In sport, recovery is part of the plan. It’s structured, scheduled, and considered essential in order to maximise your performance and keep yourself sharp. In business, it’s often seen as weakness – something you only do when you become sick or reach breaking point.

Before I studied business and became a founder, I was a professional tennis player, training to compete from the age of four. Elite sport taught me discipline, how to handle pressure, how to push myself to the limit – but it also taught me that there’s no progress without rest.

In business, that mindset is rare. Recovery is treated as something you do after burnout, not part of how you work. You push through until you’re exhausted, spiralling, and completely drained. Then you try to patch yourself back together, with your tail between your legs and try to regain the respect you think you’ve lost by stopping. That’s not recovery. That’s damage control.

I didn’t hit burnout overnight. It crept in over years of high-performance environments – first in professional sport, academia and art curation before launching my fashion business back in the UK. On paper, I looked high-functioning –collecting degrees, and trying to find my place in the world, but in reality, I was running on fumes. I was away from home, raising two kids, working constantly, and pushing through each day on autopilot. There was no off switch, because I’d forgotten how to build one in. I didn’t know how to stop. Didn’t know how to rest. Didn’t even realise I needed to.

Elite sport had taught me better than this. Recovery was never optional – it was a performance strategy that should be scheduled, protected and taken seriously; not seen as weakness. I lost sight of that for a while, but it is something that is helping me to take 11:11 LUCK to the next level.

Here’s what other founders can learn from athletic recovery – and how to put it into practice before burnout hits.

1. Build rest into your workflow, not around it
   Recovery isn’t just about sleep or time off work. It’s about giving your brain space to reset. When you plan your week, schedule that space in – meeting-free afternoons, walks between calls, protected lunch breaks where you’re not processing problems. It’s easy to eat at your desk, but these breaks have a purpose.

Research from the University of York and the University of Edinburgh showed that the brain uses idle time to consolidate memory, make sense of information, and spark creative thinking. It’s not wasted time – it’s when new ideas often surface. Steve Jobs was famously known for his long walks for this reason.

Founders need to stop seeing recovery as the absence of work. If you want to make better decisions, generate better ideas, and avoid mental fatigue, schedule rest like you would any critical task. It’s not the reward – it’s actually part of the process.

2. Fatigue isn’t just physical
   You can sleep eight hours a night and still wake up feeling exhausted. That’s because mental and emotional fatigue hits differently. Cognitive overload, emotional labour, and constant high-stakes decision-making wear you down in ways that are harder to acknowledge – because it’s just part of the job, right?

In reality, your brain doesn’t have an endless supply of decision-making energy. The prefrontal cortex – responsible for focus, planning and emotional control – gets depleted under sustained pressure. Without proper rest, that depletion becomes chronic. It leads to slower thinking, poor judgement, a short fuse, and mistakes you wouldn’t normally make.

Founders are especially at risk. You’re not just driving growth – you’re responsible for your team’s livelihood, your investors’ expectations, and the long-term vision of your business. That’s already a heavy load. Add parenting, caregiving, underrepresentation, or building something deeply personal, and the weight multiplies. Purpose-driven work is powerful – but it’s emotionally expensive.

You need to factor in the full cost of the load you’re carrying – not just the visible work, but the invisible weight too. Alongside rest, audit your energy as often as you audit your cash flow. Cut what drains you. Protect what sustains you.

Recovery isn’t just rest. It’s load management.

3. Use idle time to keep your brain sharp
   Productivity isn’t linear. The brain naturally works in 90-minute cycles of focus followed by a dip, known as ultradian rhythms. Push through those dips, and your attention, memory and judgement all start to decline. Most people try to power through – but that’s where silly mistakes creep in.

Taking short, regular breaks throughout the day helps your brain recover in real time. Try working in 90-minute blocks followed by a 10–15 minute reset – stand up, go outside, move your body, or let your mind drift. It’s not time off – it’s maintenance. If you have ADHD or work in bursts of hyperfocus, this rhythm can help you sustain performance without burning out.

Start paying attention to the type of break your body actually needs. If your brain’s overstimulated, scrolling your phone won’t help. If you’re emotionally flat, a quick walk might not cut it. The closer your recovery matches the strain, the more effective it is.

If you’re mentally overloaded, log off early. If you’re emotionally drained, talk to someone you trust and unload. If you’re creatively blocked, expose yourself to something new – art, music or movement.

Downtime isn’t a pause. It’s a reset – and it’s what keeps your thinking sharp.

4. Use recovery to regulate stress systems – not just pause work
   Chronic stress doesn’t just wear you down – it changes how your body and brain function. It strengthens your threat response while weakening the areas responsible for memory, focus and emotional control. Over time, it becomes harder to think clearly, manage your reactions, or make good decisions. It also takes a toll on your physical health, affecting blood pressure, hormones, and immunity.

There’s a saying: If you don’t make time for your wellness, you’ll be forced to make time for your illness. That applies here.

Taking a break isn’t the same as switching off. If you’re still in work-mode, just from the sofa instead of your desk, your system stays in overdrive. Recovery needs to actively calm your nervous system. Slow breathing, time with family, new experiences, or movement in nature can help reset your body and return to clear thinking

5. Your recovery habits shape your team’s performance
   Most recovery advice focuses on individual energy, but founders don’t operate in a vacuum. If you’re constantly wired, anxious, burnt out, or running on a short fuse, that stress trickles down; people mirror your state, whether you intend them to or not.

The result? Lower team morale, poorer decision-making, and a culture where people are always on edge. Productivity drops. Retention suffers, and the business feels it.

If you build recovery into your own working style – and make that visible – you give your team permission to do the same. Meeting-free time, clear start and stop hours, protected focus blocks. This shows that thinking well is valued just as much as doing more.

Final word

I didn’t reset my recovery strategy when things were going well. I was forced to when I was running on empty, and that’s the reality for most founders – recovery only becomes a priority when you’ve already hit the wall.

It shouldn’t take a crisis to make a change. Recovery isn’t a reward or a weakness. It’s how you stay focused and sharp.

High performance without recovery isn’t sustainable. It’s just a countdown. Something always gives, so don’t let it be you.