It is important to know the degree of safety before carrying out any training with your electrostimulation equipment.
You may have wondered about the side effects of EMS training, user safety or health. Right? Well, we are going to answer all these possible questions!
WHY IS EMS TRAINING SAFER THAN YOU THOUGHT?
Understanding safety as the absence of danger or risk, we can distinguish two different types of safety in our workout with EMS training: Device safety (connectivity) and physiological safety for our body.
Device security (connectivity)
The safety of the training will depend on the type of connectivity between the device and the tablet or remote control that your EMS training equipment has. With an unstable connection, you run the risk of the user leaving the training session.
A poor connectivity may result in the tablet not being able to communicate directly with the EMS training machine, causing the user to be unable to change the machine’s parameters. Imagine that the user is overwhelmed, wants to lower the intensity and cannot. In this case, the training experience will be negative and useless.
As we have previously commented, the connectivity between the electrostimulation device and the remote control or tablet should be by means of a connection that is as stable as possible.
Within the three existing types of wireless connection (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and radio frequency), we recommend the use of radio frequency, because it is the most stable electromagnetic wave.
If, in addition to using a radiofrequency connection, your EMS training equipment is of the third generation, you will avoid these connectivity problems, since the electrostimulation device is completely independent of the tablet or remote control, thus avoiding problems associated with wave instability.
If you do not understand the third generation concept well, you have a whole lesson dedicated to it.
Physiological safety for our organism
Another aspect of great importance is the doubt that arises in reference to our health. Is electrostimulation equipment safe for our body?
A first important fact to know is that the stimulus used for muscle contraction is an electric current. Whether it is voluntary (our body gives the order) or involuntary (EMS training equipment).
- The brain sends a message to the muscles through the central nervous system for muscle activation
- The EMS training device sends a command to the motor neurons for muscle activation.
Both path share the same way of stimulating the muscles, so the EMS training equipment is fully compatible with our body, the difference is the origin of the signal (voluntary or involuntary).
Now that we know how our muscles contract, we understand EMS training as a very safe tool for our organism compatible with internal processes and its metabolism.
Make sure to choose professional EMS training equipment that meets all the safety requirements seen above.
ARE THERE ANY SIDE EFFECTS WITH EMS TRAINING?
If you are a healthy, sporty person and you use the correct methodology, there are no harmful side effects.
In fact, health professionals such as physical therapists and kinesiologists use it as movement therapy.
The only side effect that you are going to experience with its use is a positive and totally normal side effect of your body in response to great muscle activation. The famous sore or broken muscle fibers necessary for the adaptation of the body to the electrical loads we are providing.
Remember that to improve our physical condition, our body has to adapt to the load (review lesson with the principles of training applied to electrostimulation).
SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS FOR EMS TRAINING
We leave you with some recommendations so that you can reach your goal using electrostimulation with the utmost safety:
Supervision by a professional or have adequate training on the equipment
Indeed, electrostimulation must be used with care since electrical signals must be regulated according to certain rules and correct planning as we have already seen.
The parameters used in the machine must be established with an appropriate criterion, since they will depend on the specific needs of each person, their health and physical condition, etc.
Eat something between 45 minutes and 2 hours before training
Be careful not to eat too much or foods with excess fat. We recommend eating something light, rich in quick-release carbohydrates that will give you enough energy for your training (banana or a similar piece of fruit), especially if you are looking to lose weight.
Stay well hydrated before and after EMS training
Your body needs adequate levels of hydration when doing EMS training.
We recommend drinking half a liter of water an hour before training so that your muscles can conduct electrical impulses perfectly. Also, do not forget to hydrate during and especially after the session to compensate for the loss of water and electrolytes.
Start the EMS training session with low intensity pulses
It is important that your body adapts to the high-intensity stimulus that it will receive. For this, we recommend a gradual increase in intensity until we reach an optimal level where we will carry out our training session.
We can do this gradual rise during the warm-up prior to the main part. The duration can be between 1 to 3 minutes.
Use recovery as the main indicator to perform the next EMS training session:
Allow your body (muscles, energy systems, etc.) to recover completely.
Otherwise, you will not be able to do the next session and it may be counterproductive. As we have already seen in the principles of sports training, recovery is one of the determining factors when scheduling the next session.
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