How do you recover after a meet?

I will let you know after the meet Sunday. Esp. after a 5 hour trip back home. I wonder how I will feel on Monday and Tuesday.

I've been toying with the following formula for a while and it works for me. Warmdown after last event if possible, usually 200-300 nice and easy. Long shower with lukewarm to cool water. Drink 500ml of Heed or G2 immediately thereafter. Change into comfortable clothes and shoes. Stay off my feet as much as possible. Eat a high-protein meal within an hour, preferably with some complex carbohydrates.* Drink lots of water and take 2-3 Advil before bed. Go to bed early. Take the following day off from working out, mentally and physically unplug. I find that if I do these things, along with drinking plenty of water and getting electrolytes during the meet, I feel OK the next day. Yes, there will be residual soreness but nothing too bad. The key is to listen to your body and keep it hydrated. I also think cold showers help too since they reduce muscle swelling. Call me strange, this is what works for me. *beer and fries count as complex carbohydrates.

Why would you not drink Heed during the competition and then Hammer Recoverite Recovery Drink after? During competition I drink water and Alka-Selzer, that seems to work best for me. I tend to sip it and not chug it in between events. The Heed gets consumed in a few minutes after I am done. Feels really good too, very impressed with the results. And I skip the Advil. Makes me tighten up/ feel hung over later. I find it helps with inflammation, especially if I am doing a lot of breaststroke. All this seems to work for me after several years of error and error. Somehow I stumbled upon the right combo that enables me to feel OK even after tough meets. Note, I focus on long course and summer training. Most of the meets I swim are during warm/hot parts of the year. I felt great at Portland even after the locals said it was hot :D

qbrain, you answered your own question! I assume you mean the SMU meet. What suit are you wearing? I was at D&J today. If the outdoor pool isn't open, you can be sure I will be begging Bobby to take a break during the meet. I find that stretching and a few jumping jacks is a very good substitute for cool down, along with "wonder woman" arm/body swings. But stand in one place, don't twirl around. LOL, I answered my own question? If you read the responses before my answer, I just consolidated them to try out at SMU. So I sorta answered my own question by stealing everyone else's answer. :) I am just wearing a practice suit. I am pretty sure I want more cool down than a couple wonder woman twirls, as entertaining as that would be. I think I know who you are, and if I am correct, it should be easy for you to pick me out. I will be the only person you don't already know :)

I do almost exactly this with two exceptions. Why would you not drink Heed during the competition and then Hammer Recoverite Recovery Drink after? And I skip the Advil. Makes me tighten up/ feel hung over later. I've been toying with the following formula for a while and it works for me. Warmdown after last event if possible, usually 200-300 nice and easy. Long shower with lukewarm to cool water. Drink 500ml of Heed or G2 immediately thereafter. Change into comfortable clothes and shoes. Stay off my feet as much as possible. Eat a high-protein meal within an hour, preferably with some complex carbohydrates.* Drink lots of water and take 2-3 Advil before bed. Go to bed early. Take the following day off from working out, mentally and physically unplug. I find that if I do these things, along with drinking plenty of water and getting electrolytes during the meet, I feel OK the next day. Yes, there will be residual soreness but nothing too bad. The key is to listen to your body and keep it hydrated. I also think cold showers help too since they reduce muscle swelling. Call me strange, this is what works for me. *beer and fries count as complex carbohydrates.

My next meet is an other short local meet. I expect to be there 3 to 4 hours and I will try the following. - stay well hydrated with water during the meet - warm up and down after events (hopefully the outdoor pool is open for warm up/down) - cool down ~500yds if the outdoor pool is open - Endurox immediately after my last event - pack something to eat (peanut butter sandwich maybe) to tide me over until I can get some real food - eat a healthly meal washed down with water - hit the gym a little later for 1-2k yoga swim + hot tub - workout Sunday First, I feel much better right now than I usually do after a meet. This is a recap comparing what I said I would do, to what I actually did. - Stayed hydrated: 96oz during the meet - 500yd crowded warm up before meet - no warm up cool down during the meet. There was one 5 minute break during the meet that wasn't helpful to me. - Didn't stay to see if we cool cool down after the meet - PureSport immediately after last event mixed with 30oz of water - 16 oz of gatorade ~10 minutes after last event - forgot to pack something to eat for after the meet - 30 minute drive home - ate boneless skinless chicken *** with BBQ sauce and mashed potatoes - drank another 16 oz of water with lunch - 2 ibuprofen - get to the gym about 1 hour after the meet - swim 900 ez until I get kicked out because they are hosting a meet - drank another 30oz of water while at the gym - no hot tub - back home to shower and dry clothes finally - chocolate cookies, glass of whole milk - 2 ibuprofen - Emergen-C (like zip fizz, vitamin c+b complex drink mix) That was about 3 hours ago and I am still fully functional. I don't think warm up and cool down affect how I feel out of the water. I am positive that I will feel better tomorrow when I get in the water because of that 900 yards I was able to get in at the gym today. Swimming ez after the meet was pain free today. If you add up all the liquid I drank today, it was a lot. So one key to me feeling well post meet is lots of liquid, plus restoring the lost electrolytes right after the meet. Previously, I have always drank lots of water, but I think the puresport and gatorade most meet allowed me to retain the water instead of... pissing it all away :) Eating quickly after the meet was a plus, because I am usually starving by the time I actually eat after a meet, but I am not so sure this was a deciding factor on how I feel. The b-complex I think helped with a headache, but it might have just been that I needed more ibuprofen. Hopefully my copious details will help anyone else who is trying to avoid the post meet zombie effect. Thanks for the suggestions from everyone, and I would love to hear from anyone who is experimenting with their post meet recovery routine.