I absolutely love strength training and even running but I can’t understand how exercise is supposed to help inflammation when you literally are creating microtears to build muscle. In breaking down muscle wouldn’t you have more inflammation in your body? Can someone explain this to me?
In: Biology
Most studies have looked at aerobic exercise, not resistance training.
With strength training, I assume that the microtears may cause localized inflammation, whereas visceral fat due to physical inactivity causes inflammation on a systemic level.
[This study found that a single episode of resistance training increased inflammation in the short term, but in the long run inflammation decreased both at rest and during future training sessions. ](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2933442/)
Acute (temp) inflammation ≠ Chronic (perma) inflammation.
Muscle building is an adaptation that happens as a result of repeated inflammation (after every workout), so that you body is more resilient against damage the next time. This adaptation trains your body to better deal with chronic inflammation long-term.
Also, the micro-tears hypothesis has been largely debunked. Muscle building is *likely* caused by some combination of 3 hypotheses: tension, metabolites & cell swelling.
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