Do Ice Baths, Compression Boots, and Massage Actually Improve Recovery? What the Science Says

Recovery has become a massive part of the fitness industry. Walk into almost any serious training facility, and you'll probably find athletes using compression boots, ice baths, massage guns, or some other device promising to help them recover faster. Some of these treatments cost thousands of dollars, and many are marketed as essential tools for anyone who trains hard.

But there's an important question that doesn't get asked nearly enough: Do these recovery techniques actually help you recover faster, or do they just make you feel like you're recovering faster?

Those aren't necessarily the same thing. Feeling less sore after a workout is nice, but if you're an endurance athlete, what you really want to know is whether a recovery treatment helps you perform better during your next training session or competition.

A 2026 systematic review and network meta-analysis published in Frontiers in Sports and Active Living examined this question by comparing several popular recovery techniques in competitive and elite endurance athletes. Researchers analyzed 16 randomized controlled trials involving 273 athletes, looking at everything from muscle soreness and inflammation to actual athletic performance.

The results weren't particularly encouraging for the recovery industry. No recovery technique demonstrated a reliable advantage over simply resting across the outcomes examined. Some treatments showed promising results in individual studies, but the evidence was generally too limited or inconsistent to support confident recommendations.

That doesn't mean ice baths, massage, or compression boots are completely useless. It does mean we should probably reconsider how much money, time, and confidence we're investing in them.

TLDR

A 2026 systematic review examined 16 randomized controlled trials involving 273 competitive and elite endurance athletes to determine whether popular recovery techniques worked better than passive recovery, which essentially means resting without a specific recovery treatment.

• No recovery technique demonstrated a reliable overall advantage over passive rest for muscle soreness, muscle damage markers, or subsequent athletic performance.

• Compression garments did not meaningfully improve subsequent athletic performance, with moderate-certainty evidence supporting that conclusion.

• Cold-water immersion, cryotherapy, massage, electrical stimulation, and active recovery lacked convincing evidence of superior recovery outcomes in this particular population.

• The evidence for reducing delayed-onset muscle soreness was especially inconsistent, making it difficult to determine whether any treatment genuinely helped.

• A sham recovery treatment involving neutral-temperature water performed as well as or better than several active treatments in one small trial, raising questions about expectation and placebo effects.

• Feeling recovered and actually restoring performance are not necessarily the same thing.

• The findings apply specifically to competitive endurance athletes and shouldn't automatically be generalized to recreational exercisers, strength athletes, or long-term training adaptations.

• The practical takeaway: Before spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on recovery equipment, consider whether it provides a meaningful benefit beyond simply resting.

What Recovery Techniques Did the Researchers Examine?

The researchers focused on physical recovery methods commonly used by competitive and elite endurance athletes. These included runners, cyclists, swimmers, triathletes, and cross-country skiers.

The review examined several popular approaches, including cold-water immersion, whole-body cryotherapy, compression garments, pneumatic compression devices, massage, active recovery, neuromuscular electrical stimulation, and far-infrared therapy.

These treatments are often grouped together under the term recovery modalities, but they don't necessarily work through the same mechanisms.

Cold-water immersion is generally used to reduce tissue temperature and potentially influence soreness and inflammation. Compression garments and pneumatic compression devices are intended to influence circulation and fluid movement. Massage applies mechanical pressure to soft tissues, while electrical stimulation produces muscle contractions through externally applied electrical impulses.

Active recovery takes a different approach by using low-intensity movement rather than complete rest. This might involve easy cycling after a hard workout or light movement between demanding efforts.

Each technique has a plausible physiological explanation for why it might help. However, having a plausible mechanism doesn't automatically mean a treatment produces a meaningful improvement in recovery or performance.

That's where controlled research becomes important.

How Was the Study Conducted?

The researchers searched four major scientific databases for randomized controlled trials involving physical recovery techniques in competitive or elite endurance athletes. Their search covered studies published through April 1, 2026.

They identified 16 eligible trials involving 273 participants, although only 14 trials contributed data to at least one of the statistical comparison networks. The athletes represented several endurance sports, including running, cycling, swimming, cross-country skiing, and triathlon.

The researchers evaluated eight outcomes, including delayed-onset muscle soreness, creatine kinase, sport-specific performance, blood lactate, perceived exertion, interleukin-6, flexibility, and measures of neuromuscular function.

