"Effects of Multiple Muscle Recovery Techniques on Pain, Force, Temperature, and Muscle Oxygenation in Professional Athletes: A Randomized Crossover Trial"

The goal of this clinical trial is to evaluate the impact of various passive post-exercise recovery techniques on professional athletes. The main questions it aims to answer are:

Do passive recovery modalities significantly improve muscle oxygenation and tissue temperature immediately following high-intensity effort?

Which specific technique is most effective in reducing perceived pain, measured by the pressure pain threshold, and restoring muscle strength?

Researchers will compare six different therapeutic interventions-Transfer of Energy Capacitive and Resistive therapy, manual massage, intermittent negative pressure therapy, extracorporeal shockwave therapy, percussion therapy, and pneumatic pressotherapy-to determine which provides a superior immediate physiological and functional recovery effect.

Participants will:

Perform a high-intensity physical effort designed to induce peripheral fatigue.

Be randomly assigned to receive one of the six recovery protocols.

Undergo objective measurements immediately after the intervention, including near-infrared spectroscopy to assess muscle oxygen saturation, tissue thermography, algometry, and dynamometry.

Due to the nature of the physical interventions-such as manual massage, extracorporeal shockwave therapy, and intermittent negative pressure-participants and therapists cannot be blinded to the treatment assignment. To mitigate potential bias, a double-blind approach will be implemented for data collection and statistical analysis.

The Outcome Assessor, responsible for recording measurements from near-infrared spectroscopy, algometry, and dynamometry, will remain blinded to the specific recovery modality administered to the athlete during each period. To maintain this blinding, the assessment will take place in a separate area from the intervention site. Furthermore, the statistical analysis will be conducted by an independent investigator using a coded dataset, ensuring that group allocation remains concealed until the final results are processed.