Responses of low and high compression during recovery after repeated sprint training in well‐trained handball players

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate the effects of wearing various levels of compression following repeated and exhausting sprint exercise on variables related to recovery. Twelve well-trained handball players performed three sessions of repeated and exhausting sprint exercise (30 × 30m). Directly after each session the participants wore tights extending from below the hip to the foot with either 0, 10, or 25 mm Hg of compression onto the thigh and calf muscles. 48 h after the training session all participants performed 5 × 30m sprints and counter movement jumps. Before, directly after, 24 h, and 48 h after the training session venous blood samples were drawn for the determination of creatine kinase (CK), urea, C-reactive protein (CRP). At the same time points, subjective ratings of the Acute Recovery and Stress Scale (ARSS) questionnaires were obtained. The results for plasma concentrations of CK and urea showed 'likely' to 'very, very likely' beneficial effects for compression garments exerting 10 mm Hg of compression (p = 0.06-1.0). With regard to sprint and jump performance no differences were evident between 0, 10, and 25 mm Hg (p = 0.07-1.0). In addition, subjective scores from the ARSS did not differ between conditions over time (p > 0.05). We conclude that the application of 10 mm Hg leg compression compared to 0 and 25 mm Hg of compression during 48 h of recovery from repeated and exhausting sprints lowered the plasma concentrations of CK and urea with no improvements in recovery for performance.

Impact of Wearing Graduated Compression Stockings on Psychological and Physiological Responses during Prolonged Sitting

“…In the present study, wearing compression stockings significantly reduced subjective lower limbs discomfort, as assessed by VAS. A recent study demonstrated that compression garments did not produce any beneficial effects on subjective scores from the acute recovery and stress scale [45]. Thus, our results may not be consistent with the previous study [45]; however, the study settings between our and their study are completely different (i.e., after sprint exercise in their study and prolonged sitting in the present study), making it very difficult to interpret these discrepancies.…”

Impact of Wearing Graduated Compression Stockings on Psychological and Physiological Responses during Prolonged Sitting

“…A recent study demonstrated that compression garments did not produce any beneficial effects on subjective scores from the acute recovery and stress scale [45]. Thus, our results may not be consistent with the previous study [45]; however, the study settings between our and their study are completely different (i.e., after sprint exercise in their study and prolonged sitting in the present study), making it very difficult to interpret these discrepancies. It has been reported that wearing stockings reduces pain and/or swelling in DVT patients, and it is likely that this manipulation may have also reduced swelling here, resulting in lower VAS scores.…”

Putting the Squeeze on Compression Garments: Current Evidence and Recommendations for Future Research: A Systematic Scoping Review

“…One-hundred and fifteen studies investigated the effects of compression garments on exercise performance and/or muscle function outcomes (Table S1 The vast majority of studies reported no ergogenic effect of compression on jump [7,10,29,33,34,38,44,51,56,64,65,70,71,79,80,[88][89][90][92][93][94][95][96][97][98], time trial/race [36,56,95,[99][100][101][102][103][104][105][106][107][108][109][110][111][112], sprint [10, 34, 38-40, 44, 50, 70, 71, 87-89, 92, 96, 97, 113-116], or agility [10,38,44,88] performance.…”