One interesting feature of the analysis was the use of a network meta-analysis. Instead of only comparing each treatment directly against rest, this statistical approach can combine direct and indirect evidence to evaluate several treatments within the same analysis.

That sounds useful, but there's a catch. A network meta-analysis is only as reliable as the studies and measurements feeding into it. If most treatments have only been tested in one or two small studies, ranking them doesn't suddenly make the evidence stronger.

This became one of the biggest problems the researchers identified.

Did Any Recovery Technique Actually Work Better Than Rest?

The short answer is that none of the treatments demonstrated a reliable overall advantage over passive recovery across the outcomes examined.

The researchers evaluated 47 comparisons between recovery treatments and passive rest. Only three produced statistically significant results, and the authors concluded that none were sufficiently reliable to support a treatment recommendation.

Two of those findings relied on single-trial evidence, while all three came from analyses combining measurements that weren't sufficiently comparable. The authors therefore considered those apparent benefits unreliable.

The quality of the evidence was another major concern. Of the 47 comparisons, 31 were rated as very low certainty, 15 as low certainty, and only one reached moderate certainty.

That matters because a nonsignificant result can mean different things depending on how good the evidence is.

Sometimes a study provides enough precision to conclude that a treatment probably doesn't produce a meaningful benefit. Other times, the study is simply too small or inconsistent to tell us much of anything.

This review contained examples of both situations, and understanding the difference is important.

Compression Garments Didn't Improve Athletic Performance

Compression garments are extremely popular among endurance athletes. Compression socks, tights, and sleeves are frequently marketed as tools for improving circulation, reducing soreness, and accelerating recovery between workouts.

The theory sounds reasonable. External compression may influence venous return and fluid movement, potentially reducing swelling or discomfort after demanding exercise.

However, the most convincing finding in this review was that compression garments did not meaningfully improve subsequent sport-specific performance.

The estimated standardized mean difference was approximately 0.04, with a 95% confidence interval ranging from −0.37 to 0.45. The researchers considered that range narrow enough to exclude a clinically important performance benefit under their predefined threshold.

This was also the only comparison in the entire review rated as moderate-certainty evidence.

That's a fairly important distinction. The researchers weren't simply saying they couldn't find enough evidence that compression garments worked. They were saying the available evidence was reasonably consistent with no clinically meaningful improvement in subsequent athletic performance.

That doesn't mean compression garments can't feel comfortable or help someone manage subjective symptoms. Those are separate questions, and the review doesn't establish that compression garments have no possible use.

But if you're buying expensive compression gear specifically because you expect it to make you faster during your next run, ride, or race, the evidence from this review doesn't provide much support for that expectation.

What About Compression Boots?

Pneumatic compression boots have become one of the most recognizable recovery products in endurance sports. These devices inflate and deflate chambers around the legs, applying sequential pressure intended to influence fluid movement and circulation.

They can also be expensive, which makes the question of whether they actually work especially relevant.

The review included evidence involving intermittent pneumatic compression, but the available research was extremely limited. Some outcomes relied on a single trial, and there wasn't enough consistent evidence to establish a meaningful recovery advantage.

This review does not prove that compression boots are ineffective. It shows that their superiority over ordinary rest remains unproven in competitive endurance athletes.

That distinction matters when evaluating a product. A company might explain how compression changes blood flow or fluid movement, but those physiological effects don't necessarily establish that you'll recover faster or perform better the following day.

If someone enjoys using compression boots and finds them relaxing, that's a legitimate personal benefit. But relaxation and demonstrated improvements in athletic performance are two different claims, and they shouldn't be treated as interchangeable.

Do Ice Baths Help You Recover Faster?

Cold-water immersion is probably one of the most recognizable recovery strategies in endurance sports. Athletes sit in cold water after demanding workouts, often believing that the cold reduces inflammation, limits muscle damage, and accelerates recovery.

There are legitimate physiological effects associated with cold exposure. Immersion can lower tissue temperature, influence blood vessel responses, and change how soreness and discomfort are perceived. However, those physiological changes don't automatically mean the muscles have recovered faster or that athletic performance has improved.

In this review, cold-water immersion did not demonstrate a statistically reliable advantage over passive recovery for sport-specific performance. The performance analysis included three cold-water immersion trials, and the pooled estimate did not establish a meaningful benefit.

The results for muscle soreness were even harder to interpret. Although some individual studies suggested benefits, the overall evidence was too inconsistent to determine whether cold-water immersion reliably reduced soreness better than rest.

