Recovery Pro
Recovery Pro is a unique recovery tracking solution that lets you know if your cardio system is recovered and ready for cardio training. In addition, it offers recovery feedback and training recommendations based on your short and long-term training and recovery balance.
Recovery Pro works together with Training Load Pro that gives you a holistic view on how your training sessions strain different systems. Recovery Pro then tells you how your body is coping with this strain, and how it affects your daily readiness for cardio training, and short and long-term recovery.
Recovery and readiness for cardio training
Your cardio system’s recovery, which affects your daily readiness for cardio training is measured with the Orthostatic test. Your heart rate variability values measured with the test are compared to your individual baseline to spot if there are any deviations from your average range.
Training and recovery balance
Recovery Pro combines your measured and subjective long-term recovery data with your long-term training load (Cardio load) to monitor the balance between training and recovery. In addition to training-induced factors affecting your recovery, Recovery Pro also takes into account other factors such as poor sleep and mental stress with subjective recovery questions asking about your muscle soreness, how strained you feel and how you slept.
Recovery feedback and daily training recommendation
With Recovery Pro you get feedback for both your cardio system’s current recovery and your longer-term training and recovery balance. Your daily personalized training recommendation is based on these both. It takes into account your heart rate variability values from the Orthostatic test and your recovery questions within your personal baseline and normal range for both together with your Cardio load status from your training sessions.
When you start using Recovery Pro, you need to gather data for a while to build up your personal baseline and typical range before we can give you accurate feedback on your recovery. Recovery feedback is available when:
- Your Cardio Load Status is available (you’ve done training sessions with heart rate monitoring on at least three days)
- You’ve taken at least three Orthostatic tests in the previous seven-day window (Grit X Pro/Vantage V/Vantage V2: You’ll need an H10 or H9 heart rate sensor for the Orthostatic test, if you already own an H6 or H7, you can also use either of them.)
- You have answered the perceived recovery questions three times in a seven-day window
The more often you take the Orthostatic test and answer the perceived recovery questions, the more accurate feedback you’ll get on your recovery. And once you’ve tracked your training sessions with heart rate for about a month we’ll have an adequate picture of your training habits to give feedback on how your long-term training and recovery balance looks like.
1.Set Recovery Pro on
Start using the Recovery Pro feature by setting recovery feedback on. This is done on your watch. Go to Settings > General Settings > Recovery tracking > Recovery Pro, and set it on. The Recovery Pro feature and the recovery tracking setting is available on your watch only, it is not shown in the Flow web service or app.
2.Schedule an Orthostatic test for at least three mornings a week
When Recovery Pro is set on, the watch asks you to schedule an Orthostatic test for at least three mornings per week (e.g. on Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays). For the most accurate recovery information, we recommend you take the Orthostatic test every morning if possible. By doing this you’ll get your cardio system’s recovery information every day in addition to daily recovery feedback.
3.Take the Orthostatic test on the scheduled mornings
The Orthostatic test measures your heart rate and heart rate variability (HRV). Heart rate variability is responsive to training overload and to stress outside of training. Its affected by stress factors such as mental stress, sleep, latent illness and environmental changes (temperature, altitude) to mention a few. Recovery Pro uses your resting heart rate variability (RMSSD rest) and standing heart rate variability (RMSSD stand) measured with the test and compares them to your individual normal range. If your heart rate variability values deviate from your normal range, this could mean that something is interfering with your recovery.
Your normal range is calculated from your individual mean and standard deviation of your test results from the past four weeks. If you’ve taken the test more than four times during this period, standard deviation is calculated based in your own individual values. If you’ve taken the test less four than times during the past four weeks, the standard deviation is calculated based on population norms. At least one test is result is needed during this four-week period.
The more frequently you take the test, the more accurate the results are. To make sure that your results are as reliable as possible, perform the test in similar conditions every time – we recommend that you take the test in the morning before breakfast.
In the evening before a scheduled test you’ll get a reminder about it. On the scheduled mornings, you’ll get a notification to take the test. From the time view on your watch, swipe up from the bottom of the display to view your notifications which include your Orthostatic test reminder. The test can be started directly from the reminder. See detailed instructions for taking the Orthostatic test here.
After taking the Orthostatic test you’ll get a summary of your cardio system’s recovery. Your cardio system is recovered, or Your cardio system is not fully recovered.
4.Answer the recovery questions daily
Your watch will ask the recovery questions via a reminder every day, whether there is an Orthostatic test scheduled for the day or not. From the time view on your watch, swipe up from the bottom of the display to view your notifications which include your recovery question reminder. On days you have an Orthostatic test, the recovery questions pop up on your watch straight after the test. Ideally, they should be answered about 30 minutes after waking up.
The questions are designed to help establish if anything is affecting your recovery. Some examples of factors affecting recovery are excessive muscle fatigue, mental pressure or maybe just a bad night’s sleep. See the recovery questions, and some instructions on how to answer them below:
Are your muscles more sore than usual? No, Somewhat, Much more
Your muscles can always be a little sore when you train regularly, so some muscle soreness can be completely normal for you. The main idea behind this question is to spot if they are sorer than you would expect them to be. If they are sorer than they usually are or what you are used to, you should then answer somewhat or much more.
Are you feeling more strained than usual? No, Somewhat, Much more
Your overall perceived fatigue. Do you feel more strained than you usually do? This strain can be coming from any aspect of your life, such as strain from work.
How did you sleep? Very well, Well, Okay, Poorly, Very poorly.
Recovery feedback is viewed on your watch. You can conveniently see your daily training recommendation on the Cardio load status view on your watch face. Swipe left/right or scroll with the UP/ DOWN buttons until you reach it.
- Tap the display or press the OK button to see more details. First, you’ll see your Cardio load status (Detraining, Maintaining, Productive or Overreaching), which is a part of Training Load Pro. When you’ve gathered enough recovery data you’ll see your daily training recommendation on this view.
- Swipe or scroll down with the buttons to Recovery feedback.
- Tap More or press the OK button to view more detailed recovery feedback. It’s made up of:
1. An icon illustrating your readiness for cardio training today that reflects the daily training recommendation stating how we advise you to train. An increased injury or illness alert icon replaces the training advice icon when your risk for injury or illness is increased. The short training advice can be: Train more, Go for it!, Train light, Train light or rest, Rest or train light, Injury & illness risk, Take it easy!
2. Daily feedback stating if your cardio system is recovered or not*, followed by your daily training recommendation based on that day’s Orthostatic test result, and if available, your recovery question answers and your history for these together with your training data (Cardio Load) over a longer period of time. The recommendation can contain a warning about an increased risk of overtraining, or it can alert you about an increased injury and illness risk.*To know if your cardio system is recovered or not you need to perform the Orthostatic test on that day.
3. Feedback about your long-term training habits and recovery. This can contain information about how you’re responding to training, if you’ve been training more than or less than usual or if you’re at risk to get injured or fall ill because you’ve been training more than usual. It can also contain feedback if you seem to have too much stress from something else than training. Your long-term feedback is based on:
- Your average mood score of past of the seven days calculated from your perceived recovery question answers.
- Your seven-day rolling average of your heart rate variability values measured with the Orthostatic test compared to your individual normal values from the past four weeks.
- Your training history (Cardio load status).
4. A disclaimer if we don’t have enough data yet to give you accurate feedback. The more you use this feature the more accurate recovery feedback you’ll get.