Know what healthy feels like!®
Post by Michael Leger
I’ve been an athlete for most of my adult life. I’ve been a martial artist – judo, karate, kung fu, taekwondo – and soft forms – tai chi and qigong. I’ve been a cyclist for more than 50 years, including quite a few years of riding through Northern winters. I love hiking and walking in natural settings. I enjoy being in my body.
It hasn’t always been that way. For my first 15 years of life, I was frequently sick, physically weak, one of the ones who was picked last for any team sport. I didn’t find my place physically until I began studying martial arts when I was 16. After that, physically, things started to click.
Over the years I’ve tried a wide variety of strength and mobility methods. I will share what I’ve learned, successes and mistakes, that I hope you might find helpful. I present the information in a way that beginners as well as experienced athletes might find useful.
I’ve posted several articles on movement and bodywork over the years, a couple of relevant articles are:
My biggest takeaway?
Train only as hard as you can recover from.
If you’ve got great recovery abilities – when you get sick, you bounce right back; when you do a really hard workout, you feel great in a short period of time; after working out for several days, you only need a day or two to recover – then worrying about how hard to go is not going to be your top issue. For many people it is; probably more than realize it.
People who fit this category used to be called mesomorphs in the old somatotype body classification system. Mesomorphs are naturally muscular and can put on muscle easily. They are like diesel locomotives: They take awhile to get going, once going, they are able to sustain physical activity for long periods of time. Arnold Schwarzenegger would be a great example.
The polar opposite of the mesomorphic type was called ectomorphic. This body type tends to be thin and wiry. If athletically inclined, they tend towards endurance sports. They are more like race horses; somewhat high strung and needing more care. Marathon runners and triathletes are good examples.
I fit into this category. Unfortunately, I trained as if I was a mesomorph. Bad combination. When I didn’t achieve the overly-optimistic training goals I set for myself, I thought I was not training hard enough or often enough or both. So I did more and more and more. Digging myself into a ever-deepening hole.
After 40 years of overdoing it, my body started to revolt. What really got my attention was developing heart arrhythmias after exerting myself. I looked up exercise-induced arrhythmias and knew I had a problem. For quite awhile after that initial shock, the only exercise I could do without triggering heart issues was very easy walking. Years of this. Not an easy thing for an over-achiever.
However, after several years, I was able to add back strength training and then cycling and hiking. What follows here is based on lessons learned.
No matter which physical activity you choose, establishing a strong foundation is essential, even if your activity levels are limited or minimal.
There are two poles that need attending to – Mobility and Strength. I cover Strength in the articles above, mobility will be covered here.
Lifetime mobility
We’ll be covering a fairly wide variety of modalities in this post. First up, our free 20 minute Lifetime Mobility video. The video is a distillation of what I’ve learned to improve mobility, sometimes referred to as stretching. It is presented in modular format – hips/legs, shoulders/arms, neck and eyes (yes, given how we overuse our eyes, building mobility for them is critical for their health.)
Lacrosse ball massage
I had heard about using lacrosse ball(s) for a form of self-massage/bodywork, but hadn’t investigated very closely. I had been loosely following Dr. Kelly Starrett of ‘The Ready State’. I started looking more seriously when I read the book he and his wife Juliet wrote called Built to Move. Kelly and Juliet are athlete’s athletes. Kelly has a PhD in Physical Therapy and really knows his stuff when it comes to strength and mobility training. Here’s a good example:
You can find a lacrosse ball at any athletic store or online. They go for $3. Bang for the buck, it doesn’t get any better than this. These balls are extremely useful for breaking up muscle/tendon/fascia blocks. Plantar fasciitis? Check. Trigger points? Check. Gentle or deep massage? Check. As Kelly notes in the above video, lacrosse balls are extremely useful.
Foam rollers
After lacrosse balls, foam rollers are the next most useful, inexpensive tool for working larger muscle/tendon masses. Lacrosse balls are very focused. Foam rollers spread the force out over a larger surface area. Here are a couple of good videos demonstrating usage of a roller for knee issues and ileotibial (IT) band tightness.
Postural strength
Esther Gokhale who founded a movement called Primal Posture. I ran into her teachings looking for solutions to nagging lower back pain I was experiencing. I purchased her book 8 Steps to a Pain-Free back and diligently applied the movement practices described in the book. It took 3 months or so to achieve a pain-free back, but I noticed improving results fairly early on.
Her method is a reset of a wide variety of postural habits that have become the norm in Western societies. Relearning how to sit, stand, walk, bend, lie down and more are what’s involved in Primal Posture modules. Esther carefully covers the changes from the primal to the contemporary postures we have adopted. One of the remarkable differences is the change in the shape of the spine from what she describes as J-shaped to an S-shaped curve.
The pictures on right and left demonstrate J-shaped spines. The center picture shows an S-shaped spine on the left and a J-shaped spine on the right. Since Western peoples have become primarily sedentary, our spines have adjusted to the new habits.
Learning new ways to sit, stand, walk, even lay down have delivered and continue to deliver great results for my structural integrity. I have recommended primal posture for many people, included people with severe back problems. Anyone who diligently applied the techniques achieved significant results. Some achieved exceptional results, including elimination of very problematic pain medications.
Here’s a free introduction to primal posture. I can’t recommend this process highly enough.