This doesn't mean an ice bath can never be useful. Other research involving different athletic populations, exercise protocols, and recovery outcomes has reported benefits, particularly for perceived soreness. What this review tells us is that the evidence is not strong enough to recommend cold-water immersion as a consistently superior recovery strategy for competitive endurance athletes.

For someone who enjoys ice baths, that may not change much. But if you're forcing yourself into freezing water after every workout because you believe it's necessary for recovery, the science doesn't justify that level of confidence.

Whole-Body Cryotherapy Didn't Provide Convincing Benefits Either

Whole-body cryotherapy takes cold exposure to another level. Instead of sitting in cold water, athletes spend a short period in a chamber exposing the body to extremely cold air.

The treatment is frequently promoted as a way to reduce inflammation, accelerate muscle recovery, and improve subsequent performance. Because cryotherapy chambers are expensive to purchase and operate, individual sessions can also become a significant recurring expense.

The review found no reliable advantage for whole-body cryotherapy over passive recovery across the primary outcomes. Although cryotherapy ranked highly for certain measurements, some of those rankings were based on a single small trial.

This is an important problem with research rankings. A treatment can rank first in a statistical analysis without having convincing evidence that it actually works. When only one study contributes to a treatment's estimate, the ranking can change dramatically when additional research becomes available.

The researchers also identified an apparent negative effect of cryotherapy in one blood-lactate comparison, but they specifically cautioned against interpreting that result as evidence of harm. The analysis combined different lactate measurements, including values collected after exercise, where higher concentrations could reflect greater work performed rather than poorer recovery.

In other words, the available evidence was too inconsistent to establish a meaningful advantage or disadvantage.

Does Massage Actually Improve Recovery?

Massage is one of the oldest recovery techniques used in sports. Unlike many newer recovery devices, it has been around long enough that most athletes have either tried it themselves or know someone who uses it regularly.

There are several reasons massage might feel beneficial after training. Mechanical pressure and sensory stimulation can influence discomfort, relaxation, and the perception of muscle tightness. For an athlete who feels sore or stiff, those effects may be valuable even without a measurable improvement in performance.

However, the evidence in this particular review was limited. The included massage studies did not provide sufficient numerical data for several key outcomes, including delayed-onset muscle soreness, so the researchers couldn't make reliable comparisons for those measures.

The review does not establish that massage is ineffective for soreness. It establishes that the available evidence in competitive endurance athletes is insufficient to confidently determine its comparative effectiveness.

That distinction is particularly important because broader reviews involving other exercise populations have reported possible benefits of massage for perceived soreness. Those findings aren't necessarily contradicted by this review, but they also shouldn't be automatically applied to elite endurance athletes.

I wouldn't tell someone to stop getting massages if they find them helpful. I would question claims that massage has been convincingly shown to accelerate physiological recovery or improve subsequent endurance performance.

What About Active Recovery?

Active recovery is probably the most accessible technique examined in the review. It doesn't require specialized equipment, a recovery chamber, or an expensive appointment.

Instead of resting completely after exercise, an athlete performs low-intensity movement. This could involve easy cycling after a hard interval session, gentle jogging after a race, or light swimming following demanding training.

One common justification for active recovery is that it helps clear lactate from the blood more quickly. That can happen under certain conditions, but faster lactate clearance doesn't necessarily mean faster recovery of muscle function or better performance during the next workout.

Lactate is also not simply a waste product responsible for muscle soreness. It is an important fuel and metabolic intermediate, and the delayed soreness experienced a day or two after exercise isn't caused by lactate remaining trapped in the muscles.

In this review, active recovery did not demonstrate a meaningful advantage over passive rest for subsequent sport-specific performance. The estimated effect was close to zero, with a confidence interval that excluded the researchers' predefined threshold for a clinically important benefit.

The blood-lactate analysis was less informative because it combined several different measurements that weren't directly comparable. The researchers therefore cautioned against drawing conclusions about whether active recovery was better or worse for lactate clearance.

If you enjoy easy movement after training, there's no reason this review should convince you to stop. But don't assume that moving around after a hard session automatically makes you recover faster than resting.

Electrical Muscle Stimulation and Recovery

Neuromuscular electrical stimulation uses electrical impulses to produce muscle contractions. Depending on the device and settings, these contractions may be gentle or relatively strong.

