Self Myofascial Release

Instantly improve your overall function in 5 minutes or less! 
By simply performing a few techniques on a foam roll, you can instantly help correct muscle imbalances, ↑ joint ranges of motion, ↓ muscle soreness, ↓ joint stress, reduce overuse injuries, and improve flexibility, function, and performance.  Doesn't that sound too good to be true?  The great thing is....it's not!  All of those things can be improved! 

Through exercise (or prolonged sedentary behavior) our muscles can develop knots or lesions which create tension and physically shorten our muscle tissue. This would be like taking a rubber band and tying a knot in it, shortening the overall length which prevents it to work 100% efficiently. Self-myofascial release is the process of turning off our nervous system to 'release' the tensed muscle and accompanying connective tissue.  It is really the same concept as a deep-tissue massage, only it's performed using your own body-weight. 

Many times we don't even know these knots are there because they are hard to detect unless physically massaging the muscle, in which case the muscle might feel bumpy like a 'washboard'.  These knots can lead to muscle tissue overload, early fatigue, dysfunctional movement patterns, and  injuries. If we can reduce this muscle tension and help restore our muscles to their normal muscle length, we will immediately improve our function. 

Roll away your pain!
By using your own body weight on a foam roll, you can release these knots.

• Roll on each muscle until pain is reported, then STOP rolling and REST on the painful area for 30-60 sec. (holding longer on more painful areas)
• Continued rolling when pain is present can actually increase tightness and pain
• After 30-60 sec., move on to another spot or another muscle.
• The intensity of painful knots, and the number of them in the muscle will tell you about the quality of that tissue….the more you have, and the more painful it is, the less efficient your body is currently operating.
• If pain is too intolerable, don’t give up…consistent use over time with the foam roll will decrease the tenderness and slowly restore normal muscle length.

***For those of you who do not have access to a foam roller, check out my 'Functional Equipment' link on the bottom of my blog where you can buy a 3' x 6" high-density foam roller under $20!

The Perfect Squat!

 Ahh yes the mobility of a child! How many adults do we know who can still suck on their toes?!?!?! As I have watched my girls grow throughout their first year of life, I have truly appreciated their ability to use proper form. Think about it, if all adults had the greatest % of body weight located above our shoulders, we would all squat with perfect form too. Babies don't have a choice to squat with bad form. If they bent over at the waist to pick something up, like many adults do, they would land right on top of that big noggin! Squatting is something we all do, everyday of our lives. Getting in and out of a car, sitting down to eat....and that's right...going to the bathroom. Let's see how we can improve our squats in order to improve our function throughout the day.


Real Squats vs. the Leg Press      An article in the Canadian Journal of Applied Physiology compared muscular EMG activity between squats in a Smith Machine vs. regular squats on the ground vs. squats on balance discs. As the Squat became more unstable, the activity of the trunk stabilizers and postural muscles increased dramatically! (Anderson & Behm, 2005).  In a time when our posture as a society has never been worse (due to the number of hours per day in seated positions) it is extremely important to choose exercises that help our posture…not hinder it. The only reason leg press machines were created was to make squatting easier!

To perform a squat correctly, we must keep our head and chest up, feet flat on the ground with our weight back on the heels, and lower our hips below the knees. That is a full range of motion, and that is a Real Squat! The reason healthy people don’t go down all the way is because they either cannot control it, suggesting lack of core stability, or they lack the range of motion, suggesting lack of normal flexibility, or likely because they cannot do as much weight when forced to go down all the way, at which point it becomes an ego thing. Most people would agree that in order to get better at golf, we must practice the entire swing. If we just practiced half of the swing, what kind of improvements could we really expect to see? So why then do we only train up to 90˚ of hip & knee flexion when performing squats? Most healthy people have around 125˚ of hip flexion available to them. Whatever range of motion you have available, try to use it, and choose a weight you can safely control getting in and out of that deep-squat position with.

Some individuals might have to go back to bodyweight squats, and work on earning that full range of motion. This is why squatting correctly is hard, and this is why many people take the easy way out and use leg machines. Next time you find yourself walking towards the leg press ask yourself “When in my life will I ever have to lie on my back, and push several hundred pounds off of me?” Also remember that when we sit down on a machine to do an exercise…we are telling our postural-stabilizers to go for a lunch break. It doesn’t work that way in real life. We rely on stabilizers to maintain postural control all the time throughout our day.

Will the leg press machine help grow muscle? Sure it will…in the prime movers (larger muscles)…but it does nothing to strengthen the muscles responsible for stabilizing our joints in all 3 Planes of Motion. So next time you want to do squats, don’t take gravity out of the equation, work on your mobility if you need it, or work on your core stability if you cannot control a full range of motion, and finally add in some instability at your level to challenge your stabilizers.

