Recovery

Training only works if you can come back.

After 40, recovery is the limiter — not motivation.

Signs you are under-recovered

• Strength dropping for more than a week
• Resting heart rate up 5–10 bpm
• Sleep getting worse, not better
• Irritable, flat, or dreading sessions you used to like
• Joints angry for days, not hours

The recovery stack (in order)

1. Sleep — see Sleep
2. Don't add junk volume — two or three hard sessions beat six sloppy ones
3. Walk on off days — blood flow without beating up joints
4. Protein — see Protein
5. Deload — every 6–8 weeks, cut volume in half for a week

Soreness vs injury

Soreness	Injury
Dull, both sides, fades in 48–72h	Sharp, one-sided, or swelling
You can warm it up	It gets worse as you go
Next session is fine	You change how you walk

If it is injury, stop loading it and get it looked at. Pushing through a tendon problem is how you lose a season.

Alcohol

A few drinks after a hard session is a recovery tax. If the session mattered, skip the drinks that night.