Lactic Acid Build Up: How To Remove It And Avoid Pain
If you’ve ever worked your body to the point of feeling like your muscles are on fire, then you’ve experienced lactic acid build up.
How and why it happens…
During exercise, glucose is burned and released as energy. One of the compounds which is created during this process is pyruvate, and unless enough oxygen is present to constantly remove it, some of it turns into lactic acid.
Lactic acid build up generally occurs during anaerobic training, or through extended periods of aerobic training, when the muscles are being worked at such an intensity that the demand for oxygen eventually cannot be met, culminating in an excess of lactic acid. The end result is severe burning sensation of the muscles.
Naturally, because the burning sensation only increases, when muscle failure is reached, it is often assumed that the muscle failed because of lactic acid. This has since been proven to be false, and that quite the reverse is true: that lactic acid actually helps to sustain muscle movement when the muscles are fatigued, and the only reason muscles fail is because they have used up their stores of glycogen.
Stopping it from happening and removing lactic acid build up…
Once exercise is over with, it’s very important to ensure that you do all you can to eliminate the lactic acid from your muscles, to minimise the painful after effects. Failure to do so will result in soreness which, at its worst, can be almost crippling – particularly in the calve muscles.
One thing I noticed quite some time ago is that, when the lactic acid burn hits the next day, by performing some stretching and some movements in the affected muscles, you can ease the pain of the burn, and help your muscles clear the lactic acid out.
That is why it is always important to stretch and warm down properly after exercising; and also, keeping hydrated before and after exercise is important.
October 4th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
i would like to know the best way to build up calve muscles. I feel I have lost calve muscles over the past two years. I am unsure if it due to the change in exercise. I use to do gymnastics and now work out at the gym. Please advise the best possible way of increasing calve muscles. THank you
Also how do I rid calve pains??
I experience dull pain in the calve muscles and would like relieve this symptom
any advice on these two questions would be appreciated..thank you again
nicki
November 14th, 2008 at 5:20 pm
Where is the documentation that lactic acid does not ” tie up ” muscles. I know that lactic acid does cause unfit race horses to “tie up” somestimes to the point that they can’t walk. Can you show me the proof?
Thanks,
Cameron Hudson
November 14th, 2008 at 9:38 pm
Hello Cameron,
As I stated in regard to removing lactic acid:
“Failure to do so will result in soreness which, at its worst, can be almost crippling – particularly in the calve muscles.”
I’m no racehorse, but lactic acid has caused me such severe pain in my calve muscles before that I could barely walk. I’m sure this wouldn’t have happened if I’d have taken proper measures to reduce lactic acid build up and remove the leftovers in the hours and days that followed.
What I did notice is, when I was active - walking or jogging, say - the pain would go and the muscles would loosen up - but the pain would return again once I stopped.
Of course, not all pain felt can be attributable to lactic acid, but DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness).
While nobody knows precisely what causes DOMS, it’s thought to be a temporary inflamation where the muscle fibres swell and press against the fascia causing nerve pain.
November 22nd, 2008 at 10:04 am
Can you pls. tell me if the following symptoms sound like lactic acid build up or DOMS (and give me some more info. if possible pls.)
Though I do not do strenuous or aerobic exercise I would say I lead a active life. I tend to get burning pain in different points in my shoulder blade area/ tips of the shoulder blades and around the hip joint just above my buttocks. These pains are not in the joints but in the muscles and are very painful. So far the only way to get rid of them is by massaging them out - (which is also very painful at the time but does bring relief eventually once the tenderness subsides). Is there some kind of supplement (that my body is missing) that could be taken to avoid these symptoms?
November 22nd, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Nicki, I would recommend doing calf raise exercises to build the calves back up. I have articles on this site about them.
Calve training is strenuous, so eliminating all post-workout pain is impossible… the best you can hope to do is minimise it. The dull pain felt in the calves is either lactic acid build up, or is DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness - thought to be caused by temporary expansion of the muscle fibres inside the fascia causing nerve pain and slightly obstructed movement).
The best you an do post-workout is to massage your calves, stretch them, drink plenty of water and just try to keep them moving a little in the following days (as well as continued stretching, etc) to prevent them from siezing up.
November 22nd, 2008 at 3:03 pm
Mardi,
I really would have no clue what your pain is, and it would probably take a doctor to work it out.
I don’t know what your ‘active life’ entails. It could be a specific activity (i.e. hoovering daily, hunched over for example?) which causes the pain in the hip. But again, that’s only a guess.
It sounds like it may be some kind of muscular tension rather than DOMS or Lactic acid - which really only occur after strenuous exercise.
My best guess would be maybe you are experiencing some kind of nerve/muscle spasm - I experienced this in the back of my shoulder for months on end once (I still get it from time to time in the same spot) and it’s extremely painful, and it also feels like burning.
If your pain is persistent and causing you a lot of discomfort, I suggest you visit your doctor.
All the best.