Recovery-oriented electrical stimulation is commonly marketed as a way to increase circulation, reduce muscle soreness, and accelerate the removal of exercise-related metabolites.

The review found no clinically meaningful improvement in subsequent sport-specific performance with electrical stimulation compared with passive recovery. The estimated performance effect was essentially zero, and the confidence interval excluded effects the researchers had defined as clinically important.

The certainty of this finding was rated low, so it shouldn't be interpreted as proof that electrical stimulation has no possible benefit under any circumstances. However, the available evidence doesn't support purchasing one of these devices with the expectation that it will reliably improve your next endurance performance.

Like compression boots, electrical stimulation may provide a sensation that some athletes enjoy. Whether that sensation translates into meaningful recovery improvements is a separate question that requires better evidence.

The Muscle Soreness Results Were Especially Unreliable

Delayed-onset muscle soreness, commonly called DOMS, is one of the most frequently discussed recovery outcomes. It typically develops after unfamiliar or demanding exercise, particularly exercise involving substantial eccentric loading, where muscles produce force while lengthening.

The researchers examined whether different recovery treatments reduced DOMS more effectively than passive rest. Five trials contributed to this analysis, and none of the treatments demonstrated a statistically reliable advantage in the primary analysis.

However, the biggest problem wasn't simply that the results were nonsignificant. It was that the results were extremely inconsistent.

The researchers reported an I² value of 90.2%, indicating substantial variation between study results that couldn't be explained by sampling error alone.

The analysis was also unusually sensitive to which studies were included. When the researchers removed two trials containing values recorded as estimates rather than directly extracted measurements, the results changed dramatically. Several treatments suddenly appeared substantially better than passive recovery.

That might sound encouraging, but the authors explained that the revised findings depended heavily on one small study with an unusual control-group result. They therefore considered neither version of the soreness analysis sufficiently reliable to support conclusions.

This is an excellent example of why we shouldn't judge scientific evidence based only on whether a result is statistically significant.

If removing two studies completely changes the conclusion, we don't have a stable enough evidence base to confidently recommend one treatment over another.

Lower Muscle Damage Markers Don't Necessarily Mean Better Recovery

Another outcome examined in the review was creatine kinase, commonly abbreviated CK. Creatine kinase is an enzyme found inside muscle cells, and blood concentrations can increase after demanding exercise.

Because CK can rise following muscle-damaging activity, researchers sometimes use it as an indirect marker of exercise-induced muscle damage.

However, CK isn't a perfect measurement of how recovered an athlete actually is. Concentrations can vary considerably between individuals, and changes in CK don't necessarily match changes in soreness, strength, or athletic performance.

The review included four trials examining creatine kinase, and none of the recovery treatments demonstrated a reliable advantage over passive rest.

The evidence was also too sparse to make strong conclusions about individual techniques. Several treatments were represented by only one study, and the statistical analysis couldn't adequately estimate differences between studies.

This reinforces an important point about recovery research: A change in a blood marker is only useful if it tells us something meaningful about the outcome we're trying to improve.

For athletes, the ability to perform the next session is often more relevant than whether one blood measurement looks slightly better.

One of the Most Interesting Findings Involved a Placebo Treatment

One of the more revealing aspects of this review involved a study that included a sham recovery treatment.

In that trial, athletes underwent immersion in water at approximately 27°C (81°F). The treatment was intended to serve as a comparison against cold-water immersion without producing the same substantial cooling effect.

Interestingly, this neutral-temperature immersion condition ranked as well as or better than several active recovery techniques across the outcomes where it was evaluated.

The sham treatment ranked highest for flexibility, third among 11 treatment categories for sport-specific performance, and above both massage treatments for one neuromuscular outcome.

These findings came from only one small trial, and the comparisons weren't statistically significant. They do not prove that placebo effects explain the benefits of recovery treatments, but they raise an important question about how much expectation contributes to the way athletes perceive recovery.

When someone steps into an expensive cryotherapy chamber or spends 30 minutes using compression boots, they know they're receiving a treatment. That knowledge can influence how they interpret soreness, fatigue, and physical readiness.

This doesn't mean those feelings are imaginary. Expectations can genuinely influence subjective experiences, including pain and discomfort.

The problem is determining whether the treatment itself produces a specific physiological benefit beyond those expectations.

If a sham treatment performs similarly to an expensive recovery device, we should be cautious about attributing the entire benefit to the device's proposed mechanism.

Feeling Recovered Isn't the Same as Being Recovered

This may be the most important distinction in the entire discussion.

