You just crushed a really hard workout. You upped the load of your training, or you stepped out of your routine and tried a new activity. You feel great — until you wake up the next morning, barely able to move.
Enter delayed onset muscle soreness, better known as DOMS. It’s an acronym that athletes and fitness buffs wear with pride.
As its name suggests, “DOMS is muscle soreness that becomes evident six-to-eight hours following activity, peaking around 24 to 48 hours post-training,” says Jon Mike, CSCS, NSCA-CPT and PhD candidate in Exercise Science at the University of New Mexico. While the symptoms will often start to diminish at about 72 hours, “the precise time course and extent of DOMS is highly variable,” Mike says.
DOMS is most pronounced when you introduce a new training stimulus — a new activity, increased intensity or volume — or if you are new to physical activity in general. “Your body is making adaptations to better prepare your muscles to do that activity again,” says Lauren Haythe, certified Kinesis Myofascial Integration Practitioner and yoga teacher. That’s why on Day 1 at the gym, after doing squats or lunges with 10-15 pound weights, you can be brutally sore the next day. “But, as you continue on, you can build up from there, and you won’t be so sore,” she says.
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