Matthew futterman
07/23/2021 10:43 AM
Clarín.com
The New York Times International Weekly
Updated 07/23/2021 12:37 PM
Every four years, the Olympics show the world the latest training or recovery method used by the best athletes.
In 2016, many swimmers had red circle marks on their skin from "
cupping therapy,
" an ancient Chinese practice that involves sucking on sore muscles and tendons.
Michael Andrew at swim trials in Omaha, Nebraska, on June 13, 2021. Photo Hiroko Masuike / The New York Times.
This year, it seems that what is fashionable are the
turnstiles
.
No, there is no burst of cuts.
However, American swimmer
Michael Andrew
wears tourniquet-like bands in the practice pool.
Galen Rupp
, the defender of the bronze medal in the marathon, sometimes ties similar bands on his legs during workouts.
They are some of the elite athletes who have become disciples of a practice known as
blood flow restriction
, which is exactly what it sounds like: cutting off the blood flow to certain muscles for limited periods of time to
enhance the effects of training and stimulate recovery. .
The practice has caught on just in time for the Tokyo Olympics, and many think it is a recognition of the work of
Yoshiaki Sato
, a former Japanese weightlifter who developed it in 1966.
For most of his adult life, 73-year-old Sato has perfected and spread the technique with which he has created a small fortune by becoming a Japanese version of
Jack LaLanne
.
Sato has created a practice and series of products called Kaatsu that are geared towards restricting blood flow.
Sato continues to practice blood flow restriction
every day
and is now in awe of the care he is receiving.
"It was always a matter of time," he said this month in an interview from his home in Fuchu, a suburb of Tokyo.
"But I didn't think it would take that long."
In recent years, blood flow restriction won a leading advocate on the other side of the Pacific with
Jim Stray-Gundersen
, a sports medicine physician and researcher who has worked closely with the Olympic organizations in the United States and Norway.
In essence, Stray-Gundersen created the
"live high, train low
"
strategy
of altitude training, in which athletes are prescribed to sleep and live above
2400 meters above sea level
to increase the production of red blood cells. that carry oxygen and then go down thousands of meters to train so as not to demand too much from the body.
At the beginning of the last decade, Stray-Gundersen trained with Sato and became known as the "Kaatsu master" before each went his own way.
Then in 2016, Stray-Gundersen created her personal blood flow restriction methods and a company called
B Strong.
"You can have the benefits of swimming 10,000 meters by swimming around 1,000," he recently commented.
Andrew, a 22-year-old rising star who will swim in three individual events and participate in relays in Tokyo, mentioned that five years ago he began experimenting with blood flow restriction after being urged by Chris Morgan, a veteran swim coach. .
Andrew often ties the bands on his arms during short 25-meter runs and tries to achieve the same times as when not wearing them.
"Of course it is very difficult," Andrew said in an interview this month.
"But you are
simulating a sensation of true pain
that tricks the body into regenerating."
The swimmer entered into a small business relationship with Sato's company after using their products for years (if a customer uses Andrew's code, Kaatsu donates 20 percent of the sale to Andrew's swim club).
Before and after training and racing, Andrew ties a device to the top of each leg, then increases and decreases the tension of the tourniquet at regular intervals - like a sphygmomanometer - to stimulate blood flow and recover.
Sometimes he wears the bands in the room where the swimmers get ready before heading to the edge of the pool for a run.
Not everyone has joined the trend.
Dave Marsh, who trained several swimmers for the Olympics and is in charge of the Israel team in Tokyo, commented that one of his athletes had used blood flow restriction to recover and rehabilitate from an injury, but would not yet recommend it for to train.
"The first job of a coach is to
do no harm,"
Marsh said.
"From my point of view, with the restriction of blood flow an athlete could take a step backwards."
When a colleague told him that restricting blood flow was helping his athletes gain muscle mass in two weeks that they normally gain in six weeks, like any good sports scientist, Stray-Gundersen wanted to see the data.
It turned out that there was a 2000 paper published in the
Journal of Applied Physiology
, authored by Sato and scientists from research institutes in Japan.
In short, according to the article, the restriction of blood flow elicited an
immense response from the brain
to accelerate the normal process of repairing and rebuilding damaged tissue.
Cutting off blood flow and then restoring it again can stimulate the brain to use more healing powers than it would normally think it needs.
Since the publication of that study, several independent researchers have confirmed the potential benefits of restricting blood flow during exercise.
Currently, Shawn M. Arent, chair of the Department of Exercise Science at the University of South Carolina, is conducting a study on its effects for the
Department of Defense.
Arent commented that early trends suggested that practice could be used
more efficiently
when athletes wanted to lower their training load without sacrificing fitness, either while calm before competition or at the end of a season. , while recovering from
injury
.
“It is a good supplement for training;
it's not all training, "added Arent.
"It offers a
psychological boost
when other things may be limited in scope."
For someone like Andrew, who swims thousands of meters a day;
Rupp, whose regimen includes more than 100 kilometers per week plus weight training and abdominal work;
New York Mets pitcher Noah Syndergaard;
champion skier Mikaela Shiffrin or any other elite athlete who has begun to incorporate blood flow restriction, the technique enables them to
reduce the likelihood of a repetitive stress injury
and speed up recovery time.
For Andrew, the most important part of the technique may be his
blind faith in
him.
As any sports scientist knows,
placebos
can often be as strong as a drug.
"I swam something like 18 races in seven days in testing and I felt refreshed," said Andrew.
“I'm sure that happened because I was very disciplined with the recovery.
I used it all the time.
c.2021 The New York Times Company
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