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I recently started working out again after a very long lay off, caused by lazyness and other reasons, but mostly lazyness.

As you would expect, I've been going through a lot of delayed onset muscle soreness, or DOMS, lately, and experiencing DOMS has reminded me of just how much misinformation there is regarding everything that has to do with bodybuilding and fitness. You can browse online and encounter the most ridiculous claims, all of which have been debunked a long time ago, but will seemingly never ever go away.

DOMS typically take place from 6-8 hours following physical activity, and peak around 24-48 hours after intensive physical activity. Normally diminishing completely after 72 hours.

DOMS are caused by eccentric muscle contraction placing a higher load on your muscles than they're used to. What happens here is your muscles are adapting to a new situation, causing them to be prepared the next time it occurs.

This is why DOMS are the most intense when your muscles are introduced to a new training stimulus. If you do the same workout over and over, it's less likely that you experience DOMS. And then when you do a new type of exercise, you may feel like you're new to the gym the next morning again.

I decided that what the heck I'll gather of a list of some of the most persistent myths that I think need to go away, on the subject of DOMS.

# Myth #1: "It's not a good workout unless you feel it the next day!" #

Not true.

DOMS themselves have next to nothing to do with whether your exercise was effective, or not. Yes, there is a correlation there since you most likely experience DOMS when introduced to a new type of stimulus - which can be a good thing - but that in and of itself does not mean that you were necessarily doing anything useful. It's perfectly possible to have an excellent workout, and not feel it the next day at all.

Keeping count of your weights, reps and sets is still a much better indicator of your workout than the soreness the next day. If you did more and at a higher volume than the last time, it was good workout, regardless of whether or not you're crippled the next morning.

I've seen a lot of people get stressed out after a certain period of working out, since they are no longer getting DOMS the next day, feeling that they're doing something wrong, but it's most likely not the case. Your body has simply adapted to this new lifestyle.

Sure, it's a good thing to do new things and attempt to hit some of the muscles you might have missed, if you've been doing the same routine for an extended period of time.

# Myth #2: Muscle damage is a sign of something being wrong. #

This is the other side of the coin, and also not true.

In fact, if you're attempting to build muscle, muscle damage is the exact thing you want to achieve.

Contrary to seemingly popular belief, muscles don't grow as you exercise, but during the rest period after the exercise. More specifically during your sleep.

The mechanism behind muscle growth is that working out breaks the muscle, and the rebuilding process during your sleep builds them up slightly bigger and stronger than before, provided you feed them with the nutrients required for growth.

So, no, muscle damage is not a bad thing, and it's astounding to still run into this claim every now and again.

# Myth #3: DOMS can be prevented by stretching. #

Wrong again, unfortunately.

[This study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21735398) for instance has concluded that "The evidence from randomised studies suggests that muscle stretching, whether conducted before, after, or before and after exercise, does not produce clinically important reductions in delayed-onset muscle soreness in healthy adults."

**In conclusion**, DOMS are a part of working out, and always will be. They are not a measure of the quality of your workout, but can be used as a sign of you hitting muscles that you haven't hit recently, which can be taken as a good sign, but by itself means very little in regards to the quality of the workout. In experienced folks DOMS typially appear in situations where you've been doing compound exercises for a long time, and then do an isolated set that uses some of the smaller parts of your body that get ignored when doing compounds.

There's no reason to be afraid of them, either. But it's good to remember that soreness is not the samething as eeling hurt. If you feel *hurt* then you may have suffered an injury, and done something wrong, but you'll likely notice it anyway, since you don't feel an injury the next day, but rather the moment it happens. So there shouldn't be much confusion there.

Bodybuilding myths that annoy you? Leave a comment and vent.