General Cycling Discussion - Icing Legs after a Ride

Hi guys! I'm new to the forum, but I want you weigh in your thoughts on this. I've seen a couple articles on how icing muscles after a ride or workout can be counter productive. What's your opinion on this?

Here are links to the articles I saw:


http://runningtimes.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=26720&PageNum=1

This one is from a Crossfit trainer that I stumbled upon looking for more info on the RunningTimes article. The ideas seem transferrable to cycling.
http://www.mobilitywod.com/2012/08/people-weve-got-to-stop-icing-we-were-wrong-sooo-wrong.html

Thanks!

What kind of riding do you do?

I have never iced my legs after a ride but I've iced them after an ultramarathon. I have no idea if it helped a whole lot with recovery, but it sure felt good.

Ice your legs just when they need max blood flow to recover?

Just how is that supposed to help?

Sounds kinda stupid to me............

If my muscles are sore or tight I use The Stick (https://www.thestick.com/) on them. It works wonders. :thumb:

Icing is not a good idea unless you are treating an injury and have it immobilized. Icing takes away pain and makes you numb and therefore you could injure yourself without feeling it.

I've only iced once. In the morning, I was coming down a hill on my recumbent when a fellow left hooked me trying to get into the Denny's parking lot for a Grand Slam breakfast. When my brakes weren't stopping me fast enough, I slammed my tennies to the street for more braking power and managed to stop with about 6" to spare.

As the day progressed my feet hurt more and more and by the end of the day I was only able to walk slowly and stand for a minute or so at a time. At the convenience store, I bought a bag of ice, put my feet in a big spaghetti pot and dumped it in. Ahhhhhh! I had to cancel plans for the next day's century, but I recovered.

If my muscles are sore or tight I use The Stick (https://www.thestick.com/) on them. It works wonders. :thumb:

Well now..........

I've never heard of this device but it makes a LOT of sense when you think about it. I also believe that it will hasten blood flow not restrict blood flow like ice does.

This is really good feed back. The only time I ice is when my knee bothers me after a run when training for triathlons. I do it more for the pain rather than recovery.

The crossfit video mentions using an electric muscle stimulation device to aid in recovery. I think the brand they mention is the Marc Pro. Has anyone used an EMS device before? What's your opinion on them?