Cold Water Immersion Recovery on Some Muscular Damage Indices of Taekwondo Practitioners

Lack of proper recovery after exercise causes damage and destruction to muscle tissue. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of cold water immersion recovery on some muscular damage indices during several consecutive simulated Taekwondo competitions.

Twenty-one taekwondo practitioners in Qazvin in the age group of 17-19 years with a training experience of 6-8 years were randomly selected. The participants were placed in their weight classification in the style of the Olympics and performed in a simulated competition. Blood samples were taken to assess liver enzymes and creatine kinase at baseline recovery periods, before the second, third, and fourth races, immersion after the second, third, and fourth races, and 12 hours after the final race, blood sampling for evaluation of liver enzymes and creatine kinase in two groups of cold water immersion (n = 10) and control (n = 11) was performed. Immersion was performed as local immersion of feet in cold water at 11 ° C for 11 min. Two-way repeated-measures ANOVA was used at a significance level of 0.05.

The simulated taekwondo competition resulted in a significant increase in the rate of muscle damage indices in the cold water immersion group compared to the control group (p<0.01). In all stages of the study, the mean indices of Creatine Kinase (CK; P=0.001), Lactate Dehydrogenase (LDH; P=0.001), Aspartate Aminotransferase (AST; P=0.001), and Alpha-Ketoglutaric Acid (ALT; P=0.001) of immersion group in cold water it was significantly lower than the control group.

Immersion in cold water is more effective than inactive recovery after several consecutive Taekwondo competitions.