FOAM ROLLING….WHAT? WHY? & HOW?
It’s the time of year where we all try and up our fitness regime by running more or going to the gym more. For the reason that, when it comes to all the Christmas festivities we have to attend to and over indulge in copious amounts food and alcohol…we feel slightly less guilty about it!
Whilst increasing the level of activity we do is fantastic and incredibly healthy! Ensuring that you’re looking after your body during this time is also important so that you’re not laid up on the sofa over the Christmas period! As we become more active, experience injury and adopt bad posture, our soft tissues start to stick together and form adhesions between each other (in layman’s terms..knots). These knots then prevent the tissues from gliding freely past each other allowing normal function and cause us to become sore and stiff with restricted movement.
So what can we do?…
FOAM ROLL.
The use of foam rollers help to provide relief of tight, sore and stiff tissues. They break down restrictions and barriers in the soft tissues with the aim to achieve this relief (Barnes, 1991). Releasing any tension within the soft tissues will benefit us by:
• Decreasing muscle soreness
• Increasing tissue flexibility
• Maintain normal muscle length
• Decrease increased muscle tone/spasm
• Increase range of movement
• Correction of muscular imbalances
Foam rolling can be done during the warm-up, recovery period and for general maintenance at home. You may have tried the standard quick rolling back and forth on the roller meaninglessly. This may help and you may get results from it, but you may gain more if you understand more of what your doing, try these techniques
• Ironing – this is simply isolated deep rolling. So find your sore spot then take a deep breath in and on your out breath let as much weight sink onto the roller as possible. Then roll slowly, and controlled into this sore area. Rolling direction can be varied, so you can roll your body up and down, side to side, rotate your body as you roll. This is much like ironing the area out.
• Contract-relax – Again find your sore spot and place as much weight on it as you can, again taking your deep breath in and out as you do this. Then contract the muscle, in a static contraction and hold it for 5-10 secs, when you relax try to let more weight sink onto the area via the roller. Do this until you notice an improvement.
If you have any more questions, just come and ask me!!
Beth
