One-day or even two-day recovery time in Iran women's volleyball semifinals: Unscientific and highly damaging to the athlete's long-term health
Mostafa Sarabzadeh --- Volleyball Section WSP
The world's talent scouts and grassroot women's sports coaches unanimously believe that the process of developing an athlete from the grassroots to the main senior teams is strongly dependent on preventive approaches to sports injuries. Therefore, the result of the game and short-term goals of a team should be in no way a priority over the health of a young sports talent.
"An athlete is not your machine or tool”
"An athlete is not your machine or tool, but first and foremost, a human being who should be allowed to go through the usual growing process of the sports performance over a decade and then passes his retirement in full health, psychologically and physically away from major life-threatening injuries", is the main mantra International Sports Organizations have all been moving with.
Timing of between-match recovery (return to initial state) plays a major role in the long-term health of the athlete and the prevention of chronic injuries during the high-pressure matches of elite leagues.
Talking about injuries, the chronic ones are hardly identified in Iran’s women's sports due to the inability to constantly monitor the athlete, at least as much as we may have felt acute injuries. However, the high number of female athletes whose peak athletic performance has been relatively low—three to five years, or the number of young talents quited early before entering to senior level, denotes an alarming sign of the systematic inattention of sport federations towards the development process of the athletes and even their health.
“Volleyball’s Energy System & Recovery-related Injury”
Volleyball is one of the most dangerous sports in women given the energy system involved, and the power and explosive skills required, and is a common cause of upper and lower body injuries, especially during the Competition season.
Frontline players, especially spikers, have been reported to have the highest number of injuries. However, the issue at hand is the proper and health-oriented recovery design model that not only prevent chronic preventable injuries but also allow the athlete to maximize their peak performance.
“ Evidence-based Basic Principles of Between-match Recovery “
The basic principles of recovery timing have long been approved by leading experts and researchers, and all competition committees are obliged to obey the guidelines, otherwise they have to be held responsible for the loss of a talent’s peak athletic life, regardless of which club he plays for.
Should the goal of the club and volleyball leagues be anything other than to promote talent development in the lower layers of the senior national team? in a way not sacrifice the future years of the player for winning a game or a league?
“Muscular Recovery—we have to wait at least 48 hours”
Apart from the timing of other psycho-cognitive, technical and metabolic recoveries that has all been largely ignored as well, one of the most basic and important factors in physical recovery is muscular recovery, which was very shocking to see it ignored in the recent the Iranian Women's Volleyball Premier League 2024-2025
Research on the biomarkers of muscle damage has abundantly shown for decades that, for example, creatine kinase troponin of fast-twitch fibers could be evaluated an hour after the match, but the key point is that to assess creatine kinase troponin of slow-twitch muscle fibers (involved in volleyball energy system ) we have to wait at least 48 hours.
This means that some micro-muscular and micro-tissue injuries occur within 48 hours of a match.
This means that the volleyballers in the Saipa and Sepahan—quarterfinal—, who appeared in the second match of the quarterfinal after less than a day, have played five-sets full-match with lower percentage of muscle tension and electrical activity (muscle capacity) than usual.
This means that even if they was lucky enough to escape the acute visible injury, they could have definitely been entered the phases of degenerative and chronic neuromuscular damage, which in the long run, will cause them to lose their peak sports performance, so the national team will permanently lose the benefit of using its talents for long-term.
And lastly, in terms of performance tests, there are countless studies in have proven that the body of a professional volleyball player is never able to repeat its base fitness records in 24 hours post-match, and rarely in 48 hours post-match, but generally in three days of the match.
Conclusion
Organizing one day, and in some cases even two days of between-match recovery, is highly unethical and not scientific-based, even in leagues that are much more professional than the Iranian volleyball leagues. The body of a young talent is very susceptible to entering phases of burnout and chronic injuries that cause instability of the sports career peak.
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