Imagine finishing a hard trail run and spending 20 minutes using compression boots. Your legs feel less heavy afterward, you feel more relaxed, and you're convinced the session helped.

Those feelings may be completely genuine. However, they don't necessarily tell us whether your muscles have restored their force-producing capacity, whether your energy stores have been replenished, or whether you'll perform better during tomorrow's workout.

Perceived recovery and actual performance restoration are related, but they're not interchangeable.

This is why I place considerably more value on studies that measure subsequent performance than studies that only ask participants how recovered they feel.

Subjective recovery still matters. An athlete who feels less sore or more comfortable may approach the next training session with greater confidence, and that can be useful.

But we shouldn't automatically translate improvements in perceived soreness into claims about faster muscle repair or better athletic performance.

The 2026 review reinforces that distinction because the evidence for subjective outcomes was generally inconsistent, while the better-supported performance comparisons showed little meaningful benefit from several popular recovery techniques.

Does This Mean Recovery Techniques Are a Waste of Money?

Not necessarily, but I think it depends on why you're using them.

If you enjoy getting a massage after a hard training week, there's nothing inherently wrong with that. The same applies to using compression boots while relaxing, taking an occasional ice bath, or performing easy recovery exercise because it feels good.

The problem starts when these treatments are marketed as essential for recovery or when athletes believe they're missing out on meaningful adaptations by not using them.

There is a major difference between something that feels beneficial and something that has been demonstrated to improve athletic performance.

Cost also matters. Spending a few minutes walking after a workout requires almost nothing, while compression systems, cryotherapy sessions, and regular professional massages can become expensive.

If two approaches produce similar measurable outcomes, I would generally favor the one that requires less money, time, and effort unless there is a compelling personal reason to choose otherwise.

That doesn't mean recovery treatments have no place in sports. It means their value should be judged by the benefits they actually provide rather than the promises attached to them.

What About Sleep, Nutrition, and Hydration?

One important limitation of this review is that it focused on physical recovery modalities. It did not compare the effectiveness of these treatments against interventions such as improving sleep, eating enough carbohydrates, consuming adequate protein, or replacing fluids lost during exercise.

Those strategies address different physiological needs.

After demanding endurance exercise, muscle glycogen may need to be replenished, damaged tissues require nutrients for repair, and fluid and electrolyte losses may need to be replaced. Sleep also supports numerous processes involved in normal recovery and physiological regulation.

A compression device doesn't provide carbohydrates to restore glycogen. An ice bath doesn't supply protein for tissue remodeling, and a massage doesn't replace the sleep someone consistently misses.

These basic recovery requirements shouldn't be confused with optional recovery treatments.

For most athletes, I would prioritize adequate food intake, sufficient sleep, appropriate hydration, and sensible training organization before spending significant money on recovery equipment.

That recommendation is based on broader exercise physiology and sports nutrition principles, rather than a direct comparison conducted in this particular review.

Recovery Also Depends on How You Train

Another issue that gets overlooked is the relationship between training stress and recovery capacity.

If you're consistently training harder than you can recover from, adding more recovery devices may not solve the underlying problem. You might simply need to adjust your training volume, intensity, or frequency.

Endurance training requires a balance between applying enough stress to stimulate adaptation and allowing sufficient recovery for those adaptations to occur.

Hard sessions are important, but so are easier days and appropriate reductions in training load when fatigue begins accumulating.

Recovery isn't something you can completely outsource to a device. It has to be built into the training program itself.

For example, an athlete performing repeated high-intensity sessions with inadequate recovery between them may experience declining performance regardless of how many recovery treatments they use.

In that situation, reducing unnecessary training stress may be more productive than adding another intervention.

Why the Evidence Is Still So Limited

One of the surprising findings from this review was how little high-quality research actually exists in competitive endurance athletes.

Although 16 randomized trials were included, most examined only a few outcomes. Across the eight statistical networks, 35 of 55 treatment nodes, or approximately 64%, were supported by just one trial.

That is a major limitation when trying to compare several treatments.

The review also included athletes with different competitive backgrounds, and four of the included cohorts involved adolescents. Only seven trials reported VO2max, making it difficult to verify whether every participant met the researchers' intended fitness criteria.

When the researchers restricted the analysis to confirmed elite-level athletes, several outcome networks could no longer be analyzed.

There were also problems with inconsistent outcome measurements, limited blinding, and some estimated rather than directly extracted data.

