluconeogenic precursor and because the processes of protein proteolysis and gluconeogenesis from amino acids are insufficient to achieve complete glycogen restitution after exhausting exercise

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Can you repeat the question? ;)

I'm gonna have to read that one about five more times, at least.
Was 1986 the latest data you could find? That's kind of old.

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Originally Posted by zencentury

Can you repeat the question? ;)

I'm gonna have to read that one about five more times, at least.
Was 1986 the latest data you could find? That's kind of old.

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Nope, the 1986 one is just the paper that was cited in Cycling news.
pubmed.org can give you more.
i also checked the biochemical pathways and wikipedia for the ATP yields.

While ya'll are sorting all this out, could the lactic acid increasing mitochondria (mitochondrial mass) jive with some of the information I seem to have understood that the aging process is linked to mitochondria dying?

And the increase in the mitochondria mass would be one reason why exercise and training seems to delay some of the effects associated with aging?

(I only use rolling pins for baking and elevate my legs after cycling as I lay on my back to stretch out my hams)

I'm just going to imagine that it's beer in there and pop a tap in to see if I can get it out.

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Originally Posted by aicabsolut

Lactic acid buildup is a myth.

The length of the workout is pretty irrelevant to the issue of edema. It really depends on how hard you were working. The more strength involved (sprint intervals, lots of climbing, big gear tempo rides, etc.), the more likely there will be some feeling of leg swelling and fluid retention, at least in my experience, but it can also happen whenever my legs get really fatigued, when the muscles are tight and I'm not diligent about massage, or when I'm overtraining.

Self-massage (no rolling pin necessary) helps a lot, especially with cooling muscle rubs. Even better, get a professional massage to really get at the harder to reach hams and glutes.

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I have been concerned for the last week on th amount of edema/tightness I have been feeling in my legs. Last Sunday I rode 64 miles...my furthest ride with hills. It was a workout for me. This week I wasn't sore...but swollen. I sometimes feel tightness/swelling in my calves but it doesn't generally run to the ankles. So should I think this might be a normal response to a hard work out?
Jean

How's your electrolyte balance? Was it warm during your ride, did you sweat a lot and did you replace electrolytes? (Excluding serious conditions which I hope your doctors have ruled out!) that's the first thing I think of when I get edema.

This discussion thread intrigues me....in the 5 years of cycling I don't think I have ever had leg swelling. I have heard not to weight right after a hard workout that your muscles retain fluid--but I have never felt tightness related to fluid or noted edema.
So am I not working out hard enough? Or is this a very individual thing?
Just intrigued that this thread had a new post.

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Originally Posted by alpinerabbit

*wonders if she could stand even seconds in the river before crawling home*

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Aaaah! Years ago I tried to swim in a river in Switzerland, the Aare, and I thought I was going to freeze!!!
Only lasted 10 minutes before jumping out! :o

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Originally Posted by OakLeaf

How's your electrolyte balance? Was it warm during your ride, did you sweat a lot and did you replace electrolytes? (Excluding serious conditions which I hope your doctors have ruled out!) that's the first thing I think of when I get edema.

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yes, it was hot that day. I will admit that I may have not replaced electrolytes as I should have. Something I should pay more attention to! Thanks Oak