Category: training (Page 2 of 2)

Hip Pain, Knee Pain Or Ankle Pain?

2nd July 2017 / Robert Manning

legs

If you have any of the above it could be a muscle called Glute Medius and it’s weakness that is causing the problem.

In a nutshell a weak glute medius can reduce your athletic performance and it can also predispose you to injuries at your hip, knee and ankle.

Before I get into how you go about strengthening I’ll give you a bit of back ground about the Glute Meidus…

The glute medius is in charge of abducting, internally rotating and extending the hip.

For everyday movements it keeps the pelvis from dropping during walking and running.

Without this we’d look like we would be walking with a limp. This means the glute medius plays a massive role in our everyday life.

But how does my glute medius get weak in the first place?

The muscle can get weak from somethings so simple as when standing having more weight on one leg than the other and also sleeping on your side with your top leg bent (a bit like the foetal position) both these positions start causing weakness as they elongate the muscle causing stretch weakness.

This weakness can lead to ‘Trendelenberg gait’, lower back pain, Iliotibial band syndrome and lateral ankle injuries
So now you know what a weak glute medius can do, how do you strengthen it!?

My go to exercise to begin with the ‘clam’

Side lying with both knees bent up. Line up heels with hips and pelvis. Keep pelvis neutral or slightly buttock region of the top leg, sometimes in the bottom buttock as well. Aimfor 2-¬‐3 sets of 10-¬‐20 forward (don’t let it roll backwards or open up).

•Breathe out, engage core and lift top knee up towards the ceiling slightly.

•Breathe in and lower slightly.

•Repeat to fatigue. Aim to feel it in the lat reps

The easy way to progress this to tie a theraband round so it is just above your knees and repeat the above. You’ll notice a complete change in difficulty

As always if you would like more advice or you would like to book a session, give me a call on 07759689612.

Remember to Subscribe below and get £5 off your next session!

The most common reason for shoulder pain..

14th June 2017 / Robert Manning

shoulder

Due to the shoulder being so mobile the most common issue that causes shoulder pain is the shoulder being instable in different movements.

This instability is usually caused from weak scapular (Shoulder blade) stabilising muscles-

When these muscles are weak this leads to a change in efficiency in how the shoulder moves, causing the pain you are most likely getting.

A quick test for this weakness is to have your top off and get someone to stand behind you. You then lift a light dumb bell (around 4kg) from your side out in front of you to your shoulder height. The person standing behind you then watches your shoulder blade to see if it sticks out as you lower your shoulder down.

If the inside border of your shoulder blade does stick out (called winging) then that is a sign you have weak scapular stabilising muscles.

Below is a list of exercises to strengthen your stabilising muscles, helping you feel much stronger and a lot more stable.

1. Scapular pinches

2. Low row with theraband

3. Cheer leader theraband exercises

4. Bhouler exercises

If you would like any advice on the above or would like to book in for a session to go over this give me a call on 07759689612. Remember if you sign up below you get five pounds off your next treatment!

for any further reading see below:

Paine R, Voight ML. INVITED CLINICAL COMMENTARY. THE ROLE OF THE SCAPULA. International journal of sports physical therapy. 2013 Oct 1;8(5).

Brumitt J. Scapular-stabilization exercises: early-intervention prescription. Athletic Therapy Today. 2006;11(5):15–8.

Why Fitbits could be bad for you!

21st May 2017 / Robert Manning

steps

1001 steps, 1002 steps, 1003 steps…. Does this sound like you and your fitness tracker?

Counting up your steps till you reach your magic number of 5k, 10k or more steps in a day

Well studies have found over the past few years it makes us feel unhappier as our fitness trackers turn going for a walk, run or a bike ride etc into a chore.

Don’t get me wrong people who use fitness trackers have been found to walk and run further however they were also found to hate it much more than people who were measured who didn’t use trackers.

At the end of the day, fitness and sport should be fun so get out there and enjoy it!

Below is one of the studies from Duke university business school in America relating to Fitbits and chores

http://www.fuqua.duke.edu/news_events/news-releases/jordan-etkin-tracking/#.WSGERsYjXIV

Remember to sign up for email updates for £5 off and free tips on keeping fully fit!

Your Biggest Issue Stopping Your Body From Healing!

31st March 2017 / Robert Manning

Our busy and hectic lives

Stress!!

As we all know, stress isn’t great and everyone in the world goes through it at varying points throughout their lives.

Stress can be anything from a GCSE exam through to trying to find a job or just trying to work out where you are going with your life.

Stress can have varying impacts on your body and not least when you are trying to recover from an injury.

Multiple studies have been conducted over the years and have found that stress from various elements can dramatically slow the healing process.

For example carers who were stressed caring for dementia patients were found to take 24% longer (9days!) to heal from a biopsy.

Moving onto exams, dental students also had a biopsy taken, the students who had the biopsy taken during exams took 40% longer to heal than the students who had the same biopsy taken during holiday time.

Lastly in older men and women, when they were stressed, anxious or depressed this caused a longer healing time than the ones who weren’t the above healed at a much quick rate.

Tips to help stress – taken from the NHS website on stress- Link below

1. Look for the positives in life- be grateful for what you have and not you don’t (glass half full)

2. Accept you’ll always have jobs to do, prioritise your work load from most important to least.

3. Have a bit of me time, this is where you take time out just to do something for you, be that a hobby of yours through to a relaxing massage.

These are just a few examples to help reduce stress!

http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/stress-anxiety-depression/Pages/reduce-stress.aspx

Christian, L. M., Graham, J. E., Padgett, D. A., Glaser, R., & Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K. (2007). Stress and wound healing. Neuroimmunomodulation, 13(5-6), 337-346.

Shoulder Surgery

5th March 2017 / Robert Manning

Before going under the knife for shoulder issues have a look below and see the affect exercise can have on an array of injuries.

50% off initial assessment for March- Massage and Injury

28th February 2017 / Robert Manning

Grab yourself a bargain this month, as for the whole of March I am halving my initial assessment price from £45 for an hour and a half to just £22.50.

You might just want a relaxing massage, or you may need help with an injury. Whatever your needs I can tailor the session around you!

Sport Massage Sport Therapy

Misleading MRI’s!

9th February 2017 / Robert Manning

Training Loads and Injury

11th February 2016 / Robert Manning

Training load related injuries are seen as ‘preventable’ injuries in the health care world.

High intensity training intensity + High volume = increased performance

This is excellent right? Well……

There is a need to balance the two. This because training at too high an intensity and or higher volume can lead to injury.

*Added to this it has also been found that too little training can also increase injury rate.

A 10% or more increase in training load can increase the injury risk from between 21% and 40% if however you increase a training load between 5 and 10% the injury rick lessens to 10% or less. This means there is a real need for coaches to monitor athletes loads

High chronic work loads have been found to decrease the injury risk.

The double edged sword of all this is that across a wide range of sports, well-developed physical qualities are associated with a reduced risk of injury.

For athletes to develop these physical capacities that provide a protective defence against injury, they must be prepared to train hard. Thus the importance of balancing training intensity!

Gabbett, T. J. (2016). The training-injury prevention paradox: should athletes be training smarter and harder?. British journal of sports medicine, bjsports-2015.

British Journal of Sports Medicine

A thanks goes to YLM sports science for the conclusion diagram

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