*** I am a huge fan of "Goblet Squats" (pictured below) because when we load up with a weight in front of us, we immediately activate our posterior postural muscles and shift our weight back on our heels, which instantly corrects form. It is also a self-limiting exercise in which you will not be able to overload your spine with a weight that you cannot control, because if you cannot hold it, you won't be able to do the exercise, so risk of injury is very low!!! Let us know how you do!

 

http://fitfinity.net/2011/09/27/the-wash-progression-for-learning-the-squat/

References: Anderson, K.; and Behm, D.G. (2005). Trunk muscle activity increases with unstable squat
movements. Can. J. Appl. Physiol. 30(1): 33-45. © 2005 Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology.

Rationale for Functional Training

Drawing a line in the sand-------------------------
   After reading this I hope you ask yourself “What am I expecting to get out of my training?”  When the topic of Functional vs. Traditional training comes up, opinions galore come out of the woodwork.  Here’s the scoop: Functional training involves using the knowledge of functional anatomy to select exercises that improve strength in muscles prone to weakness in attempt to reduce injury and improve performance. Functional exercises would include multi-joint movements, in fact the more joints the better, and might incorporate devices like Stability balls or BOSU trainers.
    Traditional training however is what sells on magazine covers, it’s all about training the large muscle groups… what bodybuilders are extremely good at…choosing exercises to isolate muscles in attempt to improve appearance while standing still.  Traditional exercises include single-joint exercises, machine exercises, etc.  So we must ask ourselves….”Am I training for function, or am I training to look good standing still?”  There is no right or wrong answer, but we must make sure our workouts match our intentions.
    I am among the group of people who wish to improve function and reduce injuries.  As renowned physical therapist and strength coach Gray Cook has said: "We cannot expect to train every muscle individually, and go to sleep at night expecting our body to mold it all together and wake up with coordinated movements.  If we tossed a bunch of letters on the wall, would we expect a sentence to appear?"  Our muscles do not work in isolation in everyday life, rather they synergistically work to create, stabilize, and control movement patterns ingrained in us from the time we first learned to walk, and our training should support this kind of function. 
   Check out the video above to learn more about functional training and share your thoughts about the 'functional training continuum'
   

Basic Concepts of Functional Training

Stand Up to Train!

     In a 2009 article published in Medicine & Science in Sport and Exercise, an interesting finding was discovered in regards to the amount of time spent sitting.  By now most of us realize the more sedentary (inactive) a person is, statistically the shorter the lifespan they have.  In this particular article, they found that “high amounts of sitting cannot be compensated for with occasional leisure time physical-activity…. even if the amount exceeds the current minimum physical activity recommendations.”  (Katzmarzyk, Church, & Craig, 2009).  This might sound shocking to some, but what this is telling us is even if we get our 1 hour/day of exercise in, we will still die sooner if we then sit all day long.  We were made to move.  Since many jobs require 8 or more hours of sitting at a computer, it is paramount that we are as active as possible the rest of the day.  This includes our workouts!  We spend enough time sitting at work, in our car, eating meals, etc….we do not need to be sitting while exercising…. and that includes senior citizens!  Unless someone has an injury, or is physically unable to stand, we need to take full advantage of our training time and use each minute to the max.  Standing not only burns more calories, but forces our bodies to use all of our postural and stabilizing muscles.

Choose Multi-Joint Exercises
Multi-joint exercises enhance our nervous system’s ability to coordinate movement at higher levels and builds stronger motor patterns, versus isolated exercises that target individual muscle groups.  Isolated exercises contradict the pure nature of how our body was designed to move.  This is great for strengthening one muscle at a time, but when in real life do we only use one muscle at a time?  Choosing exercises that target as many joints and muscles as possible also helps to proportionally increase muscle mass and prevent muscle imbalances, reducing the risk of injuries and improving overall performance.

Train in 3D                       
   Life and sports demand much more out of our body than standing still  flexing on a pedestal.  Life demands us to move freely through space, not within the confines dictated by a machine.  Therefore it is paramount to choose exercises that occur in all 3 Planes of Motion (sagittal, frontal, & transverse).  The next time you are in the gym, take a look at the  the variety of machines available, probably 90% of them are Sagittal Plane exercises…meaning they occur in a forward or backward manner.  Most injures occur however in the Transverse Plane…or any movement that incorporates rotation.  This is why isolated training fails at decreasing musculoskeletal injuries, and this is why physical therapists consistently see similar injuries to the same muscles.  What are some of your favorite exercises?  Let's talk about how to turn them into 3D exercies!

http://mmatrainingworkoutsonline.com/mma-training-programs/mma-workout-program-basics/

Reference:    Katzmarzyk, P. T., Church, T. S., , & Craig, C. L. (2009). Sitting Time and Mortality from All Causes, Cardiovascular Disease, and Cancer. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 41(5), 998-1005.