soreness

Is Soreness needed for Growth?

The soreness you feel after a workout essentially comes about because you damaged your muscle fibers. Exercise physiologists refer to this as delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS), and it typically becomes most noticeable a day or two after a workout. What happens is that micro-tears in your muscle fibres generate calcium leakage and an accumulation of histamines, potassium, prostaglandins and local edema (accumulation of fluid) in the affected muscle. The edema stimulates the nerve endings, causing the sensation of pain.The damage to your muscles and subsequent soreness occur to a greater degree as a result of the negative (eccentric) component of an exercise. That may be why you don't always experience the same level of soreness; not all exercises place the same type of eccentric stress on your muscles.