This week is a video blog with how to instructions for temporary relief from common running/walking pains.
For the best results with this quick do it yourself-massage therapy, spend 3-5 minutes massaging the areas described.
It is important to follow up with full body foam rolling techniques as outlined in my blog.
http://youtu.be/Kwoy1DTMM2M
This is the final installment of my series on Posture. A few weeks ago, I describedposture as the absolute need for stability.
“It is from stability that all healthy movement is derived.”
I keyed in on the feet as the foundation and the hips as the ballast of the body. Today I will discuss the body’s most mobile joint: the shoulder, and more specifically: the scapula – otherwise called the shoulder blade. The scapula is the mast and sails of the body. Where the scapula goes, the head and torso will follow.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-1dOuIUi9s&feature=player_embedded
As I said a few weeks ago, “stability is king.” When it comes to the shoulder the scapula is the King of stability. The scapula is the anchoring point for the postural muscles of the shoulder; it provides the stability necessary for a huge combination of movements. This large range of motion is something that distinguishes us from all other species on the planet. The shoulder is designed to provide for the movements of climbing, crawling, lifting, throwing, pushing, and pulling; and aids in the movements of running and jumping. None of these movements would be possible without the scapula’s amazing ability to stabilize.
At home and in the workplace we do not regularly engage our shoulders to meet their designed movement patterns, and what you don’t use, you lose. Instead we sit for 8-12 hours each day in front of a computer, TV or in our cars – and most of us sit with our head and shoulders forward. This posture pulls the scapula out of a position of leverage, where it is capable of providing the greatest amount of stabilization to the body. Over time, the postural muscles that are responsible for scapular stability are shut off (just like the postural muscles of the lower core and hips that I addressed in What is Postureand The Hips). Once the postural muscles are shut off, the body must recruit stabilityfrom mobility muscles such as the biceps, pecs, and trapezius. As these muscles take over, they lock the scapula in an upward rotation, and prevent the body from packing them down where they function most effectively. When the scapula are stuck in upward rotation, they lose their functional range of motion and true stabilization of the shoulder becomes difficult. And remember, where your scapula goes, your head will follow. Once the stability of the scapula is lost, the shoulder, neck, and lower back are put in a position of stress with a greater risk of pain and injury.
Keys to Regaining Shoulder Function
Scapular stability is vital to reducing pain, preventing injury, and improving your overall postural health. Here are the keys to regaining scapular stability and function:
The first and most important step to increasing the functional range of motion of the shoulder joint is through myofascial massage therapy. And deep tissue massage therapy(such as myofascial release and self-myofascial release), when paired with foam roller therapy, will help break down restrictions in the fascial tissue. These often overlooked steps will improve tissue health, reduce chronic pain, increase functional joint range of motion, and prevent injury.
Immediately following a series of deep tissue massage treatments with a full body flexibility or stretching program will help to permanently establish the newly regained range of motion. Yoga, Pilates, Egoscue and Active Release Technique are just a few examples of effective flexibility programs you can try. I highly recommend hiring an experienced and qualified coach or therapist to ensure proper form and the best approach to a flexibility program that will meet your individual needs.
As range of motion improves, the next step is corrective exercise. The goal of corrective exercise for the shoulder is to train the shoulder’s postural muscles to maintain proper position and stability and, as demonstrated in the video above, the ability to pack the scapula down.
Spend between 3-5 minutes on each side. It is very important that you spend an equal amount of time on both sides and that you work through each of the areas listed to gain the most out of self-myofascial release.
Lie on your side, your arm overhead and foam roller beneath your lats. Massage from the top of the arm to below the shoulder blade. Do not massage in the arm pit area.
Lie on your side, your arm overhead and foam roller beneath the chest. Do not massage in the arm pit area.
Lie on your side, your arm overhead and foam roller beneath the bicep. Do not massage in the arm pit area.
Corrective Exercises for the Shoulder
The following exercises will help regain functional range of motion of the scapula and shoulder.
Scapular Squeeze on Foam Roller
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDyWyH86h64&feature=player_embedded
Press and squeeze the scapula around the foam roller then reach and extend toward the ceiling. Repeat 20 times.
