Does Tapering Really Work For Peak Performance?

Tapering for peak performance is a well-established concept, but many recreational athletes seem to disregard it in favor of the flawed and dated no pain, no gain approach. This article will take about the history, science, and practical application of tapering. You'll learn how simply walking (in Peluvas!) is an excellent method of tapering, and speeding recovery in general. 

In decades past, the prevailing logic about training was simple and rudimentary: more is better - more miles, more yards, more suffering. Volume was the currency of serious athletes, and spending it freely was believed to be the path to improvement. That assumption held for decades, largely unchallenged, because nobody had the tools or perhaps the courage to question it. Then exercise science matured, research infrastructure developed, and coaches started paying attention to what the data actually showed. What emerged was a more strategic understanding of how the human body adapts. In a short time, recovery and tapering rose to the forefront of training philosophy.

Tapering — the deliberate reduction of training load before competition — is now one of the most thoroughly validated concepts in sports, especially endurance sports where system-wide fatigue is the key performance variable. During tapering and recovering in general, a body freed from accumulated training stress supercompensates. Muscles repair, the nervous system recovers, and you are primed for a performance breakthrough on the big day. 

The acknowledged pioneer in the world of tapering is Dr. David Costill, long regarded as one of the world’s leading exercise physiologists, a former collegiate swimming and running coach, multiple world and American record holding Masters swimmer, and Professor Emeritus of Exercise Science and Director of the Human Performance Laboratory at Ball State University in Indiana. Costill was the first to publish major research on the performance impact of tapering, and it has revolutionized the world of endurance sports. 

A widely publicized study by Dr. Costill in 1985 revealed that swimmers who reduced training volume by 67 percent for 15 days were able to achieve a four percent improvement in performance, a 25 percent increase in arm strength, and had lower lactate levels while racing. Ensuing research from McMaster University in Toronto revealed that highly trained runners (averaging 50 miles per week) benefited greatly from tapering. One group reduced mileage by 64 percent (to 18 miles per week) and achieved a six percent improvement in competitive performance, while another group who cut mileage by 88 percent improved performance by a stunning 22 percent! Essentially, this group ran only short, fast intervals on the track for a week, accumulating a total of six miles. Further research in this realm has led to the widespread conclusion that the best way to taper is to dramatically reduce volume but maintain intensity.

What to do with all that excess time and energy when you tone down your regular workout routine? Well, there is nothing better for overall restoration and recovery than walking, and walking in Peluvas to ensure your feet get the stimulation they need to provide a strong foundation for peak performance. We’ll talk more about tapering and recovery in future posts, but I’d love for you to appreciate the key takeaway that tapering works, especially when it comes off a foundation of emphasizing recovery in general.