Everything It Takes To Recover From An NFL Game

Everything It Takes To Recover From An NFL Game

In the NFL, every percentage counts. We try to get the most we can out of our body. We try to make sure that from game one where we’re at our peak, we’re not losing, you know, 20% of our talent, how we’re feeling physically. We try to keep that as high as we can. I’m Zion Johnson and I’m here to tell you about everything it takes to recover from an NFL game. That’s the end of the game. A huge win for the Playing in an NFL game takes an enormous physical toll on the body. Even when the player leaves the field without an injury, they’ve endured hours of highintensity exercise, high-speed collisions, and heavy physical contact on nearly every play. We say that playing in an NFL game is similar to being in multiple car accidents. So, recovery really begins the moment the game ends. The focus is on reducing inflammation as quickly as possible, restoring mobility, and promoting tissue healing. Immediately after the game, got to make sure I get some waters in, something with sodium, replenish my electrolytes, just try to get, you know, fuel back into my body after the game. Nutrition and hydration are central to recovery. They provide the building blocks for tissue repair and help to modulate inflammation. There’s certain proteins that I can’t eat, like I don’t eat steak, uh, just because it doesn’t mix well with meat and I don’t eat a lot of pork just because it’s a a fattier meat. So, we try to get a lot more chicken, uh, seafoods like salmon, uh, and then we’ll even get stuff like elk, bison, we’ll get, um, you know, if we’re feeling like something a little a little more fatty, we’ll get lamb. Haley’s a personal trainer, but she’s also studying in nutrition, so she’s kind of right there lock step with what I’m doing. and she knows exactly what I’m trying to prioritize in terms of what I’m eating and training. So, it’s just great to have somebody who really understands the whole process. We are very much on the same like mindset and like path of like nutrition and taking care of our bodies and that’s an extremely important part of our life. So, I feel like we have a very similar lifestyle which makes it a lot easier for us too. For sure. I feel like especially during the season for us, making sure you get enough carbs uh pregame is really important, but like for a postgame meal like this, uh I really just like to focus on making sure that I’m getting uh the calories I need to refuel and uh you know, feel full after the game. Uh because when you’re out there playing for four or sometimes more quarters, you lose a lot of water, you lose a lot of, you know, weight. Um and sometimes you come out of the game just feeling really depleted. Haley is a much better cook than I am. So for my dinner, I’m going to have three elk burgers. Each of them have about 33 g of protein in them. My goal for protein uh for each meal is close to about 100 grams of protein. So, um getting pretty close to that with this. For carbs, got my potatoes here. This is not an accurate portion size. It’s probably like it’s probably like the probably like these two together for me. We’ve got our spinach uh to get some leafy greens. We got some berries, blueberries, strawberries. Sometimes I’ll have blackberries and raspberries uh just because they have antioxidants in them which are pretty good. So yeah, this is dinner. Let’s chow down. Usually for me, I’ll get a massage on Monday, but if I’m really really beat up, I might get one on Tuesday, too. Every session before I have a conversation with the therapist, I say, “Hey, this is feeling pretty tight. This is feeling this way.” And we kind of, you know, come up with a plan for how they’re going to attack the massage, how they’re going to, you know, release my quad or release my my calf or whatever needs to be, you know, paid attention to. Soft tissue or massage therapy is very important. It improves circulation, decreases muscle tightness, and supports recovery between games to help prevent overuse injuries. It’s funny cuz Haley always, you know, she’s like, “Was your massage fun?” Um, a lot of times the massages, they’re they they hurt sometimes because you got to get deep tissue. They’ve got to get in there and really release tight muscles or any knots that are in there. So, the average person might not expect, but sometimes those massages aren’t like the relaxing ones where they’re like, they’re really getting in there with the elbow. It’s it’s really not directly after a game where you don’t feel great, you know, adrenaline’s pumping. It’s really that night and the next morning we’re like, “Oh man, you start to feel the bruises, the aches, the small things that happen from an NFL game.” And that’s why I think it’s important directly after in that next morning to really attack your recovery. Recovery can be very position specific. Offensive linemen endure repetitive compressive and rotational forces through their spine, shoulders, and knees. For me, I really focus on my ankles and knees. The position I play offensive line, we’re always in a bent or hinged position. So having your knees and ankles feeling good and healthy is very important. So the the main thing I do is I have an ankle routine. I’ll start on the wobble board just to get full range for my ankles and all the planes. The next thing I’ll do is toe walks and heel walks a little bit more uh for stability. I’ll go through those and then I’ll go into the slant board. Now I’m really working to try to get a little bit of a calf stretch, but also I’m attacking my soius muscles and all the muscles of the calf. The next thing I’ll do is I’ll do my ankle band routine. That way I’ve done everything to loosen up my ankles. Now I’m just doing something to strengthen all of the little muscles in my calf and that connect down into my ankles. I’ll move on into kind of stuff for my knees. I have this exercise I do on the wall where I’ll put like a band around myself and I’ll do like knee rocks, like rocker. I’ll do single leg squats, things to get my quad firing and get like range into my knee, especially after like a a tough game. You’re feeling a little stiff, open everything up. And then I’ll go into shoulder stuff. I’ll hit the four parts of the rotator cuff. And then I’ll go into some lat and back focused exercises like some lat pulls, some face pulls, stuff like that. That really changes based off of the need. The ankle and knee stuff, that’s every day. But, you know, let’s say my back’s bothering me or something. Then I’ll I’ll get down on the ground, do a little bit more stretching for my back. I’ll talk with the trainer, see what they recommend. For their active rehabilitation, we’ll use anti-gravity and underwater treadmills to unload the joints. Usually this is the day after a game. I’ll get in the hydrows, get moving in there. It’s like a underwater treadmill just to get moving, get like a a dynamic warm up, get blood coming back into the body. On the wall, they have like a bunch of different exercises that you can hit, some range of motion exercises for your hips, and then just general dynamic movement for the rest of your body. Our performance nutrition team at the Bolt helps to ensure that each player has a tailored nutrition plan to support all of their recovery needs. Balancing protein for repair, carbohydrates for energy stores, and electrolytes for rehydration. So, I eat three meals at the facility, not including dinner. For breakfast, I’ll come in, I’ll usually have some some sort of bagel sandwich with turkey, bacon, chicken, apple sausage, turkey sausage, something like that, potatoes, and then I’ll have fruit. So, berries and that’s my breakfast. The Bolt provides one of the most innovative and comprehensive athlete recovery environments in professional sports. We offer many advanced recovery modalities that help to improve circulation and decrease inflammation. This includes cold water immersion and many forms of contrast therapy with hot and cold tubs, a sauna and steam room, and hot and cold compression systems. We’ll use laser, techar, and shockwave treatments as well as full body red light therapy to activate healing and promote cell turnover. We have to rely on the training staff a lot just if anything happens, whether it’s the smallest little tweak to the biggest injury. They’re really, you know, the core piece in terms of planning for us. This seamless collaboration between UCLA Health Physicians and the Los Angeles Chargers athletic performance staff helps to provide players with all of the resources that they need to return to play safely and efficiently.

Ever wonder how NFL players recover from gamedays? Hear from LA Chargers offensive lineman Zion Johnson and UCLA Health Team Physician Dr. Amanda Honsvall Hoefler as they break down everything it takes to recover from an NFL game. From immediate hydration & refueling to position-specific routines focusing on ankle & knee mobility, learn about the importance of physical maintenance for elite athletes and how Johnson approaches recovery both at home and in the Recharge Room at The Bolt. Presented by UCLA Health.

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