Reverse Fly on Foam Roller
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CHBOSPy98E&feature=player_embedded
Squeeze the scapula around the foam roller as you slowly drop your arms down. Continue to squeeze scapula into the foam roller as you return your arms to the starting position. Repeat 20 times.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3SQyKiXVuo&feature=player_embedded
Get in push-up or plank position (on feet or knees depending on ability level) with your hands directly beneath your chest. Make sure your body is in alignment with your hips level to your shoulders. Without bending your elbows and maintaining plank position, squeeze your shoulder blades together and press back out. Focus on squeezing together at the base of your scapula and not shrugging at your ears.
As a deep tissue massage therapist, fitness coach, and barefoot running coach, I have treated a number of very common running injuries, such asplantar fasciitis, shin splints, and IT band pain. Over the years, I have noticed that the majority of clients suffering from these injuries were not runners. They were walkers.
This brought up a question: if the combination of running in shoes with a heel strike leads to dysfunctional gait patterns — and ultimately chronic pain and injury— what does it do when walking, such as speed walking or walking with a purpose?
During this time, I began exploring barefoot/minimalist running. As an experienced fitness coach, I knew that if I wanted to transition to minimalist running, I should not attempt to do so overnight. If I attempted to do too much too fast, before my body was conditioned for the task, I would be setting myself up for injury. Seems like a simple concept to grasp, but I, like so many other people, had a tendency to learn the hard way — but that is a topic for another blog.
The combination of my personal experimentation in running and what I was feeling during my deep tissue massage sessions brought about a realization: The musculature of the arches and calves has been weakened from years of wearing shoes. For just about anybody, the idea of running on weak unstable feet would spell disaster. In order to build up strength in the arches and calves, you literally have to relearn to walk before you can relearn to run. This changed my focus from being primarily on running gait mechanics to both running and walking gait mechanics and brought me to develop a theory.
I believe that our bodies are designed to have nearly identical walking and running gait patterns. If you were to engineer a mechanical structure to move at varying speeds, would you design it to perform two completely different movement patterns? Wouldn’t it be simpler and more beneficial to design the structure to perform a single movement pattern that can be maintained through variations in speed? Transitioning from running with a forefoot strike to walking with a heel strike is a major shift in movement patterns, balance and stabilization, and impact loads through the skeletal system.
My theory is that the proper form for both walking and running indicates four things: a forward lean of the body, a forefoot or mid-foot strike which lands directly beneath the body’s center of gravity, short stride length, and fast cadence. There are areas of obvious difference between the two activities, such as length of stride, the actual speed of cadence (number of foot strikes per minute — around 180 steps per minute for running), and how intense the impact forces are at footfall and lift off.
This is a theory that goes against much of today’s popular wisdom. Most of the articles on barefoot or minimalist running suggest that our natural barefoot running gait should be a forefoot or mid-foot strike, but that our walking gait should be a heel strike. This does not make much sense to me. Current research is showing the positive benefits of barefoot running with forefoot or mid-foot strike. It seems to me that walking with a forefoot or mid-foot strike would result in the same benefits since it is utilizing the exact same architecture.
When I perform deep tissue massageon both runners and walkers with painful injuries, I can feel how impact forces move throughout the fascial tissue of their body causing dysfunction. I feel adhesions and a buildup of tissue from repetitive trauma around the heel, achilles tendon, and calf; around the inside and outside of the knee from excessive inward and outward rotation of the knee; at the head of the femur (thigh bone)and the front and back of the pelvis; and around the shoulders, neck and head. This tissue tends to be intensely painful to the touch and has a direct relationship to the pain or injury for which the client sought treatment — and to their walking and/or running mechanics.
Walking and running with heel strike has an impact force that is greater than body weight and creates the same rotational forces at the foot, knee, and hip, all of which I discussed in last week’s blog.
If both walkers and runners are suffering from the same injuries, then wouldn’t the same remedy for one work for the other?
The arches of the foot are designed to absorb impact. They do this equally well for walking as they do for running — when they are fully engaged. The heel of the foot does not absorb impact any better for walking than it does for running. Over miles of repetition, the heel strike of a walker will develop the same fascial tissue dysfunctions as that of a runner. This is why so many of the “running injuries” I treat are with non-runners.