The biggest conclusion may not be that recovery techniques don't work. It may be that we have far less reliable evidence for their effectiveness in elite endurance athletes than their popularity would suggest.

This also helps explain why previous reviews involving broader athletic populations have sometimes reached more favorable conclusions about treatments such as massage and cold-water immersion.

Different populations, outcomes, and study inclusion criteria can produce different results. Those differences deserve attention rather than assuming one review automatically invalidates all previous research.

Should Recreational Athletes Follow the Same Advice?

I would be cautious about applying these results directly to everyone who exercises.

Competitive endurance athletes often have substantial training histories and may respond differently to recovery interventions than someone who recently started exercising. Their recovery demands, baseline fitness, and physiological adaptations can also be quite different.

The review did not establish how these treatments affect recreational lifters, beginners, older adults, or people recovering from unfamiliar resistance exercise.

It also focused primarily on relatively short-term recovery outcomes. It cannot tell us whether regularly using a particular recovery treatment improves or interferes with long-term training adaptations.

That last distinction matters because restoring performance between two closely spaced competitions isn't necessarily the same goal as maximizing adaptation across several months of training.

Someone preparing for a multiday cycling event may have different recovery priorities than someone performing three strength workouts per week.

The findings are useful, but the population and outcome being studied need to match the question we're asking.

What I Would Actually Recommend

I don't think athletes need to abandon every recovery treatment they enjoy. However, I also don't think the evidence supports treating these interventions as necessary components of a successful training program.

If you're deciding whether to spend money on recovery equipment, I would start by asking what specific problem you're trying to solve.

If the goal is to feel more comfortable after a workout, a treatment that you personally find relaxing may have value. If the goal is to improve subsequent performance, I would want stronger evidence that the treatment actually produces that result.

For compression garments, active recovery, and electrical stimulation, this review provides little reason to expect a clinically meaningful improvement in subsequent endurance performance. For other treatments, including cold-water immersion, massage, and cryotherapy, the evidence remains too uncertain to support confident claims of superiority over rest.

My preference would be to make sure the basics are covered before adding optional recovery treatments. That means getting enough sleep, eating appropriately for training demands, managing hydration, and organizing workouts so fatigue doesn't continually exceed recovery capacity.

Once those pieces are in place, using a recovery technique because you enjoy it is perfectly reasonable. Just don't confuse enjoying something with needing it.

The Bottom Line

A 2026 systematic review and network meta-analysis examined 16 randomized controlled trials involving 273 competitive and elite endurance athletes to determine whether popular recovery techniques worked better than passive rest.

The researchers found no reliable overall advantage for any recovery technique across the outcomes examined, including muscle soreness, muscle damage markers, and subsequent athletic performance.

The most informative finding involved compression garments, which did not meaningfully improve subsequent sport-specific performance. Active recovery and electrical stimulation also showed little evidence of clinically important performance benefits.

For other treatments, including cold-water immersion, massage, and cryotherapy, the evidence was generally too limited or inconsistent to draw strong conclusions.

The study also highlighted how difficult it is to separate the physiological effects of recovery treatments from the influence of expectations. A sham immersion treatment performed similarly to several active interventions in one small trial, raising legitimate questions about how much of the perceived benefit comes from the treatment itself.

I wouldn't interpret this research as proof that every recovery technique is useless. I would interpret it as a reason to be more skeptical of expensive recovery products promising benefits that haven't been convincingly demonstrated.

If a treatment makes you feel better and you enjoy using it, that's fine. But if your primary goal is to recover well enough to train consistently and perform better, I would focus first on the things that have a clear physiological purpose: appropriate training loads, adequate sleep, sufficient nutrition, and hydration.

You don't necessarily need more recovery tools. You may simply need to give your body what it already requires to recover.

About the Author

Matt Mosman, MS, CISSN, CSCS, is the founder and Chief Science Officer of Simply Good Supplements. With a background in exercise science, sports nutrition, and strength and conditioning, Matt focuses on turning research into practical advice that athletes, parents, and everyday active people can actually use.

References

Jin Y, Pan D, Li M, Zhu D, Wen J. Physical recovery modalities in competitive and elite endurance athletes: a systematic review and network meta-analysis finding limited evidence of benefit over passive recovery. Frontiers in Sports and Active Living. 2026;8:1876924. https://doi.org/10.3389/fspor.2026.1876924.