The difference may be small but it sure is mighty...The application of compression to sports has two essential aspects; performance and recovery. Performance happens in competition or training, and recovery happens before and after performance. You can't have one without the other. Working muscles gain mass from blood, and if you apply too much pressure or in the wrong place, you can impede performance. Due to this, the graduated compression levels applied to the working muscles in our performance garments are different from our recovery lines.