Have you ever had a coach tell you “No pain, no gain!” in response to your moaning after the latest fitness routine? Ever wondered what the evidence base is? Do you have to have pain in order to improve? Read on as 2024 Football on the Brain Sports Engagement Ambassador, RuoHan Liu, introduces her research into pain and performance in sport.
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Pain in our daily life often has a very negative connotation. Natural evolution has granted us sophisticated pain receptors, ways of processing pain, and behaviours that help us avoid hazardous endeavours and protect us from danger. However, pain can also bring a sense of satisfaction and be associated with reward. For instance, how many of you have acted on the ‘No pain, no gain’ dilemma? People could be swayed to believe that progress in sports must involve pain, therefore we naturally develop this slight sense of satisfaction when we undergo a tough training session or when feeling soreness and pain in our muscles in the days after.
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Is there an optimal training intensity that leads to progress without having to feel pain?
If there is, how would it be calculated for each individual?
People voluntarily get involved in challenging and agonizing tasks, often enduring extreme discomfort and pain in the process. This is seen in most endurance sports, such as ultramarathons, triathlon and long-distance hiking, etc. This seems to be contradictory to the energy conserving nature that has evolved in humans. Whilst monetary reward and praise received for completing these tasks are often minimal (for non-professionals), the immense satisfaction of completing the task can become addictive and encourage people back.
Previous studies have examined pain tolerance using heat and cold stimuli, which differ from the types of pain experienced during exercise. In our experiment, we aim to induce Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS) and aerobic shortage as alternative pain paradigms. Our goal is to investigate the relationship between pain, effort, and reward. Specifically, we seek to determine whether individuals derive a greater sense of satisfaction from enduring more intense tasks, whether some people are more susceptible to this type of reward, and whether this is linked to their history of injuries.
References:
Pettersen SD, Aslaksen PM, Pettersen SA. Pain Processing in Elite and High-Level Athletes Compared to Non-athletes. Front Psychol. 2020 Jul 28;11:1908. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01908. PMID: 32849117; PMCID: PMC7399202.