The math of drawdown recovery

Risk & Position Sizing

Losses and recoveries aren't symmetric

Losses and the gains needed to recover from them aren't symmetric. A 10% drawdown needs about an 11% gain to recover. A 50% drawdown needs a full 100% gain just to get back to even.

The hole gets disproportionately steeper

The deeper the hole, the more disproportionate the climb back out becomes. That's exactly why the 1-2% rule exists, to keep any single trade or streak from digging a hole this steep in the first place.

Preservation is the real priority

A trader who understands this math treats capital preservation as the actual top priority, not an afterthought, since digging out of a deep hole is mathematically much harder than avoiding it.